Hercule Poirot
From Freepedia
Hercule Poirot (pronounced [ɛʀkyl pwaʀo]) is a fictional character, the primary detective of Agatha Christie's novels. He appears in over 30 books.
The character was born in Belgium, and has worked as a Belgian police officer, but moved to England after World War I and started a second career as a private detective. Poirot is remarkable for his small stature and egg-shaped head, his meticulous moustache, his dandified dressing habits, his absolute obsession with order and neatness, and his disdain for detective methods that include crawling on hands and knees and looking for clues. He prefers to examine the psychology of a crime, once even betting his best friend and sometime partner, Arthur Hastings, that he could solve a case simply by sitting in an easy chair and using his "little grey cells."
Like a large number of detectives of the early days of mystery fiction (including Miss Marple, Sherlock Holmes, and Father Brown), Poirot is unmarried.
His fictional address (from his business card) is 56B Whitehaven Mansions, Sandhurst Square, London W1.
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Major novels
The Poirot books take readers through the whole of his life in England, from the first book (The Mysterious Affair at Styles), where he is a refugee staying at Styles, to the last Poirot book (Curtain), where he visits Styles once again. In between, Poirot solves cases outside of England as well, including his most famous case, Murder on the Orient Express (1934).
Hercule Poirot became famous with the publication, in 1926, of The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, whose surprising solution proved controversial. The novel is still among the most famous of all detective novels: Edmund Wilson alludes to it in the title of his well-known attack on detective fiction, "Who Cares Who Killed Roger Ackroyd?" Aside from Roger Ackroyd, the most critically-acclaimed Poirot novels appeared from 1932 to 1942, including such acknowledged classics as Murder on the Orient Express, The ABC Murders (1935), Cards on the Table (1936), and Death on the Nile (1937). The last of these, a tale of multiple homicide upon a Nile steamer, was judged by the celebrated detective novelist John Dickson Carr to be among the ten greatest mystery novels of all time.
The 1942 novel Five Little Pigs (aka Murder in Retrospect), in which Poirot investigates a murder committed sixteen years before by analyzing various accounts of the tragedy, is a Rashomon-like performance that critic and mystery novelist Robert Barnard called the best of the Christie novels.
Recurring characters
While the majority of the supporting cast in the Poirot stories is always different, some characters do show up more often. Arthur Hastings, whom Poirot met almost immediately after arriving in England, becomes his life-long partner and appears in many of the novels and stories. Other frequently recurring characters include the detective novelist Ariadne Oliver, Agatha Christie's humorous self-caricature, and Poirot's secretary, Miss Lemon. Chief Inspector Japp of Scotland Yard appears in many of the stories, as well.
Books featuring Hercule Poirot
Short story collections listed as ss
- The Mysterious Affair at Styles (1920)
- Murder on the Links (1923)
- Poirot Investigates (1924, ss)
- The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (1926)
- The Big Four (1927)
- The Mystery of the Blue Train (1928)
- Peril at End House (1932)
- Lord Edgware Dies (1933)
- Murder on the Orient Express (1934)
- Three Act Tragedy (1935)
- Death in the Clouds (1935)
- The A.B.C. Murders (1936)
- Cards on the Table (1936)
- Murder in Mesopotamia (1936)
- Death on the Nile (1937)
- Dumb Witness (1937)
- Murder in the Mews (1937, ss)
- Appointment with Death (1938)
- Hercule Poirot's Christmas (1939)
- One, Two, Buckle My Shoe (1940)
- Sad Cypress (1940)
- Evil Under the Sun (1941)
- Five Little Pigs (1942)
- The Hollow (1946)
- The Labours of Hercules (1947)
- Taken at the Flood (1948)
- Mrs McGinty's Dead (1952)
- After the Funeral (1953) also known as Funerals are Fatal
- Hickory Dickory Dock (1955)
- Dead Man's Folly (1956)
- Cat Among the Pigeons (1959)
- The Clocks (1963)
- Third Girl (1966)
- Hallowe'en Party (1969)
- Elephants Can Remember (1972)
- Poirot's Early Cases (1974, ss)
- Curtain (written about 1940, published 1975)
Hercule Poirot on screen and stage
Hercule Poirot has been played by several actors. The character first appeared onscreen in 1931, played by Austin Trevor. Perhaps the most notable portrayals have been by Albert Finney in the cinematic version of Murder on the Orient Express, and David Suchet in a long series of television productions. The role has also been played more than once by Peter Ustinov and by Tony Randall, Ian Holm, and Alfred Molina.
