Literary allusions in detective novels by Agatha Christie

Porinets Yurii Yur'evich PhD in Pedagogy Associate Professor of the Department of Foreign Literature at Herzen State Pedagogical University of Russia 191186, Russia, g. Saint Petersburg, ul. Nab. R. Moiki, 48 porinets2015@yandex.ru Other publications by this author

In the detective novels of Agatha Christie there are numerous allusions to literary texts. Mostly these are allusions to works of English literature. But there are also references to texts of other national literatures.

For example, in the novel "Ten Little Negroes", the identity of the murderer is revealed more fully with the help of a reference to Dante's "Divine Comedy". The hero, talking about the criminals he executed, says: "My victims had to die in strict order of priority – I attached great importance to this. I couldn't put them on the same level – the degree of guilt of each of them was completely different. I decided that the least guilty would die first, so as not to condemn them to prolonged mental suffering and fear, to which I condemned cold-blooded criminals" ^{[1, p. 707]}. It is obvious that the order of death of criminals is connected with the distribution of sinners in the circles of hell in Dante's poem. Hell in the poem was created by God, so the claim of the judge from the novel to be the Supreme Judge, his obsession with retribution and his own greatness is revealed, among other things, with the help of this parallel with Dante.

There are also rare references to works of Russian literature.  For example, in the novel "Nemesis": "Something Russian,– murmured Miss Marple. Chekhov, I think. Or maybe Dostoevsky? I really don't remember. Three sisters. But obviously not those who were so eager to go to Moscow. These are not going anywhere and do not want to leave, I have no doubt about that" ^{[2, p. 273]}. In fact, with the help of a reference to Chekhov's play, the atmosphere of the novel is revealed, the time stopped in the heroines' house is shown, the past that does not let them go, allows them to live. "It seemed to me that there was an atmosphere of sadness and longing, misfortune, misfortune and fear in this house," says another place in the novel ^{[2, p. 395]}.

Of great importance in Agatha Christie's detectives, in the center of which is always the investigation of a crime, references to the novel by F. M. Dostoevsky "Crime and Punishment". A direct reference to Dostoevsky is present in the novel "Hickory, Dickory, Doc ..." when Colin, one of the students, tells Poirot that his "horizons are limited only to "crime and punishment" ^{[3, p. 544]}. The possibility of murder committed for a good purpose, in the absence of retribution, is repeatedly discussed in the novels ("Ten Little Negroes", "It's easy to kill", "Murder has been announced", "A date with death"). The discussion on this topic is a direct reference not only to the conversation between Zosimov and the student who overheard Raskolnikov depicted in Crime and Punishment, but also to the paradox about the Chinese Mandarin from The Genius of Christianity by R. Chateaubriand and Father Goriot by O. de Balzac.

It is important that for Agatha Christie, as for Dostoevsky, killing one for the sake of one's own well-being and the good of all is unacceptable and not justified by anything, as Poirot directly says in the novel "A Date with Death". "I don't care if the victim was a saint or a monster. The fact remains that a human being was deprived of life, and I always say that I do not approve of murder."^[4]

In some novels of Agatha Christie (for example, "The Mirror cracked") there are references to the "Royal idylls" of A. Tennyson. In the novel "Seeds in the Pocket" this collection is directly mentioned. Fortescue's two brothers bear the names of her heroes: Percival and Lancelot, being by nature their complete opposite. Tennyson's lines are also quoted in other novels (for example, in The Tragedy in Three Acts).

Sir Eustace, the main criminal in the novel "The Man in the Brown Suit", is compared to John Silver from the novel "Treasure Island". It is important that this character, despite his actions, causes sympathy for the main character. This directly refers to the novel by R. L. Stevenson, in which Jim Hawkins sympathizes with Silver. When the hero manages to escape, the narrator is relieved. This collision is almost completely reproduced in the detective, the heroine is pleased with the escape of Sir Eustace.

One of the characters in the novel "At 16.50 from Paddington" Josiah Crackenthorpe is in many ways similar to the old miser Crowley from the novel "Vanity Fair" by W. M. Thackeray. The episode in which Crackenthorpe shows Lucy his wealth, criticizes his children and hints at a possible marriage with her is an obvious reference to Thackeray's novel in which old Crowley proposes to young Becky Sharp.

In the novel The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, Miss Flora tells the narrator that she loves George Eliot's novel The Mill on the Floss. The mention of this novel is important not only because Dr. Sheppard builds his narrative largely in the traditions of Victorian literature. The secondary heroines of the novel (Miss Caroline Sheppard and Mrs. Ackroyd) – clearly refer us to the heroines of Victorian novels.

