Sleeping Murder
Encyclopedia
Sleeping Murder: Miss Marple's Last Case is a work of detective fiction
by Agatha Christie
and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club
in October 1976
and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company
later in the same year. The UK edition retailed for £3.50 and the US edition for $
7.95. The book features her detective
Miss Marple
, and was the final Christie novel published—posthumously—although it was not the last she wrote.
It is generally believed that Christie wrote Sleeping Murder and Curtain
during World War II
to be published after her death, and that Sleeping Murder was most probably written sometime during the Blitz
, which took place between September 1940 and May 1941. John Curran argues in his book Agatha Christie's Secret Notebooks that Sleeping Murder was still being planned at the end of the 1940s and the beginning of the 1950s.
However,this argument is not supported by Janet Morgan in her biography Agatha Christie or by Laura Thompson in her biography Agatha Christie: An English Mystery; both biographers contend Sleeping Murder was written in 1940. Jared Cade provides further detailed proof of this in the 2011 expanded edition of his biography Agatha Christie and the Eleven Missing Days. The correspondence files of Christie's literary agents, Edmund Cork and Harold Ober, currently held at Exeter University in Devon, show that the original manuscript of Sleeping Murder was entitled Murder in Retrospect after one of the chapters in the book. On 7 June 1940 Edmund Cork wrote to Christie advising her that he would have the necessary 'deed of gift' drawn up so her husband Max would become the owner of the unpublished Miss Marple novel. Christie eventually visited Edmund Cork’s offices at 40 Fleet Street, London, on 14 October 1940 and signed the document transferring ownership of the copyright of Murder in Retrospect to her husband in consideration of what was termed her ‘natural love and affection for him’. This was before Christie’s American publishers appropriated the title for Five Little Pigs in 1942 (a year ahead of the release of the UK edition that retained the nursery-rhyme title). Christie duly renamed the Miss Marple novel Cover Her Face. One of Christie's notebooks contain references to Cover Her Face under ‘Plans for Sept. 1947’ and ‘Plans for Nov. 1948’, suggesting she was considering revising the unpublished manuscript. But both Jared Cade and Janet Morgan state these alterations did not occur until early 1950. After drafting most of the book that became Mrs McGinty’s Dead and thinking about plans for another Mary Westmacott novel, Christie wrote to Edmund Cork from Nimrud saying that, as she was well ahead of her normal writing schedule, she had gone over the Miss Marple novel thoroughly, ‘as a lot of it seemed to have dated very much’. She had removed all the political references and remarks that emphasized the period, although she stressed that the story must remain set in the 1930s, as so much of the action depended on houses with plentiful servants, ample pre-war meals and so on. She observed that it was especially catchwords and particular phrases that seemed to make a book old-fashioned. On rereading this one she thought it was quite good, and she added, somewhat facetiously, she was not sure her writing talents hadn’t gone downhill since then. Following the publication of P.D. James’s début crime novel Cover Her Face in 1962, Christie became aware of the need to think up yet another title for her Miss Marple book; she duly wrote to Edmund Cork on 17 July 1972 asking him to send her a copy of the unpublished Miss Marple manuscript and a copy of Max's deed of gift. So much time had passed that she was unable to remember if the manuscript was still called Cover Her Face or She Died Young.
On page 509 of her autobiography Christie refers to the last Poirot and Miss Marple novels that she penned during the Second World War by saying she had written an extra two books during the first years of the war in anticipation of her being killed in the raids, which seemed to be in the highest degree likely as she was working in London. One was for Rosalind, she says, which she wrote first – a book with Hercule Poirot in it – and the other was for Max – with Miss Marple in it. She adds that these two books, after being composed, were put in the vaults of a bank, and were made over formally by deed of gift to her daughter and husband.
Unlike Curtain, which concludes the career of her other famous detective Hercule Poirot
, there is nothing in the text of Sleeping Murder which indicates it is Marple's last case.
The last Marple novel Christie wrote, Nemesis, was published in 1971, followed by Christie's last Poirot novel Elephants Can Remember
in 1972 and then in 1973 by her very last novel Postern of Fate
. Aware that she would write no more novels, Christie authorized the publication of Curtain in 1975 to send off Poirot. She then arranged to have Sleeping Murder published in 1976, but died before the publication. There is a link to Christie's book By the Pricking of My Thumbs, a woman in an asylum asking Gwenda "Was it your poor child", while drinking milk, possibly the character of Mrs Lancaster.
Gwenda Reed (née Halliday), who has recently married and now comes to England
to settle down there. She believes that her father took her directly from India
to New Zealand when she was a two year-old girl and that she has never been in England before. While her husband Giles is still abroad on business, she drives around the countryside looking for a suitable house. She finds an old house in the small seaside resort of Dillmouth, in Devon
, which instantly appeals to her, and she buys it.
After moving in, Gwenda begins to believe that she must be psychic
, as she seems to know things about the house which she could not possibly know: the location of a connecting door that had been walled over, the pattern of a previous wallpaper, a set of steps in the garden that are not where they should be, and so on. Becoming increasingly uneasy, she accepts an invitation to stay for a few days in London with Miss Marple's nephew Raymond West and his wife Joan (who appear also in other stories with Miss Marple).
