Death on the Nile
Encyclopedia
Death on the Nile is a work of detective fiction
by Agatha Christie
and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club
on November 1, 1937
and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company
the following year. The UK edition retailed at seven shillings and sixpence
(7/6) and the US edition at $2.00.
The book features the Belgian
detective
Hercule Poirot
. The action takes place in Egypt
, mostly on the Nile River.
one evening, Hercule Poirot
notices a young woman, Jacqueline de Bellefort, dining and dancing with her fiancé, Simon Doyle. Poirot also notices that Jackie (a nickname given to her and used by intimates; short for Jacqueline) is very much smitten and is in love with Simon. The next day, Jacqueline takes Simon to meet her best friend, wealthy young heiress Linnet Ridgeway, in the hopes that Linnet will offer Simon a job. Three months later, Simon has broken off his engagement to Jacqueline and married Linnet.
Poirot happens to encounter the couple on their honeymoon
to Egypt
, where he himself is on holiday. At their shared hotel in Cairo
, Poirot sees an apparent chance meeting between the Doyles and Jacqueline. Afterwards, Linnet approaches Poirot and confides that Jacqueline has been stalking
them since they were married, which is antagonizing both of them. Poirot says the Doyles have no legal recourse, but tries to reason with Jacqueline in private, urging her to let go of her attachment to Simon and not "open [her] heart to evil." Jacqueline refuses to listen, confiding that she has been dreaming of killing Linnet.
Attempting to give Jacqueline the slip, the Doyles plan an extended stay in Cairo, while secretly booking passage on the same Nile river cruise as Poirot. To their rage, Jacqueline learns their plans and appears on board with them. Other passengers include:
While taking a tour of some ancient ruins, a boulder falls from a cliff, narrowly missing Linnet and Simon. They suspect Jacqueline at first, but find out she was on the boat the whole time and could not have done it.
Poirot meets his friend Colonel Race, who is joining everyone on the boat for the return trip. Race tells Poirot that one of the passengers is a deadly criminal who has murdered several other people, only Race has not yet identified him.
That night on the boat, Jacqueline gets into a drunken rage, takes out a pistol, and shoots Simon in the leg, then breaks down in a hysterical state of remorse. At Simon's insistence, the two other persons present, Cornelia and Mr. Fanthorp, help Jacqueline back to her cabin, and then fetch Dr. Bessner to see to Simon's wound. Nurse Bowers stays in Jacqueline's room all night. Later, Fanthorp tells Bessner the gun is missing.
Race and Poirot theorize that Linnet had some other enemy among the passengers, who took advantage of the scene in the lounge to murder her and implicate Jacqueline. Poirot also notices that Linnet's pearl necklace is missing from her room.
Poirot then interviews all the passengers. Several of them heard a splash shortly after midnight, and Miss Van Schuyler claims that she looked out her window and saw Rosalie Otterbourne throw something overboard. But Rosalie denies this. A short time later, the murder weapon is recovered from the Nile – Jacqueline's pistol, wrapped in Miss Van Schuyler's missing velvet stole. To Poirot this makes no sense, when someone wanting to incriminate Jacqueline would have left her pistol behind to incriminate her.
Louise Bourget is interviewed in Dr. Bessner's cabin, while Bessner is ministering to Simon. She says she saw nothing on the night of the murder, but would have done "if" she had left her cabin. This choice of words sounds strange to Poirot.
When Race announces that the cabins will be searched for the missing pearls, Miss Bowers returns them, confiding that Miss Van Schuyler took them from Linnet's cabin, being a secret kleptomaniac. But Poirot examines the string and finds it is a fake, meaning the real necklace was stolen sometime earlier.
Poirot eventually realizes that Salome Otterbourne is a secret alcoholic, and what Rosalie was throwing overboard was her mother's hidden cache of spirits. Rosalie admits this, but firmly denies seeing anyone leaving Linnet's cabin on the night of the murder.
When Louise Bourget is found murdered in her cabin, clutching a large-denomination banknote, Race and Poirot deduce that she had seen the real murderer leave Linnet's cabin, and was trying to blackmail him or her.
Poirot and Race enter Dr. Bessner's cabin and tell the doctor and Simon what happened. Salome Otterbourne enters and says she knows who killed Linnet and Louise, because she saw that person enter and leave Louise's cabin. Simon yells at her to tell him. Before she can finish her story, a shot is fired from the deck outside, killing her. Before Poirot and Race can get outside, the shooter is gone, having dropped a gun that Poirot recognizes from Andrew Pennington's luggage.
Poirot announces that he has solved the case; for him the most salient clues were:
Poirot finally explains the real mystery to Race, Miss Robson, and Dr. Bessner. Their first idea, that the murder was conceived on the spur of the moment after the scene in the lounge, was mistaken; in fact, the murder was planned months in advance – by Jacqueline and Simon.
Jacqueline used Cornelia Robson as a witness and pretended to shoot Simon in the leg. Simon faked being wounded with red ink, hidden in Linnet's nail polish bottle. While Cornelia Robson left to get Jacqueline back to her cabin and Jim Fanthorp called Dr. Bessner, Simon picked up the gun, ran to Linnet's cabin, shot her, and then came back to the lounge and shot himself in the leg, throwing the gun overboard before anyone came back. Dr. Bessner then examined him and confirmed that his wound left him unable to have left the lounge.
Before the murder, Jacqueline or Simon drugged Poirot's usual bottle of wine, ensuring that he would sleep through the night so he will not participate in the event.
All is not well, for Louise Bourget, the maid, saw Simon enter and leave Linnet's cabin. She blackmailed Simon and demanded money for hushing her up. But Simon told Jacqueline about it privately. Jacqueline entered Louise's cabin and stabbed her. However, Mrs. Otterbourne saw Jacqueline entering the maid's door. She came to Simon and Poirot to tell what she saw, but Simon yelled at Mrs. Otterbourne in a voice loud enough for Jacqueline to hear it – who acted quickly and shot Mrs. Otterbourne.
