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Birth
Agatha Christie was born in South West England,as Agatha Mary Clarissa Christie, the third child of Frederick Alvah Miller and Clara Boehmer. -
Holiday influences
At the age of 15, Agatha’s mother decided that they should both go to Paris, where she would study singing and piano at Mrs Dryden’s finishing school. Her ability to speak fluent French, helped her choice of her Belgian, French speaking detective, Hercule Poirot; and her third book, Murder on the Links, which was also set in France. -
Childhood
Agatha Christie spent much of her childhood alone, with two of her elder siblings being away at boarding school, and only a few neighbours with children of her age. Although her mother had been passionately enthusiastic for education for girls, unlike her elder sisters, Christie stayed at home. -
Childhood influences
Christie's writing is heavily influenced by the society she was born into, as she knew well, and a large number of her books were set in country houses, with servants blending into the background, but still providing a vital source of information from overheard conversations. She also reflected on many contemporary events in her novels, most notably a German measles epidemic which occurred at the time of writing "The Mirror Cracked", and which plays an important part in the book’s plot. -
Imagination
At about the age of 9, Agatha Christie's imagination led her to invent a school and a set of friends who attended the school. There were seven girls of varying ages and characters, some she like and some she disliked.
“The girls” stayed with Christie for many years, changing their characters as she matured. -
WWI
Agatha Christie spent World War One in Torquay, where she served as a nurse at the Red Cross Hospital in the Town Hall. After about two years she went to work in the hospital dispensary where she was to spend the next two years working. Christie didn’t enjoy dispensing as much as nursing yet she continued to study for her Apothecaries Hall examination, and in the process learnt all about drugs and poisons and their effects. -
Married Archibald Christie
With whom she had her daughter with, Rosalind, in the August of 1919. She divorced him in 1928. -
WW1 influences
Christie had a nervous habit of making a mistake with the poisons, which led to her laying awake at night worrying and waking up just to double check.
During the time in which she spent at Town hall, she also began to write her first book.
Working at the hospital dispensary heavily influenced her works as there are a total of 83 poisonings in her books. -
Disappearance
Agatha Christie disappeared for 11 days on the 10th of December 1926. While there is no solid evidence of what happened to her, the police came to the conclusion that Agatha Christie had left home and travelled to London, crashing her car en route. She had then boarded a train to Harrogate, where she spent the rest of her time there. More than one thousand policemen were assigned to the case, along with hundreds of civilians, and for the first time, aeroplanes were also involved in the search. -
Remarried to Sir Max Mallowan
An archaeologist whom she frequently accompanied on excavation expeditions to Iraq and Syria. -
Queen Elizabeth II bestowed the title Dame of the British Empire
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Death
Agatha’s health began to decline during the 1970s, and on 12th of January 1976 she died from natural causes at her home in Oxfordshire. Agatha’s final novel, Sleeping Murder: Miss Marple’s Last Case, was published posthumously in October 1976.