Miss Marple's interest is piqued when, at a performance of John Webster
's The Duchess of Malfi
, Gwenda screams and flees the theatre—for no reason that even she understands—when she hears the actor speaking the famous line, "Cover her face; mine eyes dazzle; she died young." Gwenda tells Miss Marple later that as she heard those words, she felt she was looking down through the banisters of her new home at the dead, blue face of someone named Helen, strangled by a man uttering the same line. She insists that she does not know anyone named Helen, and she believes she is going mad. Miss Marple suggests that she may be remembering something she witnessed as a small child (looking through rather than over the banisters), and that it may have happened in the house she has just bought, despite her belief that she has never been in England before.
The Reeds and Miss Marple do a bit of research, and they discover that Gwenda is not psychic at all, but in fact she did spend a year during early childhood in the house she was later to buy. Her young stepmother, Helen, reportedly man-crazy, disappeared, having presumably run off with a man. Her father, devastated by his wife's disappearance and convinced that he murdered her, sent Gwenda to New Zealand to be raised by an aunt and died soon afterwards in an asylum. The young couple realize that there may be an unsolved crime to investigate. Miss Marple, who first advises the young couple to "let sleeping murder lie", later suggests to her own doctor that he prescribe her some sea air, and she travels to Dillmouth.
The investigation that now sets in is completely in the hands of amateurs: Giles and Gwenda Reed and Miss Marple. The police are absent, as it has not even been established that a crime has been committed; officially, Helen Halliday ran off with one of her lovers and either died sometime later or made a clean break with her brother and never contacted anyone at home.
The amateur sleuths find two old gardeners who remember the Halliday family and some of the former household staff. The young couple talk to many witnesses, including Dr Kennedy, Helen's much older half-brother, who seems still heartbroken over the disappearance of his wild younger sister. He presents two letters posted abroad which he says he got from his half-sister after her disappearance, and which seem to prove that she did not die that night. But the amateur detectives still believe that Gwenda's memory is fundamentally reliable, and that Helen was murdered. It is later revealed that Dr Kennedy forged the two letters.
The three other men in Helen's life at the time of her disappearance were Walter Fane, a local lawyer; J J Afflick, a local tour guide; and Richard Erskine, who resides in the far north of England. It seems very likely to Giles and Gwenda that one of them must be the murderer: they were all "on the spot", as Miss Marple calls it, that August night eighteen years ago when Helen disappeared.
When Lily Kimble, who used to be in Halliday's employ, reads an advertisement looking for information about Helen, she senses there could be money in it; and after a second advertisement appears looking for her personally, she writes to Dr Kennedy asking for his advice. Kennedy interprets her letter to him as a blackmail
attempt. He writes back to her, inviting her to see him at his house and including a train timetable and exact instructions on how to get to his house. He misdirects her to a stretch of woodland, where he strangles her. Then he replaces his original letter with a fake one and is back at his house in time to "wait", together with Giles and Gwenda Reed, for her arrival.
When Lily Kimble's body is found, the police finally start investigating. (When the police inspector sees Miss Marple he comments on a case of poison pen near Lymstock; thus Sleeping Murder is set after the happenings in The Moving Finger
, which was published in 1942.) Now it dawns upon the Reeds that with a murderer still at large, their lives are in danger. This proves true: after Dr Kennedy unsuccessfully tries to poison them (it is Mrs Cocker, the cook, who takes a sip of the poisoned brandy instead and who consequently has to be hospitalized), Dr Kennedy tries to strangle Gwenda when she is alone in the house. But Miss Marple has foreseen this: she remained hidden in the garden, and when Gwenda screams she runs upstairs and disables Dr Kennedy by spraying soapy liquid into his eyes.
Miss Marple explains that she believes that Helen was an ordinary, decent young woman, trying to escape from an oppressive older brother who was pathologically obsessed with her, and that the only evidence of her being "man-mad" came from him. He strangled her to prevent her from moving to Norfolk in the east of England to live an ordinary, happy life away from him with her husband.
Robert Barnard
: "Slightly somniferous mystery, written in the 'forties but published after Christie's death. Concerns a house where murder has been committed, bought (by the merest coincidence) by someone who as a child saw the body. Sounds like Ross Macdonald
, and certainly doesn't read like vintage Christie. But why should an astute businesswoman hold back one of her better performances for posthumous publication?"
as a 100-minute film in the sixth adaptation (of twelve) in the series Miss Marple
starring Joan Hickson
as Miss Marple
. It was transmitted in two 50-minute parts on Sunday, January 11 and Sunday, January 18, 1987.
Adapter: Ken Taylor
Director: John Davies
Cast:
and transmitted as part of the Saturday Play
strand on December 8, 2001. June Whitfield
reprised her role as Miss Marple. It was recorded on October 10, 2001.
Adapter: Michael Bakewell
Producer: Enyd Williams
Cast:
's Marple
. It starred Geraldine McEwan
and Sophia Myles
but it had many extreme plot changes. Some of Helen's suitors were not included, whereas a travelling company of performers called The Funnybones was introduced. Also, Dr Kennedy became the half-brother of Claire Kennedy, who was the first wife of Kevin Halliday and who assumed the name of Helen to avoid blackmail. Helen and Claire were different people in the novel.