Confronted, Simon and Jacqueline confess to the plot. Jacqueline says that she and Simon have always been in love, and Simon never cared for Linnet, even when she tried to steal him away from Jacqueline. Jacqueline tells Poirot that the idea of murdering Linnet for her money was Simon's, but she planned it, knowing Simon was not smart enough to pull it off by himself.
As the passengers are disembarking, Jacqueline reveals a second pistol, which she hid in Rosalie Otterbourne's cabin, and kills both Simon and herself, sparing them both from more gruesome and humiliating deaths. Poirot confesses that he knew about the second pistol, and wanted to give Jacqueline the chance to take a more humane way out.
In addition to Tim and Rosalie, there is another unexpected love match: Cornelia Robson accepts Dr. Bessner's proposal, to the stupefaction of Mr. Ferguson, who had been courting her, in his own uncouth way, during the whole trip.
In The New York Times Book Review
for February 6, 1938, Isaac Anderson concluded after summarising the set-up of the plot that, "You have the right to expect great things of such a combination [of Agatha Christie and Hercule Poirot] and you will not be disappointed.".
In The Observer
s issue of November 14, 1937, "Torquemada" (Edward Powys Mathers
) started off by saying, "First this week comes Agatha Christie. She scored, I contend, two outers in her last three shots; but she is back on the very centre of the bull with Death on the Nile." He summarised the set-up of the plot and then continued, "Terrible things happen and, without the formality of breaking off her narrative to issue a challenge, the author allows Poirot to summarise his clues in one compressed paragraph sixty pages from the end. It is after that, until the retired but by no means retiring little Belgian chooses to tell us the truth, that we are very angry with ourselves indeed. When he does so, anger is swallowed up in admiration. The appearance of corpse after corse in the feast of death is entirely logical, and the main alibi, unshakeable except for Poirot, is of the first brilliance. It is no less likely than the run of such things in fiction, and is built not with many preliminary falsifications but almost in a single carefully premeditated flash of movement." He concluded, "Though less than secondary, the descriptive work is adequate and hits, as it were, the Nile on the head."
The Scotsman
of November 11, 1937 said, "An Agatha Christie story, and especially one with Hercule Poirot applying his 'little grey cells,' is always an event. It is a matter of opinion whether this author has a superior in giving an unexpected twist to concluding chapters, but it is arguable that she has none. In Death on the Nile, however, the solution of the mystery does not come with all that sudden shock of surprise to which Agatha Christie 'fans' are accustomed. At least it should not, providing that one carefully reads a certain chapter and is willing to pursue to their ultimate implications certain hints dropped by Poirot. Whether or not the reader will succeed in naming the murderer, by which is meant discovering how the crime was committed, and not just guessing at one of the least likely persons, is another matter. In any case, here is a problem eminently worth trying to solve." The review finished by saying that, "the author has again constructed the neatest of plots, wrapped it round with distracting circumstances, and presented it to what should be an appreciative public.
E.R. Punshon of The Guardian
in his review of December 10, 1937 began by saying, "To decide whether a writer of fiction possesses the true novelist's gift it is often a good plan to consider whether the minor characters in his or her book, those to whose creation the author has probably given little thought, stand out in the narrative in their own right as living personalities. This test is one Mrs. Christie always passes successfully, and never more so than in her new book." He went on to summarise the more outlandish traits of some of the characters and then said, "each and all of these, as well their more normal fellow-passengers, are firmly and clearly sketched, even if they are all a little too much types rather than characters and so miss that full rotundity of life a Dickens or a Thackeray can give." He finished by saying that, "M. Poirot's little grey cells had indeed been obliged to work at full pressure to unravel a mystery which includes one of those carefully worked out alibis that seem alike to fascinate Mrs. Christie and to provide her with the best opportunities for displaying her own skill. A fault-finding critic may, however, wonder whether M. Poirot is not growing just a little too fond of keeping to himself such important facts as the bullet-hole in the table. If he is to enjoy all, a reader should also know all."
Mary Dell in the Daily Mirror of November 11, 1937 said, "Agatha Christie is just grand. Usually if you get a good plot there is something wrong with the writing or the characters. But with her – you have everything that makes a first-class book."
Robert Barnard
: "One of the top ten, in spite of an overcomplex solution. The familiar marital triangle, set on a Nile steamer. Comparatively little local colour, but some good grotesques among the passengers – of which the film took advantage. Spies and agitators are beginning to invade the pure Christie detective story at this period, as the slide towards war begins."
on January 17, 1944 under the title of Hidden Horizon and opened in the West End
on March 19, 1946 under the title Murder on the Nile and on Broadway on September 19, 1946 under the same title.
. The stars were Guy Spaull and Patricia Wheel.
for the first of his six appearances as Poirot. Others in the all-star cast included Bette Davis
(Mrs. Van Schuyler), Mia Farrow
(Jacqueline de Bellefort), Maggie Smith
(Miss Bowers), Lois Chiles
(Linnet Doyle), Simon MacCorkindale
(Simon Doyle), Jon Finch
(Mr. Ferguson), Olivia Hussey
(Rosalie Otterbourne), Angela Lansbury
(Mrs. Otterbourne), George Kennedy
(Mr. Pennington) Jack Warden
(Dr. Bessner) and David Niven
(Colonel Race). Slight plot changes were made to the sceenplay, deleting several characters, including Cornelia Robson, the Allertons and Mr. Fanthorp. Tim Allerton is replaced as Rosalie's love interest by Ferguson.
reprised his role of Poirot. The serial was broadcast weekly from Thursday, January 2 to Thursday, January 30 at 10.00am to 10.30pm. All five episodes were recorded on Friday, July 12, 1996 at Broadcasting House
.
