She Wrote Too

Nicola spoke with Michael Ritchie of Berts Books in Swindon who is not only a writer and bookseller but a reader and re-reader of Agatha Christie. Michael is one of the knowledgeable superfans that we have had the chance to talk with this month. Michael shares his thoughts and insights as well as his experiences with working with books and readers. Thank you Michael. Berts Books are online and are an independent book shop so if you like to support the smaller specialists in the book world, you can use the link above.

We hope you are enjoying this celebration of Agatha Christie - there are more episodes to come including an anniversary episode of 70 years of The Mousetrap on 25 November.

Nicola apologises to Dr Jamie Bernthal-Hooker for pronouncing his name wrongly in this episode and has written a New Year resolution to get name pronunciation right in future.

Agatha Christie month continues on She Wrote Too.  Join us as we dive into two of Agatha Christie's most iconic mysteries, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd and A Murder is Announced. Known for their clever plotting and unforgettable twists, these novels showcase Christie's mastery at weaving suspense with insightful portrayals of human nature. 

In The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, often hailed as one of the most daring and controversial whodunits in mystery fiction, we meet Hercule Poirot in a small English village where secrets are buried as deeply as motives. Caroline teaches Nicola how to pronounce Hercule Poirot’s name correctly.  Prepare for one of Christie's most talked-about twists that has left readers stunned for decades - although there are no spoilers.  We discuss the wit, wisdom and insight of Agatha Christie and give her credit for this which may have been rather dismissed due to her fiction being ‘genre fiction’.

A Murder is Announced features Miss Marple, who unravels the mystery surrounding a chilling murder announced in a village newspaper ad. With a cast of quirky characters and red herrings galore, this novel is both a puzzle and a commentary on small-town life, illustrating Christie’s keen observation of people and her subtle sense of humour.  When a murder is announced and then actually happens, it is by happy coincidence that Miss Marple is staying in a spa hotel nearby.

Listen to the discussion of the genius behind these plots, the psychological insights into her characters, and the legacy of Agatha Christie’s storytelling. Whether you are a long-time fan or new to these classics, we hope you enjoy this discussion of these two fabulous pieces of fiction.

Nicola spoke with musician and Agatha Christie superfan, Peggy Mackay, who has read all of Agatha Christie’s novels and seen the Mousetrap many times.  She also has a great deal of knowledge about Christie’s life and attitudes and has fascinating views and theories about Christie and her writing style. 

We hope you enjoy this conversation which particularly focuses on Death Comes as the End (without spoilers) but also on the innovative nature of Christie’s work.

Welcome to Agatha Christie month on She Wrote Too. In this episode, we speak with Dr Sarah Martin and Dr Jamie Bernthal who, with fellow academic Christie enthusiasts, run Golden Age Mysteries.  They are both experts on all things Agatha Christie.  Dr Martin has a PhD in female detective novels and  Dr Bernthal is also an academic writer and novelist who writes the Jessica Brick books. Rather importantly, they are both very generous people who took time out of their busy lives to speak to Nicola and share their thoughts and stories.  

They share their views on Agatha Christie and why they are on a mission to have her taken seriously as a subject for academic study.  They blow literary snobbery out of the water and celebrate what a great writer Christie was.

Dr Bernthal founded an Agatha Christie network ten years ago.  This was the birth of Golden Age Mysteries

“The [Agatha Christie] conference is a statement of intent — we want to establish Agatha Christie studies as an academic discipline with its own identity.”

Conference founder J.C. Bernthal in The Sunday Times

He explains the resistance he had from academia ‘the only mystery here is - is she worth it?’ illustrating the snobbery surrounding genre writers. He also tells of how he booked a room for thirty people one afternoon to test out the waters and they had to change venue as they were overwhelmed with interest with Christie fans travelling from far and wide to share their deep interest.  It is fair to say they found  that the enthusiasm that they had hoped for was there. 

Their passion for this writer bubbles over during the conversation. Dr Bernthal explains possible reasons for snobbery surrounding certain types of writing.  Dr Martin delves into the treatment of domestic issues and how drama around the home has been dismissed and yet those who do so are missing out.  Their knowledge of Christie’s books is excellent.  Enjoy Tea and Scandal at 4.30.

We have at least one episode of She Wrote Too every week this month.  Still to come - we review The Mousetrap, discuss Poirot, Miss Marple and why Agatha Christie also wrote as Mary Westmacott.  We also have interviews with some knowledgeable superfans.  So please share widely and enjoy this month of mystery!

Thank you so much Dr Sarah Martin and Dr Jamie Bernthal.

This month is a celebration of women artists - other than writers - as Caroline and Nicola visited the Tate Britain exhibition, Now You See Us. 

It was striking that, as with women writers, women artists were often denied training or access to resources and dismissed as merely pursuing hobbies.  There were many commercially successful women artists in the 400 years that this exhibition focused on despite all the barriers and challenges they faced. 

In this episode, we discuss paintings that had a personal appeal to us and some of the striking ideas that stood out to us at the time of the exhibition.

To quote from the Tate website:  

‘Now You See Us: Women Artists in Britain 1520–1920 celebrates over 100 women who forged public careers as artists. The exhibition begins with the earliest recorded women artists working in Britain. It ends with women’s place in society fundamentally changed by the First World War and the first women gaining the right to vote. Across these 400 years, women were a constant presence in the art world. Now You See Us explores these artists’ careers and asks why so many have been erased from mainstream art histories.’