Poirot in the novel utters the phrase: "It is not for nothing that they say that every Englishman always hides one thing – his love" ^{[5, p. 595]}. In Eliot's novel, the main character, based on ideas about morality and duty, suppresses her love feeling. In The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, Major Blunt tries to suppress his feelings from the same motives, and Miss Flora also insists on her marriage with Ralph, who is unfairly accused of murder, out of a sense of duty. But Agatha Christie's novel is not a Victorian novel, but a detective story, suggesting a happy ending to a love collision, so thanks to Poirot's intervention, the love story ends safely. It is curious in this connection that Poirot's investigation destroys the original idea of the narrator's narrative, who wanted to devote his novel to depicting the detective's failure, and as a result described his own. Similarly, lines reminiscent of Eliot's novel, which the doctor's narrative is largely focused on, are revealed differently.

Quite often in novels quotes from L. Carroll's fairy tales are used. They serve to create a humorous flavor and seem to indicate to the reader the obvious literariness of what is happening. For example, in the novel "At 16.50 from Paddington" Lucy utters the phrase "The further, the more interesting ..." ^{[6, p. 288]}. In the novel "Seeds in the Pocket" Inspector Neal quotes the phrase "They are all very unpleasant people" ^{[7, p. 215]}. A quote from Alice in Wonderland is also present in the novel The Passenger from Frankfurt. The events that take place in the novel "The Clock" are compared by Poirot to the poem "The Walrus and the Carpenter" from "Alice through the Looking Glass".

In the novels of Agatha Christie there are a number of references to the novels of Ch . Dickens. For example, in the novel "The Riddle of Sittaford", the hero is clearly similar to Dickensian characters, which is directly indicated in the text: "Major Burnaby was doing his calculations, or, using an expression in the spirit of Dickens, looking through cases" ^{[8, p. 197]}. A reference to the novel "The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit", in which Sarah Gamp constantly told stories about the non-existent Mrs. Harris, is present in the novel "The Riddle of Endhouse": "As soon as I arrived, I was led into the dining room, and, looking around, I realized that all the persons included in Poirot's list were here starting from A and ending with I. Only K was absent, for the good reason that, like Mrs. Harris, such a person "never happened" ^{[9, p. 401]}. It was under the name of Harris that a person was registered, whose place was supposed to remain empty, and which Poirot eventually took in the novel "Orient Express".

There are especially many allusions to the novel "David Copperfield". The depiction of Croft scammers in the novel "The Riddle of the Endhouse", behaving hypocritically, clearly refers to the images of Uriah Heep and his mother. Edgar Lawson is directly compared to the same character in the novel "Trick with Mirrors". "He was a very ordinary young man, very depressed and in his humility even resembled Uriah Heep. He looked very young, was a bit vulgar and rather pathetic" ^{[10, p. 115]}. In the novel "The Dead Man's Quirk", Sir George, driving tourists out of his possessions, reminds the heroine: "Betsy Trotwood, fighting with donkeys" ^[11]. The description of the household of the Summerhays couple in the novel "Mrs. McGinty parted with her life" is a reference to the image of the Micawber household. It is quite obvious that the images of Major Summerhayes and his wife Maureen are focused on Dickensian cranks. The narrator's image of family life in the novel "Murder in the Vicarage" is a reference to the image of David and Dora's family life, in which many things do not go well, in particular, they have negligent servants.  The priest's wife does not know how to run a household, treats it lightly, in many ways perceiving it as a game, which also resembles a Dickens novel. Betsy Trotwood calls Dora a Flower, Miss Marple Griselda a Darling. But there are also important differences. The heroine of Agatha Christie, unlike Dora, has an extraordinary sense of humor. David Copperfield dreams that his wife will change after the birth of a child. But in Dickens' novel, Dora and David's family life ends tragically, the heroine dies after giving birth. "Murder in the vicarage" ends, on the contrary, with the joyful news of Griselda's pregnancy, the heroine herself says that she will soon become more serious. This is certainly a happy ending, corresponding to the formula of the detective genre. In order to leave readers in no doubt about the successful outcome, the son of the vicar and his wife is mentioned in the novel "At 16.50 from Paddington".

In the novel "One-two-Three-buckle up" there is a heroine who plays the role of the eccentric Miss Seal, reminiscent of Dickensian characters. The colorful heroines of Dickens are clearly reminiscent of both Lucy Encatell ("The Hollow") and Aunt Lucilla ("Sparkling Cyanide"). Major Horton ("It's easy to kill") is also similar to Dickens' eccentric heroes, to whom, for example, the following judgment belongs: "in order for a man to be in shape, he needs a wife" ^{[12, p. 454]}.