Adaptor: Michael Bakewell
Producer: Enyd Williams
Cast:
John Moffatt as Hercule Poirot
Donald Sinden
as Colonel Race
Amanda Barton-Chapple as Jacqueline de Bellefort
Robert Daws
as Simon Doyle
Elaine Pyke as Linnet Ridgeway
Rosemary Leach
as Mrs Allerton
Nicholas Boulton as Tim Allerton
Shirley Dixon as Mrs Otterbourne
Irene Sutcliffe
as Mrs Van Schuyler
Teresa Gallagher
as Cornelia
Stratford Johns
as Pennington
Joanna Monro
as Joanna Southwood
Sean Baker as Monsieur Blondin
Ed Bishop
as Rockford
Roger May as Fanthorp
Keith Drinkel
as Dr. Bessner
Robert Portal as Ferguson
Ioan Meredith as Richetti
Janet Maw as Miss Bowers
with Timothy Bateson
, Chris Palvo, Christopher Scott and Ben Thomas
, starred David Suchet
as Poirot. This version remained largely faithful to the novel except for a few minor changes, for example - the romantic pairing of Tim Allerton and Rosalie Otterbourne: instead of the pair ending up happily together, Tim gently refuses her. Some characters were omitted, Louise Bourget's body being found in her wardrobe instead of under her bed.
. The player takes the role of Hercule Poirot as he searches various cabins of the Karnak for clues, and then questions suspects based on information he finds.
as a graphic novel
adaptation on July 16, 2007, adapted by François Rivière and Solidor
(Jean-François Miniac
) (ISBN 0-00-725058-4). This was translated from the edition first published in France by Emmanuel Proust éditions in 2003 under the title of Mort sur le Nil.
The book was first serialised in the US in The Saturday Evening Post
in eight instalments from May 15 (Volume 209, Number 46) to July 3, 1937 (Volume 210, Number 1) with illustrations by Henry Raleigh.
Detective fiction
Detective fiction is a sub-genre of crime fiction and mystery fiction in which an investigator , either professional or amateur, investigates a crime, often murder.-In ancient literature:...
by Agatha Christie
Agatha Christie
Dame Agatha Christie DBE was a British crime writer of novels, short stories, and plays. She also wrote romances under the name Mary Westmacott, but she is best remembered for her 66 detective novels and 14 short story collections , and her successful West End plays.According to...
and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club
Collins Crime Club
The Collins Crime Club was an imprint of UK book publishers William Collins & Co Ltd and ran from May 6, 1930 to April 1994. Customers registered their name and address with the club and were sent a newsletter every three months which advised them of the latest books which had been or were to be...
on November 1, 1937
1937 in literature
The year 1937 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*January 9 - The first issue of Look magazine goes on sale in the United States.*Thomas Quinn Curtiss meets Klaus Mann.-New books:*Eric Ambler - Uncommon Danger...
and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company
Dodd, Mead and Company
Dodd, Mead and Company was one of the pioneer publishing houses of the United States, based in New York City. Under several names, the firm operated from 1839 until 1990. Its history properly began in 1870, with the retirement of its founder, Moses Woodruff Dodd. Control passed to his son Frank...
the following year. The UK edition retailed at seven shillings and sixpence
British sixpence coin
The sixpence, known colloquially as the tanner, or half-shilling, was a British pre-decimal coin, worth six pence, or 1/40th of a pound sterling....
(7/6) and the US edition at $2.00.
The book features the Belgian
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
detective
Detective
A detective is an investigator, either a member of a police agency or a private person. The latter may be known as private investigators or "private eyes"...
Hercule Poirot
Hercule Poirot
Hercule Poirot is a fictional Belgian detective created by Agatha Christie. Along with Miss Marple, Poirot is one of Christie's most famous and long-lived characters, appearing in 33 novels and 51 short stories published between 1920 and 1975 and set in the same era.Poirot has been portrayed on...
. The action takes place in Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
, mostly on the Nile River.
The Setup
While dining out in LondonLondon
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
one evening, Hercule Poirot
Hercule Poirot
Hercule Poirot is a fictional Belgian detective created by Agatha Christie. Along with Miss Marple, Poirot is one of Christie's most famous and long-lived characters, appearing in 33 novels and 51 short stories published between 1920 and 1975 and set in the same era.Poirot has been portrayed on...
notices a young woman, Jacqueline de Bellefort, dining and dancing with her fiancé, Simon Doyle. Poirot also notices that Jackie (a nickname given to her and used by intimates; short for Jacqueline) is very much smitten and is in love with Simon. The next day, Jacqueline takes Simon to meet her best friend, wealthy young heiress Linnet Ridgeway, in the hopes that Linnet will offer Simon a job. Three months later, Simon has broken off his engagement to Jacqueline and married Linnet.
Poirot happens to encounter the couple on their honeymoon
Honeymoon
-History:One early reference to a honeymoon is in Deuteronomy 24:5 “When a man is newly wed, he need not go out on a military expedition, nor shall any public duty be imposed on him...
to Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
, where he himself is on holiday. At their shared hotel in Cairo
Cairo
Cairo , is the capital of Egypt and the largest city in the Arab world and Africa, and the 16th largest metropolitan area in the world. Nicknamed "The City of a Thousand Minarets" for its preponderance of Islamic architecture, Cairo has long been a centre of the region's political and cultural life...