Adapter: Stephen Churchett
Director: Edward Hall
Cast:
In the US the novel was serialised in Ladies' Home Journal
in two abridged installments from July (Volume XCIII, Number 7) to August 1976 (Volume XCIII, Number 8) with an illustration by Fred Otnes
.
Detective fiction
Detective fiction is a sub-genre of crime fiction and mystery fiction in which an investigator , either professional or amateur, investigates a crime, often murder.-In ancient literature:...
by Agatha Christie
Agatha Christie
Dame Agatha Christie DBE was a British crime writer of novels, short stories, and plays. She also wrote romances under the name Mary Westmacott, but she is best remembered for her 66 detective novels and 14 short story collections , and her successful West End plays.According to...
and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club
Collins Crime Club
The Collins Crime Club was an imprint of UK book publishers William Collins & Co Ltd and ran from May 6, 1930 to April 1994. Customers registered their name and address with the club and were sent a newsletter every three months which advised them of the latest books which had been or were to be...
in October 1976
1976 in literature
The year 1976 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Saul Bellow won both the Nobel Prize for Literature and the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.-New books:*Kingsley Amis – The Alteration...
and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company
Dodd, Mead and Company
Dodd, Mead and Company was one of the pioneer publishing houses of the United States, based in New York City. Under several names, the firm operated from 1839 until 1990. Its history properly began in 1870, with the retirement of its founder, Moses Woodruff Dodd. Control passed to his son Frank...
later in the same year. The UK edition retailed for £3.50 and the US edition for $
Dollar sign
The dollar or peso sign is a symbol primarily used to indicate the various peso and dollar units of currency around the world.- Origin :...
7.95. The book features her detective
Detective
A detective is an investigator, either a member of a police agency or a private person. The latter may be known as private investigators or "private eyes"...
Miss Marple
Miss Marple
Jane Marple, usually referred to as Miss Marple, is a fictional character appearing in twelve of Agatha Christie's crime novels and in twenty short stories. Miss Marple is an elderly spinster who lives in the village of St. Mary Mead and acts as an amateur detective. She is one of the most famous...
, and was the final Christie novel published—posthumously—although it was not the last she wrote.
It is generally believed that Christie wrote Sleeping Murder and Curtain
Curtain (novel)
Curtain: Poirot's Last Case is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club in September 1975 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company later in the same year....
during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
to be published after her death, and that Sleeping Murder was most probably written sometime during the Blitz
The Blitz
The Blitz was the sustained strategic bombing of Britain by Nazi Germany between 7 September 1940 and 10 May 1941, during the Second World War. The city of London was bombed by the Luftwaffe for 76 consecutive nights and many towns and cities across the country followed...
, which took place between September 1940 and May 1941. John Curran argues in his book Agatha Christie's Secret Notebooks that Sleeping Murder was still being planned at the end of the 1940s and the beginning of the 1950s.
However,this argument is not supported by Janet Morgan in her biography Agatha Christie or by Laura Thompson in her biography Agatha Christie: An English Mystery; both biographers contend Sleeping Murder was written in 1940. Jared Cade provides further detailed proof of this in the 2011 expanded edition of his biography Agatha Christie and the Eleven Missing Days. The correspondence files of Christie's literary agents, Edmund Cork and Harold Ober, currently held at Exeter University in Devon, show that the original manuscript of Sleeping Murder was entitled Murder in Retrospect after one of the chapters in the book. On 7 June 1940 Edmund Cork wrote to Christie advising her that he would have the necessary 'deed of gift' drawn up so her husband Max would become the owner of the unpublished Miss Marple novel. Christie eventually visited Edmund Cork’s offices at 40 Fleet Street, London, on 14 October 1940 and signed the document transferring ownership of the copyright of Murder in Retrospect to her husband in consideration of what was termed her ‘natural love and affection for him’. This was before Christie’s American publishers appropriated the title for Five Little Pigs in 1942 (a year ahead of the release of the UK edition that retained the nursery-rhyme title). Christie duly renamed the Miss Marple novel Cover Her Face. One of Christie's notebooks contain references to Cover Her Face under ‘Plans for Sept. 1947’ and ‘Plans for Nov. 1948’, suggesting she was considering revising the unpublished manuscript. But both Jared Cade and Janet Morgan state these alterations did not occur until early 1950. After drafting most of the book that became Mrs McGinty’s Dead and thinking about plans for another Mary Westmacott novel, Christie wrote to Edmund Cork from Nimrud saying that, as she was well ahead of her normal writing schedule, she had gone over the Miss Marple novel thoroughly, ‘as a lot of it seemed to have dated very much’. She had removed all the political references and remarks that emphasized the period, although she stressed that the story must remain set in the 1930s, as so much of the action depended on houses with plentiful servants, ample pre-war meals and so on. She observed that it was especially catchwords and particular phrases that seemed to make a book old-fashioned. On rereading this one she thought it was quite good, and she added, somewhat facetiously, she was not sure her writing talents hadn’t gone downhill since then. Following the publication of P.D. James’s début crime novel Cover Her Face in 1962, Christie became aware of the need to think up yet another title for her Miss Marple book; she duly wrote to Edmund Cork on 17 July 1972 asking him to send her a copy of the unpublished Miss Marple manuscript and a copy of Max's deed of gift. So much time had passed that she was unable to remember if the manuscript was still called Cover Her Face or She Died Young.
