Ever since the emergence of Edgar Allen Poe’s “C. Auguste Dupin” in The Murders at the Rue Morgue, the characterization of the fictional detective has remained constant. Detectives like Sherlock Holmes can be classified as arrogant, educated, European, males who use their wit to solve crimes and often do not align themselves with the authorities. Even in modern times, detective fiction is still dominated by males. With an abundance of detectives like Batman, Monk and Columbo, female detectives aren’t represented as often. In her book, In her book The Mirror Crack’d From Side to Side Agatha Christie provides an alternative, Jane Marple. Unlike many detectives, Marple is an elderly spinster lady who uses her connections with other people in
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One of Miss Marple’s biggest struggles in the novel is her resistance to the gentrification of her community. Throughout the novel she constantly laments over the modernization of her once quaint village.
Agatha Christie demonstrates this at the beginning of the novel when Miss Marple visits
“St Mary Mead was not the place it had been... Miss Marple, who was a very sensible lady, knew that quite well. It was just that, in a queer way, she felt it more in St Mary Mead, because it had been her home for so long.” (Christie 7) By including this passage in the novel, Christie shows that Miss Marple is a caring person with a genuine interest in the people of her community with a high resistance to change. Christie also shows that Miss Marple isn’t just solving murders for her own self pleasure, she solves these cases in order to make her community a better …show more content…
Women were also expected to remain chaste and pure both physically and spiritually. This demand for women to remain flawless is what oppressed them all the way through the 1950’s. Miss Marple, nonetheless, is flawed and eventually ends up rebelling against the law by withholding the true identity of Heather Badcock’s killer, Marina Greg. By the end of the novel, Marina Greg has passed away, allegedly in her sleep, but Miss Marple suspects that her death may have been caused by someone else in the form of an assisted suicide; the culprit, Jason Rudd. In a conversation with Jason, Miss Marple says, “ Death was really the only way of escape left to her. Yes - very fortunate she took that overdose - or - was given it?” (Christie 224) Miss Marple has the opportunity to reveal this information to her nephew, Inspector Craddock, but remains quiet about what she knows in order to prevent exposing Marina Greg as Heather Badcock’s killer. While her intentions were noble, Miss Marple still lets Marina Gregg get away with her murder, defying everything she stands for in order to help a woman who suffered so much in her
One of Miss Marple’s biggest struggles in the novel is her resistance to the gentrification of her community. Throughout the novel she constantly laments over the modernization of her once quaint village.
Agatha Christie demonstrates this at the beginning of the novel when Miss Marple visits
“St Mary Mead was not the place it had been... Miss Marple, who was a very sensible lady, knew that quite well. It was just that, in a queer way, she felt it more in St Mary Mead, because it had been her home for so long.” (Christie 7) By including this passage in the novel, Christie shows that Miss Marple is a caring person with a genuine interest in the people of her community with a high resistance to change. Christie also shows that Miss Marple isn’t just solving murders for her own self pleasure, she solves these cases in order to make her community a better …show more content…
Women were also expected to remain chaste and pure both physically and spiritually. This demand for women to remain flawless is what oppressed them all the way through the 1950’s. Miss Marple, nonetheless, is flawed and eventually ends up rebelling against the law by withholding the true identity of Heather Badcock’s killer, Marina Greg. By the end of the novel, Marina Greg has passed away, allegedly in her sleep, but Miss Marple suspects that her death may have been caused by someone else in the form of an assisted suicide; the culprit, Jason Rudd. In a conversation with Jason, Miss Marple says, “ Death was really the only way of escape left to her. Yes - very fortunate she took that overdose - or - was given it?” (Christie 224) Miss Marple has the opportunity to reveal this information to her nephew, Inspector Craddock, but remains quiet about what she knows in order to prevent exposing Marina Greg as Heather Badcock’s killer. While her intentions were noble, Miss Marple still lets Marina Gregg get away with her murder, defying everything she stands for in order to help a woman who suffered so much in her