, Poirot sees an apparent chance meeting between the Doyles and Jacqueline. Afterwards, Linnet approaches Poirot and confides that Jacqueline has been stalking
Stalking
Stalking is a term commonly used to refer to unwanted and obsessive attention by an individual or group to another person. Stalking behaviors are related to harassment and intimidation and may include following the victim in person and/or monitoring them via the internet...
them since they were married, which is antagonizing both of them. Poirot says the Doyles have no legal recourse, but tries to reason with Jacqueline in private, urging her to let go of her attachment to Simon and not "open [her] heart to evil." Jacqueline refuses to listen, confiding that she has been dreaming of killing Linnet.
Attempting to give Jacqueline the slip, the Doyles plan an extended stay in Cairo, while secretly booking passage on the same Nile river cruise as Poirot. To their rage, Jacqueline learns their plans and appears on board with them. Other passengers include:
- American erotica novelist SalomeSalomeSalome , the Daughter of Herodias , is known from the New Testament...
Otterbourne and her daughter, Rosalie; - Mrs. Allerton and her son, Tim;
- Linnet's American trustee, Andrew Pennington, who happened to run into her in Egypt;
- Linnet's maid, Louise Bourget;
- American socialite Marie Van Schuyler and her younger cousin, Cornelia Robson;
- Miss Van Schuyler's nurse, Miss Bowers;
- A young traveler named, Mr. Ferguson, an outspoken Socialist;
- Archaeologist, Signor Richetti;
- A diffident young man named James Fanthorp;
- An Austrian physician named Dr. Bessner.
While taking a tour of some ancient ruins, a boulder falls from a cliff, narrowly missing Linnet and Simon. They suspect Jacqueline at first, but find out she was on the boat the whole time and could not have done it.
Poirot meets his friend Colonel Race, who is joining everyone on the boat for the return trip. Race tells Poirot that one of the passengers is a deadly criminal who has murdered several other people, only Race has not yet identified him.
That night on the boat, Jacqueline gets into a drunken rage, takes out a pistol, and shoots Simon in the leg, then breaks down in a hysterical state of remorse. At Simon's insistence, the two other persons present, Cornelia and Mr. Fanthorp, help Jacqueline back to her cabin, and then fetch Dr. Bessner to see to Simon's wound. Nurse Bowers stays in Jacqueline's room all night. Later, Fanthorp tells Bessner the gun is missing.
The Crime
The next day, Linnet is found dead with a bullet in her head. Race takes charge of the situation and asks Poirot to handle the investigation. Several clues seem to incriminate Jacqueline – a "J" written in blood on the wall above Linnet's head, for instance – but Miss Bowers assures Poirot that Jacqueline never left her cabin that night. Dr. Bessner also assures Poirot that Simon's leg wound completely incapacitated him, and so he could not have moved from his bed, even if he wanted to.Race and Poirot theorize that Linnet had some other enemy among the passengers, who took advantage of the scene in the lounge to murder her and implicate Jacqueline. Poirot also notices that Linnet's pearl necklace is missing from her room.
Poirot then interviews all the passengers. Several of them heard a splash shortly after midnight, and Miss Van Schuyler claims that she looked out her window and saw Rosalie Otterbourne throw something overboard. But Rosalie denies this. A short time later, the murder weapon is recovered from the Nile – Jacqueline's pistol, wrapped in Miss Van Schuyler's missing velvet stole. To Poirot this makes no sense, when someone wanting to incriminate Jacqueline would have left her pistol behind to incriminate her.
Louise Bourget is interviewed in Dr. Bessner's cabin, while Bessner is ministering to Simon. She says she saw nothing on the night of the murder, but would have done "if" she had left her cabin. This choice of words sounds strange to Poirot.
When Race announces that the cabins will be searched for the missing pearls, Miss Bowers returns them, confiding that Miss Van Schuyler took them from Linnet's cabin, being a secret kleptomaniac. But Poirot examines the string and finds it is a fake, meaning the real necklace was stolen sometime earlier.
Poirot eventually realizes that Salome Otterbourne is a secret alcoholic, and what Rosalie was throwing overboard was her mother's hidden cache of spirits. Rosalie admits this, but firmly denies seeing anyone leaving Linnet's cabin on the night of the murder.
When Louise Bourget is found murdered in her cabin, clutching a large-denomination banknote, Race and Poirot deduce that she had seen the real murderer leave Linnet's cabin, and was trying to blackmail him or her.
Poirot and Race enter Dr. Bessner's cabin and tell the doctor and Simon what happened. Salome Otterbourne enters and says she knows who killed Linnet and Louise, because she saw that person enter and leave Louise's cabin. Simon yells at her to tell him. Before she can finish her story, a shot is fired from the deck outside, killing her. Before Poirot and Race can get outside, the shooter is gone, having dropped a gun that Poirot recognizes from Andrew Pennington's luggage.
Poirot announces that he has solved the case; for him the most salient clues were:
- the fact that Poirot only drinks wine with dinner, while his two usual dinner companions, the Allertons, drink something else;
- two bottles of nail polish in Linnet's room, one labelled "Cardinal" (a deep, dark red) and the other "Rose" (pale pink), but both of which contain red coloring;
- the fact that Jacqueline's gun was thrown overboard; and
- the circumstances of Louise and Mrs. Otterbourne's deaths.
