The Murder of Roger Ackroyd: A Review, and Then Some
I read Agatha Christie’s The Murder of Roger Ackroyd over the weekend and even though the ending had been rudely spoiled for me just the week before by a stumbled-upon article online, I couldn’t put it down. Luckily, I didn’t have many other commitments for the weekend!
What follows is my SPOILER FREE review of Agatha Christie’s most famous novel, plus some extra tidbits and factoids, like where you can watch an adaptation of this book, why it was so controversial when it was published, and a few of the best quotes from the book.
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The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
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My Review of The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
Summary
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd begins with a murder that leads to a suicide, which leads to another murder. The narrator of the story is a village doctor who lives with his sister, the town gossip. The siblings’ new neighbor just happens to be none other than the recently “retired” detective, Hercule Poirot. (We can allow ourselves a little chuckle over this last point, since The Murder of Roger Ackroyd was only the 4th in what was to become a series of 39 novels Christie wrote for her famed Belgian detective! Retired, indeed.)
Roger Ackroyd is found murdered in his study just a day after his fiance is found to have committed suicide. He confides in Dr. Sheppard and reveals to him a tale of poison, blackmail, and secrets, only for the doctor to discover him stabbed to death that same night. All the evidence points to Mr. Ackroyd’s missing stepson, who is nowhere to be found.
Dr. Sheppard keeps a journal recording the entire story as it happens, including the details of Poirot’s investigation of his friend Mr. Ackroyd’s murder, never guessing that Poirot would actually solve the case. He plays the part of Poirot’s sidekick in this case and is compared a few times by Poirot to his dear friend Captain Hastings, who has gone off on his own adventures at this point in the Poirot canon. (Since the BBC Poirot series includes Captain Hastings so often, it’s easy to forget how early Agatha Christie phased him out.)
My Thoughts
I did not want to stop reading this book, even though I knew the identity of the murderer before I even started. In a way, it was almost more fun to read it this way, since I was fascinated and enthralled by how Poirot would follow the clues and how he orchestrated the characters like a brilliant puppeteer. He sized up a character’s tendencies and weak spots and used them to gain information; it was brilliant to watch unfold.
A Poirot novel is never without its share of humor, and what had me chuckling most in this book was Christie’s treatment of “gossip”. Gossip becomes almost a character in its own right in this story. Poirot understands the nature of the small town and its gossip mills. He knows just which characters to ask which questions and knows how to put a bug in one person’s ear in a way that would ensure it would end in another’s. People telling others every detail of what they know during a murder investigation might be some detectives’ bane, but Poirot amusedly uses the rumor mill to his advantage in gathering clues and misdirecting certain players’ suspicions.
Agatha Christie avoided a potential plot hole here by using gossip in this way. Without it, the reader might have thought, “no way, I know this kind of small town, I know how this works, that information would be all over town by now”. By giving gossip an important role in the story telling, Christie solved the problems that might have been created if she’d just hoped the reader wouldn’t think too hard about it.
Funnier still was Dr. Sheppard’s despising of his sister’s profundity toward gossip, eye rolling at her tales at every turn, but then himself engaging in the gossip in every conversation with her and others. He didn’t even realize his own entrenched pension for rumor.
Why Was The Murder of Roger Ackroyd Controversial?
This book is hard to discuss without spoilers, but I’m going to do my best! I’d hate for someone to accidentally see the answer to this mystery when they’ve yet to read it for themselves.
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, while an instant success when it was published, also caused quite a bit of controversy in the Golden Age of Detective Fiction, when whodunnits were supposed to follow certain rules. Because of the identity of the murderer in this particular case, and the fact that one important clue was added so near to the end, people thought this novel didn’t play fair. They argued that the point of detective fiction is for the reader to be able to figure out the solution, and so certain types of twists were off limits.
I don’t agree, and neither do most fans of today. Christie’s twist in this novel was a stroke of brilliance, and when read through again, once you already know the solution, one will notice that all the clues really are there. I, for one, do not like to be able to easily guess the solution before the end, but maybe that’s just me. I’d much rather be surprised.
