Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie (1937)

Been a hot minute since I read Murder on the Orient Express, but I've decided to continue my Agatha Christie journey to go along with the new adaptations done by Branagh that have been coming out with him in the titular role of Hercule Poirot. This time, its Death on the Nile from 1937.

For my thoughts and review on Orient Express, you can read my other post here: Book Club 2018.

Because my last Christie was years ago, I'm not sure if I'm just coming at with different eyes now, or more experience from reading so many things from different time periods for my graduate program - but I remember one of my personal gripes about Orient Express being that I didn't like the writing... and yet, I found I enjoyed Death on the Nile just fine. I didn't struggle with the writing like my younger self did (haha, only a few years, but still). It is an interesting observation to be sure.

I found Nile less hard to follow than Orient Express in terms of characters, events, and the facts of the murder being revealed. Some of the family dynamics were hard to track because some of the references used first name and then last name in other instances for the same character. Had to map it out a little for myself and use nicknames to tell people apart in my notes.

Unlike Orient Express, I didn't try and guess who the murderer was when it happened in the book; I just let it unfold. However, I wasn't surprised by who it ended up being. I think in Nile, the murderer made more sense to me than the multiple murderers converging in a weird series of events like in Orient Express. But again, Poirot was his same old self and pieced everything together.

Branagh's adaptation is from 2022 and starts with a flashback to WWI in which we learn about Poirot's fiancé and the injury he sustains from an explosion. Again, this is a deviation from the book that was also present at the start of the Orient Express film - a deepening of the character that would potentially take multiple books to piece together if this information is even present in them.

While Nile is still serious, there is a bit more of a ridiculous flair to it because of the love triangle situation happening with Linnet, Simon, and Jackie. On the other hand, Poirot felt more... grounded in this film to me than Orient Express. I think it is because the audience learns about his lost love and that ties into the love triangle and all its ups and downs.

Again, book Death on the Nile has way more characters than the film can accommodate, so there are more character combos and changes in this one. There is no military presence like in book; no search for another suspect accused of a different crime which is supposed to throw off the scent of the real murderer, and the crew of the ship is way less (almost nonexistently) involved in the plot of events. All of this is ok, because the one change they did in making the Otterbournes African American was one of my favourites!

My one big gripe about the film was the massive OMISSION of the significance of the sound of the splash heard in the night during the events of the murder. It was a integral part of how Hercule put together the pieces and it was just *not* a thing in the film. That annoyed me even though I am fully aware that certain concessions must be made when adapting a text.

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I'm going to round out my Agathe Christie readings with Hallowe'en Party from 1969 and its "loosely based" adaptation A Haunting in Venice from 2023. You'll have to watch out for that post when I finally get around to reading and watching. I've got a lot to catch up in my TBR pile.

ENGL 817AL - Field Notes: Literature as Artificiality

In Aspects of the Novel, E.M. Forster writes:

"In daily life we never understand each other, neither complete clairvoyance nor complete confessional exists. We know each other approximately, by external signs, and these serve well enough as a basis for society and even for intimacy. But people in a novel can be understood completely by the reader, if the novelist wishes; their inner as well as their outer life can be exposed. And this is why they often seem more definite than [Pg 74]characters in history, or even our own friends; we have been told all about them that can be told; even if they are imperfect or unreal they do not contain any secrets, whereas our friends do and must, mutual secrecy being one of the conditions of life upon this globe."

This passage stuck with me... like profoundly.

He writes about how that not only do/can characters have a totality that is outlined and provided by the author, but that characters, in some ways, are (possibly) more full beings than we are in reality. 

We will never know as much about the people in our daily lives and real life that we will about the fictional people on the pages of the books we read. This could potentially even apply to ourselves—our inner selves—as there are many aspects about ourselves that we refuse to outwardly show or even personally acknowledge. We play parts, we put on false facades, we act, we perform roles; all parts of ourselves that are as artificial as the made-up people detailed in words.

Do we even know our own real selves as those characters in books?