The Solution(s)
Before explaining his solution to the crime, Poirot decides to clear away some of the lesser mysteries first, by interviewing several of the passengers in turn:- Andrew Pennington admits that he has speculated, illegally, with Linnet's holdings; he was hoping to replace the funds before she came of age, but upon her marriage she gained full control of her estate; on learning of her marriage, Pennington rushed to Egypt to stage a "chance" encounter with Linnet and dupe her into signing legal documents that would exculpate him; he abandoned the plan when he found that Linnet was a shrewd woman who read anything she was asked to sign in detail; in desperation, he tried to kill her by dropping the boulder on her, but that is as far as he went, and he swears that he did not murder her;
- Fanthorp is revealed to be a young attorney with Linnet's British solicitors, who sent him to Egypt to spy on Pennington, suspicious of his intentions;
- Tim is exposed as a society jewel thief, working in partnership with his cousin, a down-on-her-luck socialite. Tim stole the pearls from Linnet's cabin that night and substituted the fake string for them, but, likewise, swears he didn't kill her; he does not know if Linnet was already dead when he entered her cabin; Rosalie admits that she saw Tim enter and leave Linnet's cabin, but she has come to love Tim, and was trying to protect him; Poirot clears Tim of the murder and agrees not to report his thievery to the police; Tim promises to reform and happily asks Rosalie to marry him, to the delight of his mother.
- Signor Richetti is exposed as the foreign agent and criminal Race is after, after Race hears of a telegram Richetti received, using a code that Race recognizes;
Poirot finally explains the real mystery to Race, Miss Robson, and Dr. Bessner. Their first idea, that the murder was conceived on the spur of the moment after the scene in the lounge, was mistaken; in fact, the murder was planned months in advance – by Jacqueline and Simon.
Jacqueline used Cornelia Robson as a witness and pretended to shoot Simon in the leg. Simon faked being wounded with red ink, hidden in Linnet's nail polish bottle. While Cornelia Robson left to get Jacqueline back to her cabin and Jim Fanthorp called Dr. Bessner, Simon picked up the gun, ran to Linnet's cabin, shot her, and then came back to the lounge and shot himself in the leg, throwing the gun overboard before anyone came back. Dr. Bessner then examined him and confirmed that his wound left him unable to have left the lounge.
Before the murder, Jacqueline or Simon drugged Poirot's usual bottle of wine, ensuring that he would sleep through the night so he will not participate in the event.
All is not well, for Louise Bourget, the maid, saw Simon enter and leave Linnet's cabin. She blackmailed Simon and demanded money for hushing her up. But Simon told Jacqueline about it privately. Jacqueline entered Louise's cabin and stabbed her. However, Mrs. Otterbourne saw Jacqueline entering the maid's door. She came to Simon and Poirot to tell what she saw, but Simon yelled at Mrs. Otterbourne in a voice loud enough for Jacqueline to hear it – who acted quickly and shot Mrs. Otterbourne.
Confronted, Simon and Jacqueline confess to the plot. Jacqueline says that she and Simon have always been in love, and Simon never cared for Linnet, even when she tried to steal him away from Jacqueline. Jacqueline tells Poirot that the idea of murdering Linnet for her money was Simon's, but she planned it, knowing Simon was not smart enough to pull it off by himself.
As the passengers are disembarking, Jacqueline reveals a second pistol, which she hid in Rosalie Otterbourne's cabin, and kills both Simon and herself, sparing them both from more gruesome and humiliating deaths. Poirot confesses that he knew about the second pistol, and wanted to give Jacqueline the chance to take a more humane way out.
In addition to Tim and Rosalie, there is another unexpected love match: Cornelia Robson accepts Dr. Bessner's proposal, to the stupefaction of Mr. Ferguson, who had been courting her, in his own uncouth way, during the whole trip.
Literary significance and reception
The Times Literary Supplements short review of November 20, 1937 by Caldwell Harpur concluded, "Hercule Poirot, as usual, digs out a truth so unforeseen that it would be unfair for a reviewer to hint at it".In The New York Times Book Review
The New York Times Book Review
The New York Times Book Review is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to The New York Times in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely read book review publications in the industry. The offices are located near Times Square in New York...
for February 6, 1938, Isaac Anderson concluded after summarising the set-up of the plot that, "You have the right to expect great things of such a combination [of Agatha Christie and Hercule Poirot] and you will not be disappointed.".
In The Observer
The Observer
The Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...
s issue of November 14, 1937, "Torquemada" (Edward Powys Mathers
Edward Powys Mathers
Edward Powys Mathers was an English translator and poet, and also a pioneer of compiling advanced cryptic crosswords....
) started off by saying, "First this week comes Agatha Christie. She scored, I contend, two outers in her last three shots; but she is back on the very centre of the bull with Death on the Nile." He summarised the set-up of the plot and then continued, "Terrible things happen and, without the formality of breaking off her narrative to issue a challenge, the author allows Poirot to summarise his clues in one compressed paragraph sixty pages from the end. It is after that, until the retired but by no means retiring little Belgian chooses to tell us the truth, that we are very angry with ourselves indeed. When he does so, anger is swallowed up in admiration. The appearance of corpse after corse in the feast of death is entirely logical, and the main alibi, unshakeable except for Poirot, is of the first brilliance. It is no less likely than the run of such things in fiction, and is built not with many preliminary falsifications but almost in a single carefully premeditated flash of movement." He concluded, "Though less than secondary, the descriptive work is adequate and hits, as it were, the Nile on the head."
The Scotsman
The Scotsman
The Scotsman is a British newspaper, published in Edinburgh.As of August 2011 it had an audited circulation of 38,423, down from about 100,000 in the 1980s....
of November 11, 1937 said, "An Agatha Christie story, and especially one with Hercule Poirot applying his 'little grey cells,' is always an event. It is a matter of opinion whether this author has a superior in giving an unexpected twist to concluding chapters, but it is arguable that she has none. In Death on the Nile, however, the solution of the mystery does not come with all that sudden shock of surprise to which Agatha Christie 'fans' are accustomed. At least it should not, providing that one carefully reads a certain chapter and is willing to pursue to their ultimate implications certain hints dropped by Poirot. Whether or not the reader will succeed in naming the murderer, by which is meant discovering how the crime was committed, and not just guessing at one of the least likely persons, is another matter. In any case, here is a problem eminently worth trying to solve." The review finished by saying that, "the author has again constructed the neatest of plots, wrapped it round with distracting circumstances, and presented it to what should be an appreciative public.
