Book Fever
By Marcia Loy January 11, 2008 San Miguel de Allende
I’m fond of Hercule Poirot, but it’s Miss Marple I love
Agatha Christie is a master of the art of the cozy murder story told briskly, vivaciously, and with ever fertile imagination.
Manchester Evening News
Of all the classic British mystery writers, Agatha Christie remains my favorite. I love her stories, her characters and settings. I am very fond of Hercule Poirot, but it’s Miss Marple I love. As I recall, so did Christie herself. The Mysterious Affair at Styles was her first and in many ways, one of her best. So was A Pocketful of Rye. Neither of these is in the library, so I’ll recommend books that are. I hardly ever guess the identity of the murderer(s), although I constantly consider the possibilities. If by chance I cotton to the killer, it’s usually for the wrong reason, or they have a co-conspirator I never guess. All books mentioned in this column are in the library.
A Caribbean Mystery, 1964. Jane Marple goes on vacation to an island in the Caribbean and is listening to Major Palgrave drone on about his adventures in India. Then she realizes he’s switched locales and is talking about murders when he looks over his shoulder and stops. When he’s found dead that night she wishes she’d paid more attention.
Excerpt: Her eyes strayed to Mr. Rafiel’s table. The principal thing to know about Mr. Rafiel was that he was incredibly rich, he came every year to the West Indies, he was semi-paralyzed and looked like a wrinkled old bird of prey. . . . His eyes were shrewd and he was frequently rude, but people seldom took offence, partly because he was so rich, and partly because of his overwhelming personality, which hypnotized you into feeling that somehow, Mr. Rafiel had the right to be rude if he wanted to be.
Murder in Mesopotamia, 1935. The setting is an archeological dig in the Middle East. Dr. Leidner has hired a nurse (the narrator of the story) to look after his wife. He’s worried about her because, in his words, she suffers from “fits of recurring nervous terrors.” No one takes her fears seriously until she’s murdered. Hercule Poirot, Christie’s Belgian detective, uses his “little grey cells” to discover the murderer. As usual, there are many suspects.
Excerpt: “Flight-Lieutenant Jervis and I rode over the other day. It was in the morning. Most of them were up on the dig. [Mrs. Leidner] was sitting writing a letter and I suppose she didn’t hear us coming. The boy who brings you in wasn’t about for once, and we came straight up on to the verandah. Apparently she saw Flight-Lieutenant Jervis’s shadow thrown on the wall—and she fairly screamed! Apologized, of course. Said she thought it was a strange man. A bit odd, that. I mean, even if it was a strange man, why get the wind up?”
A Murder is Announced, 1950. Here’s another Miss Marple mystery. This one takes place in the deliciously named village of Chipping Cleghorn. An advertisement appears in the local paper, announcing a murder will take place at the home of Letitia Blacklock at 6:30 that evening. Naturally several of her friends and neighbors just happen to drop by that evening—6:30 comes, the lights go out and—
Excerpt: “How that reminds me of my old Nannie! Where was Moses when the light went out? The answer, of course, “In the Dark.” Just like us yesterday evening. All standing about and wondering what was going to happen. And then you know, the thrill when it suddenly went pitch black. And the door opening—just a dim figure standing there with a revolver and that blinding light and a menacing voice saying ‘Your money or your life.!’ Oh, I’ve never enjoyed anything so much. And then a minute later, of course, it was all dreadful. Real bullets, just whistling past our ears! It must have been just like the Commandos in the war.”
Peril at End House, 1931. Hercule Poirot and his faithful friend, Arthur Hastings, are on a week’s holiday, staying at the Majestic Hotel on the Cornish coast. Poirot has retired from his life of solving crimes. However, they quickly meet a pretty young woman whose life is in danger. This one’s a dilly.
Excerpt: He held out his hand with a small object in the palm of it.
“A spent bullet, mon ami. It was that which hit the terrace just now when we were talking. A spent bullet!”
“You mean—”
“I mean that one inch of a difference and that hole would not be through the hat but through the head. Now do you see why I am interested, Hastings? . . . Ah! but he made a grave mistake, that would-be murderer, when he shot at his victim within a dozen yards of Hercule Poirot! For him, it is indeed la mauvaise chance. But you see now why we must make our entry into End House and get into touch with Mademoiselle? Three escapes from death in three days. That’s what she said. We must act quickly, Hastings. The peril is very close at hand.”
Nemesis, 1971. In this mystery, Jane Marple encounters the strange Mr. Rafiel, whom she first met on a Caribbean holiday. This time he’s left her £20,000 in his will and he wants her to investigate a crime. The problem is he doesn’t tell her what crime but sends her off on a bus tour of famous houses with sixteen other passengers.
Excerpt (Miss Marple asks herself why Mr. Rafiel sent her on this tour.): Is it for some geographical or territorial reason? A connection or a clue? Some particular famous house? Or something involving some particular garden or landscape connected? This seems unlikely. The more likely explanation lies in the people or one of the people on this particular coach party. None of them is known to me personally, but one of them at least must be connected with the riddle I have to solve. Somebody among our group is connected or concerned with a murder. Somebody has information or a special link with the victim of a crime, or someone personally himself or herself is a murderer—a murderer as yet unsuspected.
Marcia Loy is a member of the steering committee of the Authors’ Sala and a volunteer at the Biblioteca Pública. She can be reached at marciabookfever@hotmail.com.