On page 509 of her autobiography Christie refers to the last Poirot and Miss Marple novels that she penned during the Second World War by saying she had written an extra two books during the first years of the war in anticipation of her being killed in the raids, which seemed to be in the highest degree likely as she was working in London. One was for Rosalind, she says, which she wrote first – a book with Hercule Poirot in it – and the other was for Max – with Miss Marple in it. She adds that these two books, after being composed, were put in the vaults of a bank, and were made over formally by deed of gift to her daughter and husband.
Unlike Curtain, which concludes the career of her other famous detective Hercule Poirot
Hercule Poirot
Hercule Poirot is a fictional Belgian detective created by Agatha Christie. Along with Miss Marple, Poirot is one of Christie's most famous and long-lived characters, appearing in 33 novels and 51 short stories published between 1920 and 1975 and set in the same era.Poirot has been portrayed on...
, there is nothing in the text of Sleeping Murder which indicates it is Marple's last case.
The last Marple novel Christie wrote, Nemesis, was published in 1971, followed by Christie's last Poirot novel Elephants Can Remember
Elephants Can Remember
Elephants Can Remember is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie, first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club in November 1972 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company later in the same year. The UK edition retailed for £1.60 and the US edition at $6.95.It features her Belgian...
in 1972 and then in 1973 by her very last novel Postern of Fate
Postern of Fate
Postern of Fate is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie that was first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club in October 1973 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company later in the same year. The UK edition retailed at £2.00 and the US edition at $6.95.The book features her...
. Aware that she would write no more novels, Christie authorized the publication of Curtain in 1975 to send off Poirot. She then arranged to have Sleeping Murder published in 1976, but died before the publication. There is a link to Christie's book By the Pricking of My Thumbs, a woman in an asylum asking Gwenda "Was it your poor child", while drinking milk, possibly the character of Mrs Lancaster.
Plot summary
"Let sleeping murder lie": this is the proverb (a variation on "Let sleeping dogs lie") which is not obeyed by twenty-one year old New ZealanderNew Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...
Gwenda Reed (née Halliday), who has recently married and now comes to England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
to settle down there. She believes that her father took her directly from India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
to New Zealand when she was a two year-old girl and that she has never been in England before. While her husband Giles is still abroad on business, she drives around the countryside looking for a suitable house. She finds an old house in the small seaside resort of Dillmouth, in Devon
Devon
Devon is a large county in southwestern England. The county is sometimes referred to as Devonshire, although the term is rarely used inside the county itself as the county has never been officially "shired", it often indicates a traditional or historical context.The county shares borders with...
, which instantly appeals to her, and she buys it.
After moving in, Gwenda begins to believe that she must be psychic
Parapsychology
The term parapsychology was coined in or around 1889 by philosopher Max Dessoir, and originates from para meaning "alongside", and psychology. The term was adopted by J.B. Rhine in the 1930s as a replacement for the term psychical research...
, as she seems to know things about the house which she could not possibly know: the location of a connecting door that had been walled over, the pattern of a previous wallpaper, a set of steps in the garden that are not where they should be, and so on. Becoming increasingly uneasy, she accepts an invitation to stay for a few days in London with Miss Marple's nephew Raymond West and his wife Joan (who appear also in other stories with Miss Marple).
Miss Marple's interest is piqued when, at a performance of John Webster
John Webster
John Webster was an English Jacobean dramatist best known for his tragedies The White Devil and The Duchess of Malfi, which are often regarded as masterpieces of the early 17th-century English stage. He was a contemporary of William Shakespeare.- Biography :Webster's life is obscure, and the dates...
's The Duchess of Malfi
The Duchess of Malfi
The Duchess of Malfi is a macabre, tragic play written by the English dramatist John Webster in 1612–13. It was first performed privately at the Blackfriars Theatre, then before a more general audience at The Globe, in 1613-14...
, Gwenda screams and flees the theatre—for no reason that even she understands—when she hears the actor speaking the famous line, "Cover her face; mine eyes dazzle; she died young." Gwenda tells Miss Marple later that as she heard those words, she felt she was looking down through the banisters of her new home at the dead, blue face of someone named Helen, strangled by a man uttering the same line. She insists that she does not know anyone named Helen, and she believes she is going mad. Miss Marple suggests that she may be remembering something she witnessed as a small child (looking through rather than over the banisters), and that it may have happened in the house she has just bought, despite her belief that she has never been in England before.