E.R. Punshon of The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
in his review of December 10, 1937 began by saying, "To decide whether a writer of fiction possesses the true novelist's gift it is often a good plan to consider whether the minor characters in his or her book, those to whose creation the author has probably given little thought, stand out in the narrative in their own right as living personalities. This test is one Mrs. Christie always passes successfully, and never more so than in her new book." He went on to summarise the more outlandish traits of some of the characters and then said, "each and all of these, as well their more normal fellow-passengers, are firmly and clearly sketched, even if they are all a little too much types rather than characters and so miss that full rotundity of life a Dickens or a Thackeray can give." He finished by saying that, "M. Poirot's little grey cells had indeed been obliged to work at full pressure to unravel a mystery which includes one of those carefully worked out alibis that seem alike to fascinate Mrs. Christie and to provide her with the best opportunities for displaying her own skill. A fault-finding critic may, however, wonder whether M. Poirot is not growing just a little too fond of keeping to himself such important facts as the bullet-hole in the table. If he is to enjoy all, a reader should also know all."
Mary Dell in the Daily Mirror of November 11, 1937 said, "Agatha Christie is just grand. Usually if you get a good plot there is something wrong with the writing or the characters. But with her – you have everything that makes a first-class book."
Robert Barnard
Robert Barnard
Robert Barnard is an English crime writer, critic and lecturer.- Life and work :Born in Essex, Barnard was educated at the Colchester Royal Grammar School and at Balliol College in Oxford....
: "One of the top ten, in spite of an overcomplex solution. The familiar marital triangle, set on a Nile steamer. Comparatively little local colour, but some good grotesques among the passengers – of which the film took advantage. Spies and agitators are beginning to invade the pure Christie detective story at this period, as the slide towards war begins."
Murder on the Nile
Agatha Christie adapted the novel into a stage play which opened at the Dundee Repertory TheatreDundee Repertory Theatre
Dundee Repertory Theatre or Dundee Rep is a theatre and arts company in the city of Dundee, Scotland. It operates as both a producing house - staging at least six of its own productions each year, and a receiving house - hosting work from visiting companies throughout Scotland and the United...
on January 17, 1944 under the title of Hidden Horizon and opened in the West End
West End theatre
West End theatre is a popular term for mainstream professional theatre staged in the large theatres of London's 'Theatreland', the West End. Along with New York's Broadway theatre, West End theatre is usually considered to represent the highest level of commercial theatre in the English speaking...
on March 19, 1946 under the title Murder on the Nile and on Broadway on September 19, 1946 under the same title.
Kraft Television Theatre
A live television version of the novel under the name of Murder on the Nile was presented on July 12, 1950 in the US in a one-hour play as part of the series Kraft Television TheatreKraft Television Theatre
Kraft Television Theatre is an American drama/anthology television series that began May 7, 1947 on NBC, airing at 7:30pm on Wednesday evenings until December of that year. In January 1948, it moved to 9pm on Wednesdays, continuing in that timeslot until 1958. Initially produced by the J...
. The stars were Guy Spaull and Patricia Wheel.
Death on the Nile (1978 film)
The novel was adapted into a highly-successful feature film, released in 1978 and starring Peter UstinovPeter Ustinov
Peter Alexander Ustinov CBE was an English actor, writer and dramatist. He was also renowned as a filmmaker, theatre and opera director, stage designer, author, screenwriter, comedian, humourist, newspaper and magazine columnist, radio broadcaster and television presenter...
for the first of his six appearances as Poirot. Others in the all-star cast included Bette Davis
Bette Davis
Ruth Elizabeth "Bette" Davis was an American actress of film, television and theater. Noted for her willingness to play unsympathetic characters, she was highly regarded for her performances in a range of film genres, from contemporary crime melodramas to historical and period films and occasional...
(Mrs. Van Schuyler), Mia Farrow
Mia Farrow
Mia Farrow is an American actress, singer, humanitarian, and fashion model.Farrow first gained wide acclaim for her role as Allison Mackenzie in the soap opera Peyton Place, and for her subsequent short-lived marriage to Frank Sinatra...
(Jacqueline de Bellefort), Maggie Smith
Maggie Smith
Dame Margaret Natalie Smith, DBE , better known as Maggie Smith, is an English film, stage, and television actress who made her stage debut in 1952 and is still performing after 59 years...
(Miss Bowers), Lois Chiles
Lois Chiles
Lois Cleveland Chiles is an American actress and former fashion model known for her role as Dr. Holly Goodhead in the 1979 James Bond film Moonraker.-Early life:...
(Linnet Doyle), Simon MacCorkindale
Simon MacCorkindale
Simon Charles Pendered MacCorkindale was a British actor, film director, writer and producer. MacCorkindale spent much of his childhood moving around due to his father's commission with the Royal Air Force. Poor eyesight prevented him from following a similar career in the RAF, so he instead...
(Simon Doyle), Jon Finch
Jon Finch
Jon Finch is an English actor noted for many Shakespearean roles. Perhaps his most notable role was the title role in Roman Polanski's 1971 film adaptation of Shakespeare's Macbeth. His other famous role was as a down-and-out ex-RAF pilot wrongly accused of murder in Alfred Hitchcock's...
(Mr. Ferguson), Olivia Hussey
Olivia Hussey
Olivia Hussey is an Argentinian actress who became famous for her role as Juliet in Franco Zeffirelli's Academy Award-winning 1968 film version of Romeo and Juliet. For this role she won the Golden Globe Award for New Star of the Year - Actress as well as the David di Donatello for best actress...
