Agatha Christie
Home cooking, but idealised: 2 Fore Street reviewed
The restaurant 2 Fore Street lives on Mousehole harbour, near gift shops: the post office and general store have closed,…
Wuthering Heights in Devon: the Pilchard Inn, Burgh Island, reviewed
The Pilchard Inn sits at the entrance to Burgh Island, a minute tidal island off the coast of south Devon.…
Whodunits shouldn’t be dismissed as a guilty pleasure
What a weird lot crime writers are. I don’t come to this conclusion lightly, since I’m a crime writer myself,…
If you're tired of Netflix's agendas, turn to BritBox's new Agatha Christie
Netflix’s share price has collapsed and a major factor, people are saying, is its relentless pushing of agendas. I think…
It's impossible not to feel snooty watching ITV's Agatha and Poirot
Agatha and Poirot was one of those programmes that had the annoying effect of making you feel distinctly snooty. ITV’s…
The Archers is a masterclass in how not to write a monologue
If you’ve been listening to The Archers lately, you’ll know how tedious monologues can be. The BBC has received so…
Adapting Wodehouse for the radio is a challenge – but the BBC has succeeded brilliantly
Everyone knows a Lord Emsworth. Mine lives south of the river and wears caterpillars in his hair and wine on…
Odd but gripping: BBC1’s The Pale Horse reviewed
Not much was clear in the opening scenes of The Pale Horse (BBC1, Sunday), which even by current TV standards…
A purity test for artists is the end of art
However we keep ourselves amused over the holidays this year, two sources of entertainment are off the docket. Amid the…
The death of cosy Christie
This is not Midsomer Murders. The new film adaptation of Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express is thick with…
Ancient Egypt’s obsession with death was in fact a preoccupation with life
The Fitzwilliam Museum is marking its bicentenary with an exhibition that takes its title from Agatha Christie: Death on the…
Aleppo Notebook: the city’s terrorist besiegers will now be besieged
I had been trying to get to Aleppo for ages, but was unable to do so because rebel activity had…
If the world economy crashes again, blame the central bankers
Like the Christmas pudding sampled by Hercule Poirot at Kings Lacey — but six weeks early — our Spectator Money…
When escape to the sun — or even to Devon — goes horribly wrong
A character in Sophie Hannah’s A Game for All the Family (Hodder, £14.99, pp. 432) presents a theory: ‘Mysteries are…
The best of British — from Agatha Christie to the YBAs
Is it true that, having lost an empire, we reinvented ourselves as an island of entertainers? Do we channel the…
Bohemian conformity can be just as suffocating as any other type: BBC1’s Life in Squares reviewed
On all those comic lists of the world’s shortest books (Great Italian War Heroes, My Hunt for the Real Killers,…
The sad demise of the amateur sleuth: it’s all the fault of better policing
‘The crime novel,’ said Bertolt Brecht, ‘like the world itself, is ruled by the English.’ He was thinking of the…
Indiscretions from two veteran producers
Robert Gore-Langton talks to Duncan Weeldon and Paul Elliott about the good old days – and getting shafted
The 'detestable, bombastic, egocentric' detective — Hercule Poirot lives on
Robert Gore-Langton on our love for fictional detectives — and especially Poirot