The Reeds and Miss Marple do a bit of research, and they discover that Gwenda is not psychic at all, but in fact she did spend a year during early childhood in the house she was later to buy. Her young stepmother, Helen, reportedly man-crazy, disappeared, having presumably run off with a man. Her father, devastated by his wife's disappearance and convinced that he murdered her, sent Gwenda to New Zealand to be raised by an aunt and died soon afterwards in an asylum. The young couple realize that there may be an unsolved crime to investigate. Miss Marple, who first advises the young couple to "let sleeping murder lie", later suggests to her own doctor that he prescribe her some sea air, and she travels to Dillmouth.
The investigation that now sets in is completely in the hands of amateurs: Giles and Gwenda Reed and Miss Marple. The police are absent, as it has not even been established that a crime has been committed; officially, Helen Halliday ran off with one of her lovers and either died sometime later or made a clean break with her brother and never contacted anyone at home.
The amateur sleuths find two old gardeners who remember the Halliday family and some of the former household staff. The young couple talk to many witnesses, including Dr Kennedy, Helen's much older half-brother, who seems still heartbroken over the disappearance of his wild younger sister. He presents two letters posted abroad which he says he got from his half-sister after her disappearance, and which seem to prove that she did not die that night. But the amateur detectives still believe that Gwenda's memory is fundamentally reliable, and that Helen was murdered. It is later revealed that Dr Kennedy forged the two letters.
The three other men in Helen's life at the time of her disappearance were Walter Fane, a local lawyer; J J Afflick, a local tour guide; and Richard Erskine, who resides in the far north of England. It seems very likely to Giles and Gwenda that one of them must be the murderer: they were all "on the spot", as Miss Marple calls it, that August night eighteen years ago when Helen disappeared.
When Lily Kimble, who used to be in Halliday's employ, reads an advertisement looking for information about Helen, she senses there could be money in it; and after a second advertisement appears looking for her personally, she writes to Dr Kennedy asking for his advice. Kennedy interprets her letter to him as a blackmail
Blackmail
In common usage, blackmail is a crime involving threats to reveal substantially true or false information about a person to the public, a family member, or associates unless a demand is met. It may be defined as coercion involving threats of physical harm, threat of criminal prosecution, or threats...
attempt. He writes back to her, inviting her to see him at his house and including a train timetable and exact instructions on how to get to his house. He misdirects her to a stretch of woodland, where he strangles her. Then he replaces his original letter with a fake one and is back at his house in time to "wait", together with Giles and Gwenda Reed, for her arrival.
When Lily Kimble's body is found, the police finally start investigating. (When the police inspector sees Miss Marple he comments on a case of poison pen near Lymstock; thus Sleeping Murder is set after the happenings in The Moving Finger
The Moving Finger
The Moving Finger is detective fiction novel by Agatha Christie, first published in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in July 1942 and in UK by the Collins Crime Club in June 1943. The US edition retailed at $2.00 and the UK edition at seven shillings and sixpence...
, which was published in 1942.) Now it dawns upon the Reeds that with a murderer still at large, their lives are in danger. This proves true: after Dr Kennedy unsuccessfully tries to poison them (it is Mrs Cocker, the cook, who takes a sip of the poisoned brandy instead and who consequently has to be hospitalized), Dr Kennedy tries to strangle Gwenda when she is alone in the house. But Miss Marple has foreseen this: she remained hidden in the garden, and when Gwenda screams she runs upstairs and disables Dr Kennedy by spraying soapy liquid into his eyes.
Miss Marple explains that she believes that Helen was an ordinary, decent young woman, trying to escape from an oppressive older brother who was pathologically obsessed with her, and that the only evidence of her being "man-mad" came from him. He strangled her to prevent her from moving to Norfolk in the east of England to live an ordinary, happy life away from him with her husband.
Literary significance and reception
George Thaw in the Daily Mirror of October 22, 1976 said, "Agatha Christie's last novel is very good. Sleeping Murder is the last of Miss Marple's excursions into detection. But perhaps it is her best. Agatha Christie wrote it years ago but if I was going to pick a swansong book this is certainly the one that I would choose. It's her best for years."Robert Barnard
Robert Barnard
Robert Barnard is an English crime writer, critic and lecturer.- Life and work :Born in Essex, Barnard was educated at the Colchester Royal Grammar School and at Balliol College in Oxford....
: "Slightly somniferous mystery, written in the 'forties but published after Christie's death. Concerns a house where murder has been committed, bought (by the merest coincidence) by someone who as a child saw the body. Sounds like Ross Macdonald
Ross Macdonald
Not to be confused with John D. MacDonaldRoss Macdonald is the pseudonym of the American-Canadian writer of crime fiction Kenneth Millar...
, and certainly doesn't read like vintage Christie. But why should an astute businesswoman hold back one of her better performances for posthumous publication?"
BBC "Miss Marple" series
Sleeping Murder was filmed by the BBCBBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
as a 100-minute film in the sixth adaptation (of twelve) in the series Miss Marple
Miss Marple (TV series)
Miss Marple is a British television series based on the Miss Marple murder mystery novels by Agatha Christie. It starred Joan Hickson in the title role, and aired from 1984 to 1992. All twelve original Miss Marple Christie novels have been dramatised. The screenplays were written by T. R...
starring Joan Hickson
Joan Hickson
Joan Hickson OBE was an English actress of theatre, film and television, famed for playing Agatha Christie's Miss Marple in the television series Miss Marple.- Wivenhoe :...
as Miss Marple
Miss Marple
Jane Marple, usually referred to as Miss Marple, is a fictional character appearing in twelve of Agatha Christie's crime novels and in twenty short stories. Miss Marple is an elderly spinster who lives in the village of St. Mary Mead and acts as an amateur detective. She is one of the most famous...