(Rosalie Otterbourne), Angela Lansbury
Angela Lansbury
Angela Brigid Lansbury CBE is an English actress and singer in theatre, television and motion pictures, whose career has spanned eight decades and earned her more performance Tony Awards than any other individual , with five wins...
(Mrs. Otterbourne), George Kennedy
George Kennedy
George Harris Kennedy, Jr. is an American actor who has appeared in over 200 film and television productions. He is perhaps most familiar as the convict Dragline in Cool Hand Luke , airline troubleshooter Joe Patroni in the Airport series of disaster movies from the 1970s and...
(Mr. Pennington) Jack Warden
Jack Warden
Jack Warden was an American character actor.-Early life:Warden was born John Warden Lebzelter in Newark, New Jersey, the son of Laura M. and John Warden Lebzelter, who was an engineer and technician. He was of Irish and Pennsylvania Dutch ancestry...
(Dr. Bessner) and David Niven
David Niven
James David Graham Niven , known as David Niven, was a British actor and novelist, best known for his roles as Phileas Fogg in Around the World in 80 Days and Sir Charles Lytton, a.k.a. "the Phantom", in The Pink Panther...
(Colonel Race). Slight plot changes were made to the sceenplay, deleting several characters, including Cornelia Robson, the Allertons and Mr. Fanthorp. Tim Allerton is replaced as Rosalie's love interest by Ferguson.
BBC Radio 4 adaptation
The novel was adapted as a five part serial for BBC Radio 4 in 1997. John MoffattJohn Moffatt (actor)
John Moffatt is an English actor and playwright, perhaps best known for his portrayal of Hercule Poirot on BBC Radio....
reprised his role of Poirot. The serial was broadcast weekly from Thursday, January 2 to Thursday, January 30 at 10.00am to 10.30pm. All five episodes were recorded on Friday, July 12, 1996 at Broadcasting House
Broadcasting House
Broadcasting House is the headquarters and registered office of the BBC in Portland Place and Langham Place, London.The building includes the BBC Radio Theatre from where music and speech programmes are recorded in front of a studio audience...
.
Adaptor: Michael Bakewell
Michael Bakewell
Michael Bakewell is a British television producer. He is best known for his work during the 1960s, when he was the first Head of Plays at the BBC after Sydney Newman divided the drama department into separate series, serials and plays divisions in 1963...
Producer: Enyd Williams
Cast:
John Moffatt as Hercule Poirot
Donald Sinden
Donald Sinden
Sir Donald Alfred Sinden CBE is an English actor of theatre, film and television.-Personal life:Sinden was born in Plymouth, Devon, England, on 9 October 1923. The son of Alfred Edward Sinden and his wife Mabel Agnes , he grew up in the Sussex village of Ditchling, where their home doubled as the...
as Colonel Race
Amanda Barton-Chapple as Jacqueline de Bellefort
Robert Daws
Robert Daws
Robert Daws is an English actor. He is most notable for a variety of roles he has played in television dramas.-Career:Daws played Tuppy Glossop in the early 1990s version of Jeeves and Wooster...
as Simon Doyle
Elaine Pyke as Linnet Ridgeway
Rosemary Leach
Rosemary Leach
Rosemary Leach is a British stage, television and film actress.She was born at Much Wenlock, Shropshire. Her parents were teachers related to Edmund Leach. She attended grammar school and RADA...
as Mrs Allerton
Nicholas Boulton as Tim Allerton
Shirley Dixon as Mrs Otterbourne
Irene Sutcliffe
Irene Sutcliffe
Irene Sutcliffe is an English actress. She is best known for playing Maggie Clegg in ITV's Coronation Street, a role she played from 1968 until 1975...
as Mrs Van Schuyler
Teresa Gallagher
Teresa Gallagher
-Career:Gallagher is known for her role as Ellen Smith in The Bill, for her appearances on radio in No Commitments, Salem's Lot and Memorials to the Missing, and the voices of Emily, Mavis, Rosie, Duchess of Boxford and other female characters from the first CGI Thomas and Friends Special Hero of...
as Cornelia
Stratford Johns
Stratford Johns
Stratford Johns, born Alan Edgar Stratford-Johns, was a popular British stage, film and television actor who is best remembered for his starring role as Detective Inspector Charlie Barlow in the innovative and long-running BBC police series Z-Cars, created by Troy Kennedy-Martin.-Early life:Johns...
as Pennington
Joanna Monro
Joanna Monro
Joanna Monro is a British actress and former TV presenter who, in the 1980s, appeared on the BBC show That's Life! with Esther Rantzen....
as Joanna Southwood
Sean Baker as Monsieur Blondin
Ed Bishop
Ed Bishop
Ed Bishop was an American film, television, stage and radio actor based in Britain.-Early life:Bishop served in the US Army from 8 October 1952 to 24 September 1954, working as a disc jockey with the Armed Forces Radio at St. Johns in Newfoundland...
as Rockford
Roger May as Fanthorp
Keith Drinkel
Keith Drinkel
Keith Drinkel is a British actor, born in York on 14 November 1944. He was educated at St Michael's College, Leeds and is now based in Brighton....
as Dr. Bessner
Robert Portal as Ferguson
Ioan Meredith as Richetti
Janet Maw as Miss Bowers
with Timothy Bateson
Timothy Bateson
Timothy Dingwall Bateson was a British actor. The son of Dingwall Bateson, a solicitor later knighted, he was educated at Uppingham School and Wadham College, Oxford....
, Chris Palvo, Christopher Scott and Ben Thomas
Agatha Christie's Poirot
Death on the Nile, a television adaptation shown in 2004 in the series Agatha Christie's PoirotAgatha Christie's Poirot
Agatha Christie's Poirot is a British television drama that has aired on ITV since 1989. It stars David Suchet as Agatha Christie's fictional detective Hercule Poirot. It was originally made by LWT and is now made by ITV Studios...