The exhibition runs to 13 October so there is still time to see it.  However, if you cannot make it, it is fair to say that Tate Britain is very supportive of women artists as we mention.  Further, we also mention the book, Now You See Us edited by Tabitha Barber which details the artists featured in the exhibition.

The exhibition also includes interesting texts such as petitions that women artists made to endeavour to be included in exhibitions and art education.  The sense of struggle and determination was palpable.  They created and produced good works anyway.

Next month is Agatha Christie month. We are focusing on the biggest selling woman writer of all time and we have episodes every week including interesting interviews, book reviews, discussions with academics, a review of the Mousetrap and all sorts of celebratory specials. If you would like to get involved or take part, please just let us know in the comments and we will be in touch.

We discuss the life and selected works of the famous poet, Elizabeth Barrett Browning (EBB) 1806—1861. That is, she was famous at the time - so highly critically acclaimed that she was short-listed for the position of poet Laureate. Yet, in the early 20th Century, she was more or less ignored by the poetry critics who were happy for her to live in the shadow of Robert Browning. We also talk about the most recent biography of EBB by Fiona Sampson, Two Way Mirror. The last biography was in the 1980s so it is good to see that she is back in public discourse.

We discuss three of her poems, in particular, although her work is very extensive and some of it can be accessed by the Poetry Foundation.

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EBB loved animals and particularly her dog, Flush, we discuss what animals can mean to people - particularly during difficult times. EBB spend much of her life invalided and consequently alone, kept company and loved by her spaniel. We discuss how those with disabilities can be helped and supported by animals, particularly the work of Riding for the Disabled. We encourage you to look at their work and consider whether you can support them in any way at all. This gives us an excuse for a couple of pictures of animals.

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Caroline Rance also writes about the history of medicine, you can find further details on Substack , you can find out about her published books by clicking the images below. Any that are not in paper publication at the moment are still available on Kindle.

Nicola writes about narrative psychology and shares thoughts and poems on Substack here.

Please do comment positively if you care to or share any kind questions that you may have.

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In this episode Caroline and Nicola discuss the multi-talented Clemence Dane who cannot be limited to just one title -  she did write, extensively and well.  An actor, teacher, sculptor, broadcaster, screenwriter and popular social woman with many talented friends which reflected her own creativity.  She was also a talented artist - a self-portrait and portrait of Noel Coward are shown on this page. 

She was the first woman screenwriter to win an Oscar.  She was also awarded a CBE.  She was great friends with Noel Coward and was extremely famous at the beginning of the 20th Century and thoroughly deserves to be celebrated and remembered.  Her essays, The Women’s Side, are all available online here.

‘The invisible woman’ of the early 20th Century, she is a fascinating character and we hope you enjoy this episode in which we discuss our objections to the definitions of high, middle and low brow attitudes to art. 

Her work is still published on Kindle and so is accessible for all.

Caroline and Nicola talk with Paul Kerensa, comedian, broadcaster, writer and host of podcast The British Broadcasting Century about this clever one act comedy.  As they discuss, the play could not deal with political matters explicity on the radio at that time - and yet, in a comedic way it deals with matters of class and gender along with societal expectation in an amusing and entertaining way.

10 Clowning Street by Joan S. Dugdale is published in the Metheun Drama Book of Suffrage Plays .  It tells the story of an anti-suffragist Prime Minister - who we do not meet immediately because he is taking a relaxing salt bath - and his brilliant plan to stop the suffragettes by introducing a compulsory National Work for Women scheme under which all single women over 21 are to work full-time.  Satisfied that these weary women will have no energy left to pester him anymore for the vote, he sends his daughters out to work in typical working women’s roles.  Only, his plan does not quite work out the way that he had hoped.  His previously anti-suffrage daughters having led a privileged and comfortable life until their work experience, come back with a rather different view, which was not part of the plan - just as the Prime Minister has a visit from a hack in search of a scoop.

This is a really interesting use of humour in the suffrage campaign.  In this episode, we discuss the play, the humour within it and its use in the suffrage movement. 

We mention an academic study called Jokes for Women which is a PhD thesis on how humour was used by the suffragettes - which is interesting as humour was often used against them as illustrated by some of the art on this page.  

We also discuss the interesting life of Joan S. Dugdale 1881-1975 who campaigned for equality throughout her career and was, herself, a suffragette who was arrested and imprisoned for her actions. Hear what the judge thought of her rebellion and of some of the causes that she later went on to support.  

We hope you enjoy this episode of She Wrote Too.  Please do recommend us to others. 

We are on social media on Instagram and Facebook where you can find additional information on women writers of the past.  

We look forward to posting our next episode on 1st July.

She Wrote Too.

An early feminist novel set in South Africa in 1883, this book is an interesting and unusual literary work. It is a generic hybrid in that in some ways it is new woman fiction whilst also having many other elements such as Dickensian farce, spiritual musings, gothic elements and melodrama. It follows three central characters from their childhood in South Africa to their adults lives exploring their development and ideas as well as their love interests and encounters with other interesting characters on the way.

In this podcast we discuss the themes of the novel, a little of Schreiner’s life and attitudes and some of the issues that arise in the book.

We do give a warning that there is mention of child death in the discussion. We also mention the issue of the racist terms that were used in South Africa at the time - although these are not explicitly said.

We hope you enjoy this podcast. For extra content, please do join us on social media on Facebook and Instagram for more information about women writers that have gone before us.