. It was transmitted in two 50-minute parts on Sunday, January 11 and Sunday, January 18, 1987.
Adapter: Ken Taylor
Director: John Davies
Cast:
- Geraldine Alexander as Gwenda Reed
- John Moulder BrownJohn Moulder BrownJohn Moulder-Brown is a British actor who started his career as a child; he is best remembered for his role in the 1971 classic Deep End....
as Giles Reed - Frederick TrevesFrederick Treves (actor)Frederick William Treves BEM, is an English character actor with an extensive repertoire, specialising in avuncular military and titled types....
as Dr James Kennedy - Jean AndersonJean AndersonJean Anderson was an English actress born in Eastbourne, Sussex. She is best remembered for her television roles as hard-faced matriarch Mary Hammond in the 1970s BBC drama The Brothers and as rebellious aristocrat Lady Jocelyn "Joss" Holbrook in the 1980s Second World War series Tenko .She is...
as Mrs. Fane - Terrence Hardiman as Walter Fane
- John BennettJohn Bennett (actor)John Bennett was an English actor. Born in Beckenham, Kent, he was educated at Bradfield College in Berkshire, then trained at the Central School of Speech and Drama, followed by a wide Rep experience including Bromley, Bristol Old Vic, Dundee, Edinburgh Festival and Watford before going to...
as Richard Erskine - Geraldine NewmanGeraldine NewmanGeraldine Newman is an English film and television actress who has acted in more than 30 television programmes and films.Her most notable television performance was on the sitcom Ever Decreasing Circles.-Biography:...
as Janet Erskine - Jack WatsonJack Watson (actor)Jack Watson , was an English actor who appeared in many British films and television dramas from the 1950s onwards....
as Mr. Foster - Joan Scott as Mrs. Cocker
- Jean HeywoodJean HeywoodJean Heywood is a British actress, appearing in films such as Billy Elliot and Our Day Out as well as TV series When the Boat Comes In, All Creatures Great and Small, Boys from the Blackstuff, Family Affairs, The Bill and Casualty.In 2010, Heywood made a guest appearance in the ITV series Married...
as Edith Paget - Georgine Anderson as Mrs. Hengrave
- Edward JewesburyEdward JewesburyEdward Jewesbury was a British actor, notable for his film, stage and television work and as a member of the Renaissance Theatre Company. In his later years he appeared in such television comedies as Yes Minister and Blackadder II.His son Ian was a senior civil servant at the UK Department of...
as Mr. Sims - David McAllister as Raymond West
- Amanda BoxerAmanda BoxerAmanda Boxer is an English actress who is best known for her television work and her performance in The Last Days of Judas Iscariot at the Almeida Theatre and The Painter by Rebecca Lenkiewicz at the Arcola Theatre....
as Joan West - Esmond KnightEsmond KnightEsmond Penington Knight was an English actor.He was an accomplished actor with a career spanning over half a century. For much of his career Esmond Knight was virtually blind...
as Mr. Galbraith - John RinghamJohn RinghamJohn Henry Ringham was a British character actor of both television and stage who appeared in over a hundred screen appearances in a wide variety of roles....
as Dr. Penrose - Eryl Maynard as Lily Kimble
- Ken KitsonKen KitsonKenneth "Ken" Kitson is a British actor who has been active on British television since the early 1970s....
as Jim Kimble - Kenneth CopeKenneth CopeKenneth Cope is an English actor. He is most famous for his roles as Marty Hopkirk in Randall and Hopkirk , Jed Stone in Coronation Street and Ray Hilton in Brookside.- Career :...
as Jackie Afflick - Peter Spraggon as Detective Inspector Last
- Sheila Raynor as Shop assistant
- Donald BurtonDonald BurtonDonald Burton was an English theatre and television actor. Burton was the husband of actress Carroll Baker....
as Bosola - Struan RodgerStruan RodgerStruan Rodger is a British actor who has appeared widely in a range of supporting roles. His first feature film role was as Eric Liddell's friend and running coach Sandy McGrath, in the Oscar-winning 1981 film, Chariots of Fire....
as Ferdinand - Gary WatsonGary WatsonGary Watson is a retired British television actor who started out as a stage actor most notably acting in Friedrich Hebbel's 1962 play Judith at Her Majesty's Theatre in London, England with Sean Connery...
as Major Kelvin Halliday
BBC Radio 4 Adaptation
The novel was adapted as a 90 minute play for BBC Radio 4BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British domestic radio station, operated and owned by the BBC, that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. The station controller is currently Gwyneth Williams, and the...
and transmitted as part of the Saturday Play
Saturday Play
The Saturday Play is a regular feature on BBC Radio 4 and is described as "Thrillers, mysteries, love stories and detective fiction, as well as an occasional special series."The Saturday Play is part of the BBC's series...
strand on December 8, 2001. June Whitfield
June Whitfield
June Rosemary Whitfield, CBE is an English actress, well known in the United Kingdom since the 1950s for roles in radio and television comedy series....
reprised her role as Miss Marple. It was recorded on October 10, 2001.