, starred David Suchet
David Suchet
David Suchet, CBE, is an English actor, known for his work on British television. He is recognised for his RTS- and BPG award-winning performance as Augustus Melmotte in the 2001 British TV mini-drama The Way We Live Now, alongside Matthew Macfadyen and Paloma Baeza, and a 1991 British Academy...
as Poirot. This version remained largely faithful to the novel except for a few minor changes, for example - the romantic pairing of Tim Allerton and Rosalie Otterbourne: instead of the pair ending up happily together, Tim gently refuses her. Some characters were omitted, Louise Bourget's body being found in her wardrobe instead of under her bed.
PC adaptation
Death on the Nile was turned into a "hidden object" PC game, Agatha Christie: Death on the Nile, in 2007 by Flood Light Games, and published as a joint venture between Oberon Games and Big Fish GamesBig Fish Games
Big Fish Games is a provider of Internet media delivery software and game services based in Seattle, Washington. The company was founded in 2002 by Paul Thelen , and currently employs more than 400 people...
. The player takes the role of Hercule Poirot as he searches various cabins of the Karnak for clues, and then questions suspects based on information he finds.
Graphic novel adaptation
Death on the Nile was released by HarperCollinsHarperCollins
HarperCollins is a publishing company owned by News Corporation. It is the combination of the publishers William Collins, Sons and Co Ltd, a British company, and Harper & Row, an American company, itself the result of an earlier merger of Harper & Brothers and Row, Peterson & Company. The worldwide...
as a graphic novel
Graphic novel
A graphic novel is a narrative work in which the story is conveyed to the reader using sequential art in either an experimental design or in a traditional comics format...
adaptation on July 16, 2007, adapted by François Rivière and Solidor
Solidor
The Solidor was a German automobile manufactured in Berlin from 1905 until 1907. It was basically a rebranded Passy-Thellier.Solidor is also the surname of an illustrator, Jean-François Miniac....
(Jean-François Miniac
Jean-François Miniac
Jean-François Miniac, better known under his pen name Solidor, is a French comic book creator . He was born in Paris and lives in France....
) (ISBN 0-00-725058-4). This was translated from the edition first published in France by Emmanuel Proust éditions in 2003 under the title of Mort sur le Nil.
Publication history
- 1937, Collins Crime Club (London), November 1, 1937, Hardback, 288 pp
- 1938, Dodd Mead and Company (New York), 1938, Hardback, 326 pp
- 1944, Avon Books, Paperback, 262 pp (Avon number 46)
- 1949, Pan BooksPan BooksPan Books is an imprint which first became active in the 1940s and is now part of the British-based Macmillan Publishers owned by German publishers, Georg von Holtzbrinck Publishing Group....
, Paperback, 255 pp (Pan number 87) - 1953, Penguin BooksPenguin BooksPenguin Books is a publisher founded in 1935 by Sir Allen Lane and V.K. Krishna Menon. Penguin revolutionised publishing in the 1930s through its high quality, inexpensive paperbacks, sold through Woolworths and other high street stores for sixpence. Penguin's success demonstrated that large...
, Paperback, (Penguin number 927), 249 pp - 1960, Fontana Books (Imprint of HarperCollinsHarperCollinsHarperCollins is a publishing company owned by News Corporation. It is the combination of the publishers William Collins, Sons and Co Ltd, a British company, and Harper & Row, an American company, itself the result of an earlier merger of Harper & Brothers and Row, Peterson & Company. The worldwide...
), Paperback, 253 pp - 1963, Bantam BooksBantam BooksBantam Books is an American publishing house owned entirely by Random House, the German media corporation subsidiary of Bertelsmann; it is an imprint of the Random House Publishing Group. It was formed in 1945 by Walter B. Pitkin, Jr., Sidney B. Kramer, and Ian and Betty Ballantine...
, Paperback, 214 pp - 1969, Greenway edition of collected works (William Collins), Hardcover, 318 pp
- 1970, Greenway edition of collected works (Dodd Mead), Hardcover, 318 pp
- 1971, Ulverscroft Large-print Edition, Hardcover, 466 pp ISBN 0-85-456671-6
- 1978, William Collins (Film tie-in), Hardback, 320 pp
- 2006, Poirot Facsimile Edition (Facsimile of 1937 UK First Edition), HarperCollins, September 4, 2006, Hardback, ISBN 0-00-723447-3
The book was first serialised in the US in The Saturday Evening Post
The Saturday Evening Post
The Saturday Evening Post is a bimonthly American magazine. It was published weekly under this title from 1897 until 1969, and quarterly and then bimonthly from 1971.-History:...
in eight instalments from May 15 (Volume 209, Number 46) to July 3, 1937 (Volume 210, Number 1) with illustrations by Henry Raleigh.
International titles
- Dutch: Moord op de Nijl (Murder on the Nile)
- Croatian: Smrt na Nilu (Death on the Nile)
- French: Mort sur le Nil (Death on the Nile)
- Hungarian: Poirot kéjutazáson (Poirot on a Pleasure Trip), Halál a Níluson (Death on the Nile)
- Italian: Poirot sul Nilo (Poirot on the Nile)
- Norwegian: "Hun fulgte etter" (She followed after), later renamed "Mord på Nilen" (Murder on the Nile), since the first title almost revealed the plot.
- Russian: "Убийство на пароходе <<Карнак>>" (=Ubiystvo na parokhode Karnak, Murder on the steamer Karnak), "Смерть на Ниле" (=Smert' na Nile, Death on the Nile)
- Serbian: Смрт на Нилу (Death on the Nile)
- Spanish: Muerte en el Nilo (Death on the Nile) or Poirot en Egipto (Poirot in Egypt)
External links
- Death on the Nile at the official Agatha Christie website