Fate in person

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The fate in person (original title Nemesis ) is the 62nd detective novel by Agatha Christie . It appeared first in the UK in November 1971 at the Collins Crime Club and later that year with Dodd, Mead and Company . The German first edition was published in 1972 by Scherz Verlag (Bern, Munich, Vienna) in the long-used translation by Claudia Persson.

Since July 16, 2016, the novel has been available for the first time in full in German from Atlantik-Verlag in the new translation by Julian Haefs.

It determines Miss Marple in her eleventh novel.

This novel is the last Miss Marple novel that Agatha Christie wrote. The twelfth novel with Miss Marple - Calm Rude  - which was published in October 1976, dates from the 1940s.

Explanation of the English novel title

In Caribbean Affair , Miss Marple and Jason Rafiel meet in a hotel in the Caribbean. Now Miss Marple is posthumously commissioned by Mr. Rafiel to investigate a crime that went back many years. Already in the Caribbean affair, Miss Marple described herself as Nemesis , the Greek goddess of vengeance. This self-identification is taken up by Mr. Rafiel and is also largely the leitmotif of the novel.

action

In his will, Rafiel bequeathed Miss Marple £ 20,000 for solving a past crime. He does not give any clues about the crime, only an instruction to visit various British mansions and gardens with a tour group. From Elizabeth Temple, a former director of a girls' school, Miss Marple learns that a student, Verity, was murdered 10 years ago - apparently by Rafiel's son.

After much laboriously collected clues, Miss Marple discovers that the crime was committed out of disappointed love. However, the act was not committed by a man, but by a woman on her adult adopted daughter. Clotilde Bardbury-Scott loved Verity beyond the normal mother-daughter relationship. She couldn't stand Verity wanting to leave her for a young man, Michael Rafiel. That was the motive for the murder.

Clotilde had first murdered another girl, Nora Broad, and made it unrecognizable. She then identified the body as her adopted daughter, Verity. She had previously poisoned it and buried it in the garden to have with her forever.

Michael Rafiel is released from prison and Miss Marple receives her inheritance bonus.

people

  • Miss Marple, the amateur detective
  • Jason Rafiel, recently deceased millionaire
  • Michael Rafiel, his son
  • Broadribb and Schuster, his lawyers
  • Mrs. Sandbourne, the tour guide
  • Mrs. Riseley-Porter, a fellow traveler
  • Joanna Crawford, her niece
  • Emlyn Price, a young anarchist
  • Miss Cooke and Miss Barrow, two mysterious fellow travelers
  • Professor Wanstead, a psychologist
  • Elizabeth Temple, a former school principal
  • Richard Jameson, an architect
  • Mr. Caspar, a foreign tourist
  • Miss Lumley and Mildred Bentham, two elderly fellow travelers
  • Colonel Walker and Mrs. Walker, a married couple
  • Mr. and Mrs. HT Butler, an American couple
  • Clotilde Bradbury-Scott, Anthea Bradbury-Scott and Lavinia Glynne, three sisters who invite Miss Marple to their home
  • Archdeacon Brabazon, a friend of Elizabeth Temple

Film adaptations

Miss Marple (1987)

In 1987 the novel was made into a film for the BBC TV series Miss Marple . The main role is played by Joan Hickson as Miss Marple.

Agatha Christie's Marple (2007)

In 2007 the novel was made into a film for the third season of the television series Agatha Christie's Marple with Geraldine McEwan as Miss Marple, although the plot and the characters were greatly changed.

Major expenses

  • 1971 Collins Crime Club (London), November 1971, hardcover, 256 pages
  • 1971 Dodd Mead and Company (New York)
  • 1972 German first edition Scherzverlag (Bern, Munich, Vienna) in the translation by Claudia Persson, which is still used today

Audio books

  • 2003 Das Schicksal in Person (5 CDs): only unabridged reading. Speaker: Ursula Illert. Director: Hans Eckardt. Translation by Claudia Persson: Publishing house and studio for audio book productions (Marburg / Lahn)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. Chris Peers, Ralph Spurrier and Jamie Sturgeon. Collins Crime Club - A checklist of First Editions . Dragonby Press (Second Edition) March 1999 (Page 15)
  2. John Cooper and BA Pyke. Detective Fiction - the collector's guide : Second Edition (Pages 82 and 87) Scholar Press. 1994. ISBN 0-85967-991-8
  3. American Tribute to Agatha Christie
  4. a b German first edition in the catalog of the German National Library
  5. The Fate Personified by Agatha Christie. Retrieved October 15, 2017 .