Adapter: Michael Bakewell
Michael Bakewell
Michael Bakewell is a British television producer. He is best known for his work during the 1960s, when he was the first Head of Plays at the BBC after Sydney Newman divided the drama department into separate series, serials and plays divisions in 1963...
Producer: Enyd Williams
Cast:
- June WhitfieldJune WhitfieldJune Rosemary Whitfield, CBE is an English actress, well known in the United Kingdom since the 1950s for roles in radio and television comedy series....
as Miss Marple - Julian GloverJulian GloverJulian Wyatt Glover is a British actor best known for such roles as General Maximilian Veers in Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back, the Bond villain Aristotle Kristatos in For Your Eyes Only, and Walter Donovan in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.-Personal life:Glover was born in...
as Dr Kennedy - Beth Chalmers as Gwenda Reed
- Carl PrekoppCarl PrekoppCarl Prekopp is a British actor. He played Richard III at the Riverside Studios and originated the part of Lawrence in Tim Firth's stage adaptation of Calendar Girls. He has appeared in BBC Radio 4 adaptations of Terry Pratchett's Mort , Small Gods and Night Watch...
as Giles Reed - Hilda Schroder as Mrs Hengrave
- Caroline Pickles as Aunt Alison and Mrs Erskine
- Joan LittlewoodJoan LittlewoodJoan Maud Littlewood was a British theatre director, noted for her work in developing the left-wing Theatre Workshop...
as Edith - Derek WaringDerek WaringDerek Waring was an English actor who is best remembered for playing Detective Inspector Goss in Z-Cars from 1969 to 1973...
as Richard Erskine
ITV 'Marple' Series
A new adaptation was transmitted on February 5, 2006 as part of ITVITV
ITV is the major commercial public service TV network in the United Kingdom. Launched in 1955 under the auspices of the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC, it is also the oldest commercial network in the UK...
's Marple
Marple (TV series)
Marple is a British television series based on the Miss Marple and other murder mystery novels by Agatha Christie. It is also known as Agatha Christie's Marple. The title character was played by Geraldine McEwan from the first to third series, until her retirement from the role. She was replaced...
. It starred Geraldine McEwan
Geraldine McEwan
Geraldine McEwan is an English actor with a diverse history in theatre, film, and television. From 2004 to 2009 she appeared as Miss Marple, the Agatha Christie sleuth, for the series Marple.-Background:...
and Sophia Myles
Sophia Myles
-Early life:Myles was born in London. She is the daughter of Jane, who works in educational publishing, and Peter Myles, a retired Anglican vicar in Isleworth, west London. Her maternal grandmother was Russian, and she refers to herself as "half-Welsh, half-Russian". She grew up in Notting Hill,...
but it had many extreme plot changes. Some of Helen's suitors were not included, whereas a travelling company of performers called The Funnybones was introduced. Also, Dr Kennedy became the half-brother of Claire Kennedy, who was the first wife of Kevin Halliday and who assumed the name of Helen to avoid blackmail. Helen and Claire were different people in the novel.
Adapter: Stephen Churchett
Stephen Churchett
Stephen Churchett is a British actor and writer.One of his most notable roles was as solicitor Marcus Christie in EastEnders, on and off from 1990 to 2004....
Director: Edward Hall
Edward Hall
Edward Hall , English chronicler and lawyer, was born about the end of the 15th century, being a son of John Hall of Northall, Shropshire....
Cast:
- Geraldine McEwanGeraldine McEwanGeraldine McEwan is an English actor with a diverse history in theatre, film, and television. From 2004 to 2009 she appeared as Miss Marple, the Agatha Christie sleuth, for the series Marple.-Background:...
as Miss Jane Marple - Russ AbbotRuss AbbotRuss Abbot is an English musician, comedian and actor who first came to public notice during the 1970s as the singer and drummer with British comedy showband the Black Abbots, later forging a prominent solo career as a television comedian with his own weekly show on British television.Continuing...
as Chief Inspector Arthur Primer - Geraldine ChaplinGeraldine ChaplinGeraldine Leigh Chaplin is an English-American actress and the daughter of Charlie Chaplin.Chaplin first came to prominence for her Golden Globe-nominated role of Tonya in David Lean's Doctor Zhivago . She received her second Golden Globe nomination for Robert Altman's Nashville...
as Mrs. Fane - Phil Davis as Dr. James Alfred Kennedy
- Dawn French as Janet Erskine
- Martin Kemp as Jackie Afflick
- Aidan McArdleAidan McArdleAidan McArdle is an Irish actor.McArdle was born in Dublin. He studied for an Arts degree at University College Dublin before going on to study at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London, England....
as Hugh Hornbeam - Paul McGannPaul McGannPaul McGann is an English actor who made his name on the BBC serial The Monocled Mutineer, in which he played the lead role...