When you can’t go home
By Pat Hirschl
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PEN Winter Lecture Series Diana Anhalt Tues, Jan 15, 6pm Auditorio Miguel Malo Bellas Artes Hernandez Macías 75 50 pesos |
Citizens of the US expect political refugees to come from Cuba or Libya. Self-imposed exiles from the US, fleeing for safety to, of all places, Mexico, are a surprise. Yet, that is exactly what next Tuesday’s talk will be about. Mexico: Haven or Last Resort kicks off the PEN winter lecture series and tells the story of political refugees from the US settling in Mexico.
| The author, Diana Anhalt, a longtime resident of Mexico City, is the author of A Gathering of Fugitives: Voices of American Political Expatriates in Mexico 1948-1965, which has been translated into Spanish. Her articles, book reviews and poetry have been published in English and Spanish in both Mexico and the US. | |
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Anhalt reports: “I write about my childhood for the same reason some people visit cemeteries: to reconcile ourselves with the past, to let the dead know we forgive them and in the hope of finding answers to questions left unanswered.
“My parents died a few years ago, before they got around to telling me why we had precipitously left New York City in 1950 and a secure, if not prosperous, life for an uncertain future in Mexico. Of course, by then, I already had some idea as to their motives. Many years earlier a fellow student at the American School in Mexico City had announced to a group of classmates as we changed shoes after gym, ‘My parents say her parents are communists,’ and, no, I was not terribly surprised.
“From the late forties through the early sixties, popularly referred to as the McCarthy era, Mexico became, for a number of reasons, a refuge for a diversified group of political expatriates—some notorious, some obscure. As the US grew increasingly hostile to communism, the liberal left and New Deal politics, expatriates drifted south. Some were there so briefly, Mexico left little more than faint fingerprints in their memories. Others had their bones planted in Mexican soil, while the majority stayed for years, traveling full circle to eventually return to the country they had abandoned.
“Who were they? Why did they leave the US? How did they adapt to Mexico? How did Mexico and the US react to them? Where are they now? A Gathering of Fugitives is about that small band of Americans who chose Mexico as either a temporary or permanent home and it is my personal attempt to better understand and come to terms with my past.”
The San Miguel chapter of PEN International sponsors its winter lecture series both to publicize important books and ideas and to raise money for its work. Locally, PEN scholarships pay for tuition and books for students with limited resources. PEN Internacional helps authors who are in trouble because of their writing throughout the world. Beginning January 15, the lectures continue every Tuesday through March 4, at 6pm in the Bellas Artes auditorium. Admission is 50 pesos. For further information: lucina.kathmann@gmail.com or 152-0614.
Pat Hirschl is a former editor of The Prudent Planner, a financial services newsletter which was quoted in Money magazine and most recently of Logros, CASA’s newsletter.
Stories from the frontline
By Bill Pearlman
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Lecture Series PEN Writers Aloud Lucina Kathman Thurs, Jan 17, 4pm Sala Quetzal Biblioteca Pública Insurgentes 25 |
The San Miguel PEN Writers Aloud series presents Lucina Kathmann. Kathmann will tell stories about Latin American and African writers she has met through her work in International PEN, and she will read (in English) delightful short texts they have written. Most of these texts are unavailable in English; Lucina has translated them as part of her PEN work.
Born in the US, Lucina Kathmann has lived in San Miguel for 30 years. In her position as an International Vice President of International PEN, the largest worldwide writers association, she travels around the world meeting writers working in interesting and dangerous situations. At home in San Miguel, she is the mother of eight children, six of whom she and her partner, writer Charles Kuschinski (who died in 1996) inherited one night 19 years ago when her best friend died in childbirth. Stories by both of them from their family life appear in the new Authors’ Sala anthology, Solamente en San Miguel. In addition, Kathmann has recently published three books with bilingual editions from a university publisher in Salta, Argentina. A fourth book is expected in February or March, 2008.
Bill Pearlman coordinates the PEN Writers Aloud series. For more information, write to
bdpearl@yahoo.com.
Popular Mexican sayings
By Geoff Hargreaves
A regular glance at the popular wisdom of Mexico.
El que nace para maceta, del corredor no pasa. (literally, the one who is born to be a plant-pot never gets out of the hallway.) A somewhat fatalistic view of human nature.
However, it serves as a caution against reckless optimism about human potential. It is also a warning to the infatuated not to think that their love will convert frogs into princes.
It won’t. A plant-pot never transcends its natural surroundings.
Dos agujas no se pican. (Two needles don’t prick each other.) Sharp or unscrupulous people are cautious in the presence of similarly sharp people and limit their aggressiveness, for fear of retaliation. But, in fact, there’s little honor among thieves. Given the slightest chance, they’ll prey on each other with the ruthlessness they prey on the innocent.
Éramos muchos y parió la abuela. (We were many and the grandmother gave birth.) This is a way of saying “That’s all we needed!” The family already had more mouths than it could feed and then, at her advanced age, Granny went and produced yet another child. In other words, the straw that broke the camel’s back. A less colorful, more literal way to state this predicament is the ironical saying, No me faltaba más. (That’s the only thing I was lacking!)
Vestir santos. (To put clothes on saints.) The statues of saints in English-speaking churches come equipped with their plaster clothes, painted in permanent colors. In Mexican churches, the clothes are detachable and renewable, according to the requirements of the religious calendar. Some sacred figures end up being little more than a tiny face surrounded by masses of embroidered fabrics. Women who had no families to care for traditionally took charge of changing the saintly wardrobes. To say that a woman was destined “to put clothes on saints” became a way of saying she was unlikely ever to marry. However, unmarried women were not long in coming back with an apt riposte: Más vale vestir santos que desvestir borrachos. (It’s better to be putting clothes on saints than taking clothes off drunken (husbands).)