Why Was This Agatha Christie’s Most Famous Novel?
We all know how it goes. The more people talk about something, the better it sells. All publicity is good publicity, right? Was this what happened here? While The Murder of Roger of Ackroyd was one of Agatha Christie’s personal favorites of all her books, and is still one of the best selling today, I have to wonder if the controversy is what really pushed it into the limelight.
Whether or not this was the case, it was the catalyst for Agatha Christie’s rise to fame, so we can all be glad its success made the publication of all the books that came after this one possible!
My Favorite Quotes from the Novel:
I dog eared some pages (don’t tell any librarians!) so I could find a few of my favorite quotes to share here. A couple of these made me laugh out loud.
After putting his arm into a dirty pond to retrieve a clue, Dr. Sheppard thought Poirot had come up empty. Poirot’s response:
“‘My good friend,’ he said gently and reproachfully, ‘Hercule Poirot does not run the risk of disarranging his costume without being sure of attaining his object. To do so would be ridiculous and absurd. I am never ridiculous’”
It’s made funnier by the fact that Poirot is often described as ridiculous by characters who have encountered him for the first time.
On a more serious note, when opining to his journal on the case, Dr. Sheppard writes,
“Everyone had a hand in the elucidation of the mystery. It was rather like a jig-saw puzzle to which everyone contributed their own little piece of knowledge or discovery. But their task ended there. To Poirot alone belongs the renown of fitting those pieces into their correct place.”
We all know how much Poirot can despise the outdoors. He likes his creature comforts and wants everything to be just so. When the doctor visits him at home and finds the air hot and stifling, Poirot says,
“The English people, they have a mania for the fresh air. The big air, it is all very well outside, where it belongs. Why admit it to the house?””
And finally, we get a small ode to Captain Hastings, when Poirot tells the doctor about him, says that he has moments when he greatly longs for his friend and how many times Hastings helped him solve a case:
“For he had a knack, that one, of stumbling over the truth unawares — without noticing it himself, bien entendu. At times, he has said soemthing particularly foolish, and behold the foolish remark has revealed the truth to me!”
Talk about a backhanded compliment, eh?
Want More Ackroyd?
There is currently no full length theater-style movie of Christie’s most famous novel, but there is of course an excellent adaptation of it as part of the BBC series Agatha Christie’s Poirot. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd can be found in season 7, episode 1. You can watch several seasons of this show on Amazon Prime with a Britbox subscription, but sadly, season 7 is not currently one of them. However, every library I’ve ever patronized has had all of the Poirot seasons on DVD, and you can of course purchase the DVDs of the series as well.
Could there be a movie coming?
Due to one line in the most recent Poirot movie starring and directed by Kenneth Branaugh, Death on the Nile, a movie version of the novel might be in the works. The line was something about vegetable marrows and in the book, Poirot has retired to the quiet village to grow vegetable marrows.
Some fans think this might be a clue, since Death on the Nile was hinted at at the end of its preceding Poirot film, Murder on the Orient Express. One the other hand, Branaugh has said the next one will take place in post-War Venice and will be based on one of the lesser known novels, so that leaves some doubt. I guess we’ll see!
Audio Books and Adaptations
You can listen to the entire audiobook of The Murder of Roger Ackroyd on Audible! You can also listen to the dramatized radio versions of this and 7 other cases in Poirot’s Finest Cases. The BBC radio dramas of Agatha Christie’s stories are so well done and are some of my favorite things to listen to on road trips.
Poirot’s Finest Cases
Listen to dramatized versions of 8 of Poirot’s best cases with an Audible subscription!
What are your thoughts on The Murder of Roger Ackroyd? Do you think Agatha Christie cheated with this particular twist? Let me know your thoughts!
Until next time,
Ariadne
P.S. I do not enable comments on individual articles, but I do encourage Letters to the Editor! Please know that your thoughts may be included an article featuring these letters at some point down the road, though your email address will be kept confidential, of course.