I mean, ok, book characters aren't self aware, but there is no question about if they do or do not know things about themselves. It is implied that whatever there is to know, the author knows, and they let the character come out of the page. Real People do not do that. As Forster states, "mutual secrecy" is a requirement of reality. We are about as real as the artificial people made up of words. And yet, in ways, they are more real than us.

It is a circular logic that can keep going and going and I'm going to be thinking about it for a long time...

ENGL 817AL - Field Notes: Yellowface by R.F. Kuang

Here we go again! Another class - and my last one (shock!) - and another one where I'm doing field notes about what we're reading in the class: my thoughts, feelings, mini analysis, and how it all applies to my academics and the world around me. I've got this!

I started off the semester, like I usually do, reading a book ahead for the semester because it makes my life easier balancing grad school and a full-time job. Yellowface was not what I expected, to say the least. And, I kind of have two steams of thought going on about the book: an academic analysis stream and a personal feelings stream.

Let's start with the academic jumble of thoughts.

In keeping with the theme of the class which is about - in very broad strokes - literary creations of the mind as an artificial act, I noticed a pattern of the characters in Yellowface impersonating, or disguising themselves as the dead Athena Liu. The digital spheres of Twitter and Instagram are being used by others to disguise themselves as Athena's ghost to terrorize Juniper into confronting her guilt and questioning her own reality.

Example #1 - Geoff uses the Twitter handle @AthenaLiusGhost to rouse the Twitterverse into harassing and attacking Juniper because he is trying to out her for stealing Athena's work and publishing The Last Front without acknowledging Athena's contribution or initial authorship of it.

Example #2 - Candice (questionable in itself) activates Athena's old Instagram account that was deactivated after her death and starts posting creepily altered photos of Athena and targeting Juniper again to terrorize her into admitting her guilt over the publication of The Last Front and Mother Witch. 

In both examples, people who are not Athena are using the digital spaces of social media to artificially disguise themselves and impersonate the dead Athena. This is all very questionable and morally hazy. What right do either Geoff or Candice have to think that it is okay to impersonate a dead person with the specific goal to try and get Juniper to admit to plagiarism?

Another example of this Athena-in-disguise situation is when Juniper confronts Diana Qiu in the street and accuses her of being the one who has been stalking and digitally harassing her. Juniper's reality is so warped with guilt and grief at this point that as the confrontation takes place, the layers of the artificially imposed image/disguise of Athena onto Diana become reality and fall away to reveal the truth that Diana was not a part of it at all. 

Obviously, Juniper also does her own disguising herself as Athena with the writing and publishing of the books. Juniper eventually confronts her own issues - not in a good way though - and spins it to still make herself out to be the victim. Juniper also does the work of sleuthing out and confronting both Geoff and Candice in the real world. Their digital impersonations were untouchable due to the relative anonymity of social media, but in reality, Juniper is able to control the situation with Geoff, and only eventually finds a way to get the better of Candice with a future plan to play the victim again.

This whole pattern of artificial disguise was an interesting thread to follow through the book and look at examples. The biggest question from it being: Is it ethical or moral to impersonate a dead person in a digital space where there is little to no accountability to the harm you are doing to that person's image or legacy and other people you may be trying to hurt?

Now, my personal feelings assessment is much less analytical.

I personally struggled with this book. While I couldn't put it down, I did find that I had some very visceral reactions to it. First, I am a rule follower, so the fact that Juniper plagiarizes her dead friend's book and pass it off as her own really rubbed me the wrong way. I could NEVER.

I am fully aware that rules are these arbitrary things that were made up by society to facilitate a certain social order, but to just flagrantly disobey them as Juniper does because she is jealous and wants the fame is intense! And then to stick to her guns about it the authenticity! I... just... I struggled to have any sympathy for her character. Which I guess might be sort of the point. There will be those readers who support what she did: "It was different enough, as she explained." But I am definitely a detractor. I can't relate to the situation.

I can see the avenue in which Juniper did what she did and believes what she has done is in the best interest of the art and Athena's legacy - but I just would have never put myself in that position in the first place. Again, I can't relate to the situation.

Maybe this book needs to sit with me more. 

Maybe I need to hear more about it from my classmates. 

Maybe I'll look at it differently. 

Maybe...