as Dickie Erskine - Sophia MylesSophia Myles-Early life:Myles was born in London. She is the daughter of Jane, who works in educational publishing, and Peter Myles, a retired Anglican vicar in Isleworth, west London. Her maternal grandmother was Russian, and she refers to herself as "half-Welsh, half-Russian". She grew up in Notting Hill,...
as Gwenda Halliday - Anna-Louise PlowmanAnna-Louise PlowmanAnna-Louise Plowman is an actress. She is perhaps best known for her roles as Consultant Anaesthetist Annalese Carson in Holby City and Dr. Sarah Gardner in Stargate SG-1 who was possessed by the Goa'uld Osiris...
as Helen Marsden - Peter SerafinowiczPeter SerafinowiczPeter Szymon Serafinowicz is an English actor, comedian, writer, composer, voice artist and occasional director.-Early life:Serafinowicz was born in Liverpool, England. He attended Our Lady of the Assumption Roman Catholic Primary School and St Francis Xavier Secondary School...
as Walter Fane - Una StubbsUna StubbsUna Stubbs is an English actress and former dancer who has appeared extensively on British television and in the theatre, and less frequently in films. She is particularly known for her roles in the sitcom Till Death Us Do Part and Aunt Sally in the children's series Worzel Gummidge.-Film and...
as Edith Pagett - Julian WadhamJulian Wadham-Career:He has appeared on television as both Charles II and George V...
as Kelvin Halliday - Sarah ParishSarah ParishSarah Parish is an English actress.Parish is known for her work on such TV series as: Peak Practice, Hearts and Bones, Cutting It, Doctor Who, Mistresses, Merlin and the new ITV medical drama Monroe....
as Evie Ballantine - Emilio Doorgasingh as Sergant Desai
- Harry TreadawayHarry Treadaway- Personal life :Treadaway was born in Devon, England, and brought up in Sandford, near Crediton, Devon, with his father, an architect, his mother, a primary school teacher and two brothers - his slightly older twin Luke and their older brother Sam, an artist...
as George Erskine - Richard BremmerRichard BremmerRichard Bremmer is a British actor. He played Lord Voldemort in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone and played Skeld in The 13th Warrior. He also had a role in the 2004 movie :Vipere au poing.-External links:...
as Mr. Sims - Harriet WalterHarriet WalterDame Harriet Mary Walter, DBE is a British actress.-Personal life:She is the niece of renowned British actor Sir Christopher Lee, as the daughter of his elder sister Xandra Lee. On her father's side she is a great-great-great-granddaughter of John Walter, founder of The TimesShe was educated at...
as Duchess of Malfi - Greg HicksGreg HicksGreg Hicks is an English actor. He completed theatrical training at Rose Bruford College and has been a member of The Royal Shakespeare Company since 1976...
as Ferdinand - Mary Healey as Shop Assistant
- Helen Coker as Lily Tutt
- Nickolas GraceNickolas GraceNickolas Grace is a British actor known for his roles on television, including Anthony Blanche in the acclaimed ITV adaptation of Brideshead Revisited and the Sheriff of Nottingham in the 1980s series Robin of Sherwood...
as Lionel Luff - Vince Leigh as Jim Tutt
- Darren Carnall as Dresser
Publication history
- 1976, Collins Crime Club (London), October 1976, Hardcover, 224 pp ISBN 0-002-31785-0
- 1976, Dodd Mead and Company (New York), Hardcover, 242 pp, ISBN 0-39-607191-0
- 1977, Fontana Books (Imprint of HarperCollinsHarperCollinsHarperCollins is a publishing company owned by News Corporation. It is the combination of the publishers William Collins, Sons and Co Ltd, a British company, and Harper & Row, an American company, itself the result of an earlier merger of Harper & Brothers and Row, Peterson & Company. The worldwide...
), Paperback, 192 pp - 1977, Bantam BooksBantam BooksBantam Books is an American publishing house owned entirely by Random House, the German media corporation subsidiary of Bertelsmann; it is an imprint of the Random House Publishing Group. It was formed in 1945 by Walter B. Pitkin, Jr., Sidney B. Kramer, and Ian and Betty Ballantine...
, Paperback - 1978, Ulverscroft Large-print Edition, Hardcover, 358 pp, ISBN 0-70-890109-3
- 1990 GK Hall & Company Large-print edition, Hardcover, ISBN 0-81-614599-7
- 2006, Marple Facsimile edition (Facsimile of 1976 UK first edition), May 2, 2006, Hardcover, ISBN 0-00-720860-X
In the US the novel was serialised in Ladies' Home Journal
Ladies' Home Journal
Ladies' Home Journal is an American magazine which first appeared on February 16, 1883, and eventually became one of the leading women's magazines of the 20th century in the United States...
in two abridged installments from July (Volume XCIII, Number 7) to August 1976 (Volume XCIII, Number 8) with an illustration by Fred Otnes
Fred Otnes
Fred Otnes is an illustrator. A resident of Connecticut, he is best known for his collage paintings.-External links:**- Articles :* Art In America December 2002* Artnews September 2002...
.
External links
- Sleeping Murder at the official Agatha Christie website
- Wiki collection of quotations from Sleeping Murder