Join us in Oxford for an exciting in-person weekend event studying the detective fiction of Agatha Christie, focusing on her two most famous detectives: Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple.
Focusing primarily on four of her novels (The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, Death on the Nile, The Murder in the Vicarage, and A Murder is Announced), you’ll examine how these characters build on earlier types of detective, and how they subvert expectations as apparently marginalised figures (the refugee and the spinster respectively).
We’ll look at how Christie’s novels negotiate between an imagined rural England and the glamorous networks of international travel, alongside the effects of the First World War on crime fiction. You’ll examine the narrative workings of some of Christie’s most famous novels, and gain an understanding of how these popular fictions raise more fundamental questions about literature and textuality.
We’ll also assess the criticism that Christie’s novels reduce crime to a puzzle, and examine the ways in which Christie’s novels are more subversive than is popularly supposed. We’ll look at adaptations of Christie’s work, and how they have been translated for the screen.
Please note: this event will close to enrolments at 23:59 BST on 13 May 2026.