Dickensian allusions in the novels of Agatha Christie, in many ways, as in the novels of her contemporaries (G. K. Chesterton, I. Waugh, P. G. Wodehouse, G. Green, D. Sayers and others) not only contribute to the creation of a national English flavor, but also emphasize belonging to a certain literary tradition. The depiction of poetry of a calm peaceful life, bright secondary characters, consoling finales, heroes-cranks – all this goes back to the tradition of Dickens.

Agatha Christie often uses a technique associated with Baroque literature, when everything turns out to be not what it seems, the external impression is deceptive, the characters impersonate someone else ("Elephants can remember", "The Third", "Trick with mirrors", "Hour zero", "It's easy to kill", "After the funeral", "Villa "White Horse"). The Baroque principle of "world – theater", often used by Shakespeare and associated with him in subsequent eras, can be observed, for example, in "The Riddle of the Endhouse". The heroine, Nick, organizes a performance, posing as a potential victim of a criminal and committing a murder, which she is going to accuse her friend of. Poirot arranges his own performance, exposing the murderer. The criminal tries to play an active role in the investigation in the novels "Tragedy in Three Acts", "Alphabetical Murders", "The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, "The Death of Lord Edgware", also acting out his performance. In the endings of novels, as in Baroque literature, the true state of things is revealed. In the novel "The Sleeping Murder" there are allusions to the play by the Baroque playwright D. Webster "The Duchess of Amalfi", the connection with this play is constantly emphasized by the author. It is the references to this baroque drama that help to solve the crime.

Allusions to Shakespearean drama occupy a special place in the novels. For example, many quotes from Shakespeare are present in the novel "A Date with Death". Through the lines of Shakespeare's sonnet, the young heroine of the novel "Holidays in Limstock" expresses her feeling for the hero, thereby expanding the semantic field of the novel, Shakespeare's quote gives the formulaic narrative depth. The heroine of the novel "The Third" Norma is repeatedly compared with Ophelia during the novel, with the help of this comparison, the author emphasizes her fragility and defenselessness. The image of Elsa Grier ("Five Piglets") is revealed by comparison with Juliet, the similarity with the image of Shakespeare's heroine only emphasizes their differences. Elsa is "predatory", she did not die young, but stayed alive, she chose not a young Romeo, but a married genius artist, she is demanding, ruthless, calculating and cynical. Agatha Christie seems to be trying to show the reverse side of Shakespeare's heroine. A heroine in whom there is no sacrifice, genuine love, but only passion, vulnerability, demanding and unwillingness to take into account the circumstances inherent in youth. Such a Juliet becomes not a victim in the novel, but a murderer, forever imprinted on the portrait of the artist she killed. Here, perhaps, there is also a reference to O. Wilde's novel "The Portrait of Dorian Gray", in which the true image of his soul was displayed on the portrait of the hero.

Barton, the hero of the novel "Sparkling Cyanide", in the episode, when he learns about his wife's infidelity, compares himself to Othello. Colonel Reis also compares him with the hero of Shakespeare's tragedy. Othello is also mentioned in the novels "Five Piglets" and "The Man in the Brown Suit". In the novel The Riddle of the Endhouse, Poirot explains to Hastings that the genius of Iago's crime lies "in the fact that it was committed by someone else's hands" ^{[9, p. 322]}?

Some novels give an interpretation of Shakespeare's plays. For example, in the novels Villa The White Horse and Nemesis, the writer refers to the interpretation of the image of witches from Macbeth. In her interpretation, Shakespeare's witches should be shown on stage by "three completely ordinary old ladies" ^{[2, p. 281]}.

If in the detective stories about Miss Marple, the heroine constantly talks about investigating crimes by analogy with the residents of St. Mary Mead, then Poirot draws analogies with literature. For example, in "The Coast of Luck" a reference to Shakespearean drama is given. "It's complicated,– agreed Poirot. – It's very difficult. Because, you see, here before you are two different types of crime, and accordingly – you must have two different killers. The First killer enters, the Second killer enters…

–Don't quote Shakespeare," moaned Spence.

