The murderous tea round
The Murderous Tea Round (Original title Problem at Pollensa Bay and Other Stories ) is a collection of short stories by Agatha Christie , which was published in November 1991 in the United Kingdom by HarperCollins . The collection was not published in the USA because all the stories it contained had been published there earlier.
The German first edition was published by Scherz Verlag in 1993 in a translation by Karl H. Schneider.
The original contains eight short stories, two with Hercule Poirot , two with Harley Quin and two with Parker Pyne. Two short stories are missing from the German translation.
It was not until 2011 that the 80th volume of The Official Collection Agatha Christie, published by the French publisher Hachette Collections , was translated into German by Heike Steffen. The collection was given the different title Paradies Pollensa .
The stories
The murderous tea round
(Original title The Harlequin Tea Set )
Remarks
A story with Mr. Satterthwaite and Mr. Harley Quin that the reader knows from The Strange Mister Quin .
Paradise Pollensa
(Original title Problem at Pollensa Bay )
Remarks
It identifies Parker Pyne in one of the two short stories that are not in the anthology Parker Pyne Determined .
First publication in the UK
Problem at Pollensa Bay : November 1935 - Strand Magazine issue 539.
The stumbling block
(Original title The Regatta Mystery )
Remarks
It identifies Parker Pyne in one of the two short stories that are not in the anthology Parker Pyne Determined .
For the first publication in a book, which appeared only in the USA in 1939 under the title The Regatta Mystery , the author replaced Hercule Poirot with Parker Pyne.
First publication in the UK
The Regatta Mystery : June 1936 - Strand Magazine issue 546 (entitled Poirot and the Regatta Mystery ). (The Strand Magazine publication remained the only publication of the original until 2008, until the issue of Hercule Poirot: the Complete Short Stories ( ISBN 978-0006513773 ).)
Let flowers speak
(Original title Yellow Iris )
action
One evening the detective Hercule Poirot receives a call from a woman who thinks she is in danger. Thereupon he goes to the "Jardin des Cygnes" to meet her at a table with a yellow iris on it. Once there, he sees that five people are sitting at the table, including Poirot's friend Tony Chapell, who asks him to join them. As it soon turns out, the guests remember Barton Russell's wife Iris, who was poisoned exactly four years earlier under mysterious circumstances in a similar scenario. When the room darkens because a show is about to begin, Barton Russel gets up and leaves the table in order - as it turns out later - to return under cover of darkness and to poison Pauline, who had asked Poirot for help. Thanks to Poirot's intervention, nothing happens to her.
First publication in the UK
Yellow Iris : July 1937 - Strand Magazine issue 559.
Film adaptations
Adapted and filmed in season 5 for the English television series Agatha Christie's Poirot with David Suchet as Poirot, Hugh Fraser as Hastings, Philip Jackson as Japp and Pauline Moran as Miss Lemon. Also using Sparkling Cyanide motifs.
References to other works
On the basis of this short story with Hercule Poirot , the author later wrote the novel hydrogen cyanide . She replaced Poirot with Colonel Race and made some other changes, but the similarities in the choice of motifs cannot be overlooked.
The watch was a witness
(Original title The Love Detectives )
Remarks
A story with Mr. Satterthwaite and Mr. Harley Quin that the reader knows from The Strange Mister Quin .
It was the first in a series of six short stories that appeared in The Story-Teller magazine under the title The Magic of Mr. Quin . The other five were published in The Strange Mister Quin Collection in 1930 .
First publication in the UK
The Love Detectives : December 1926 - The Story-Teller issue 236 (under the title At the Crossroads ).
The Second Gong
(Not yet translated into German.)
Remarks
Hercule Poirot is investigating .
First publication in the UK
The Second Gong : June 1932 - Strand Magazine issue 499.
References to other works
In 1937, the author expanded this short story into a short novel Punctuality can kill (original title Dead Man's Mirror ).
A dog's life
(Original title Next To A Dog )
First publication in the UK
Next To A Dog : September 1929 - Grand Magazine Issue 295.
Magnolia flowers
(Original title: Magnolia Blossom )
A fortnight ago Vincent Easton met and fell in love with Theodora Darrell, a married woman. He describes her like a magnolia blossom and her first kiss like the scent of a magnolia tree. Now he is waiting for her in Victoria Station to start a future together with her. You reach Dover.
There Theodora learns from the evening papers that her husband Richard's company has collapsed. She decides to go back to her husband. After a few days he confesses to her that the bankruptcy will also have criminal consequences. Theodora decides to stay with him anyway. That same evening he explains to her that the matter could be swept under the table if he got certain papers - papers that Vincent Easton currently has.
Since it is a matter of life and death, he tells Theo to get the papers from Vincent this evening. Vincent hands her the documents and Theo immediately burns them in the fireplace.
Vincent then decides to leave the country. Back at home, Richard insinuates that she paid Vincent something in return for handing over the papers, an insinuation that hurts her deeply.
Theo admits that she had left with Vincent and immediately makes it clear that she will never forgive her husband for having "sold" them today just to save his skin. Theo leaves her husband and goes into solitude.
The story ends with the sentence: "In front of the window something fluttered to the ground: the last petal of the magnolia, soft and fragrant."
First publication in the UK
Magnolia Blossom : March 1926 - Royal Magazine issue 329.
Film adaptations
This short story was filmed for the ten-part television series Agatha Christie Hour and aired as the sixth episode on October 12, 1982 for the first time.
The German version of the book
The stories Next To A Dog and Magnolia Blossom are missing from the German edition of Scherz Verlag . And instead of the original short story The Second Gong , the short novel, which has been expanded by the author, is also printed, Punctuality can kill .
Important issues of the collection
- November 1991, Problem at Pollensa Bay and Other Stories , HarperCollins (United Kingdom)
- 1993, The Murderous Tea Round , Scherz Verlag (German first edition)
Web links
- Problem at Pollensa Bay and Other Stories on the official Agatha Christie website
Individual evidence
- ^ German first edition in the catalog of the German National Library
- ↑ Volume 80 The official collection Agatha Christie on pressekatalog.de ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Yellow Iris (1993) in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- ↑ Magnolia Blossom (1982) in the Internet Movie Database (English)