– No, it's just like Shakespeare. Here are all the feelings, human feelings that Shakespeare reveled in: jealousy, hatred, sudden actions in a fit of passion. There is a desire to use a lucky chance: "The tide also happens in people's affairs. The tide, which – if you don't miss it–will lead to wealth..." Someone played this role, the chief Inspector. To seize a happy opportunity and turn it in your own way - all this was brilliantly executed and, so to speak, under your very nose" ^[13]. The quoted phrase belongs to Brutus from the tragedy "Julius Caesar". Poirot changes the word "success" from the original replica of the tragedy to "wealth", adapting it to a specific situation. With the help of Shakespeare's allusion, the background of what is happening is actually explained.

The novel "Halloween Party" is correlated with the play "The Tempest". One of the heroines is named Miranda. The hero-artist dreams of an island where he can create a semblance of paradise, which clearly refers the reader to the island of Prospero. In the novel there is a dialogue between Miranda and Poirot, which directly uses a quote from the play: "The world is beautiful where the inhabitants are like this!" But that doesn't really happen, does it? (...) A wonderful new world always exists," Poirot replied, "but only for lucky people – for those who are able to create such a world in themselves." ^[14]. The novel touches on the nature of evil in man, which brings him closer to Shakespeare's tragicomedy.

In the novels of Agatha Christie there are characters belonging to the type of unprincipled, daring, enterprising and ruthless murderers, in this respect they are similar to Shakespeare's Richard III ("Coast of Luck", "Seeds in your pocket", At 16.50 from Paddington, "A Corpse in the Library", "Mrs. McGinty lost her life", "Sparkling cyanide"). These characters have crossed the border separating good from evil. It should be noted that these heroes can, like Dostoevsky, be called "transgressors".

The novel "The Sad Cypress" opens with an epigraph from "Twelfth Night". The love plot of the novel is correlated with Shakespeare's comedy, where the Duke, during the play, unrequited in love with Olivia, convinced of the impossibility of marriage with her, discovers in the finale the desire to marry Viola, who loves him. It should be noted that in Shakespeare's comedies only mutual love is certainly genuine. Shakespeare's hero, who persists in his unrequited love, looks like a man who, according to the Jester, is trying to catch "his own tail" ^{[15, p. 154]}. There is no Shakespearean concept of mutual love in the novel, but the closeness to the plot of Shakespeare's comedy is obvious. Eleanor is passionately in love with Roddy, who does not reciprocate her, does not understand her love, but has been going to marry her for some time. In the finale of the novel, it is obvious that she will not marry him, as Poirot directly says, never making mistakes in his final grades. Her future husband will be Dr. Peter Lord, who loves her and is ready to sacrifice everything for her, which refers to Viola's love for the Duke in Shakespeare's play. The heroine does not feel passionate love for the doctor, but it is his face in the courtroom that looks "soothing" and "ordinary" ^{[16, p. 350]}.  As Poirot says: "She loved Roderick Welman. So what? But she can be happy with you" ^{[16, p. 358]}. Thus, it is obvious that Shakespeare's play is united with the novel by a plot, as a result of the development of which an unhappy, unrequited love is replaced by a happy one leading to marriage. If in the comedy the Duke's love for Olivia is largely far-fetched, which allows him to accept Viola's love in the finale and realize that he himself loves her, then in the novel Eleanor's love for Roderick is portrayed as a genuine deep feeling. The proposed marriage with the doctor is shown as an opportunity for happiness, peace, the heroine needs Peter Lord and is ready to accept his love. This collision is close not so much to Shakespeare as to the finale of I. S. Turgenev's novel Rudin, in which Natalia Lasunskaya, having experienced a love drama with the main character and not finding peace and happiness in passionate love, marries a reliable Lezhnev.

True love, which replaces the imaginary one, is also depicted in the novel "Sparkling Cyanide". The reference to Shakespeare is directly given in the text: "At that moment he felt the same as Romeo felt when he tried to think about Rosalind when he first saw Juliet" ^[17]. "Even Romeo had Rosalind before he was conquered by Juliet," Anthony Brown explains to his fiancee in the novel.

As for many representatives of the English detective, the work of G. K. Chesterton was of great importance for Agatha Christie. As N. N. Kirilenko correctly notes, "Christie is constantly playing both with his predecessors and with his own creativity, up to quoting." As an example, the researcher notes "obvious ironic references to Chesterton's "Broken Sword" in "Murder by Alphabet" ^{[18, p. 37]}.

In the novel "Murder at the Vicarage", the killer even indirectly quotes Chesterton, saying that the criminal might not have been noticed. This remark is a direct reference to the story about Father Brown "The Invisible Man". In response , the narrator directly says: "You've read a lot of Chesterton" ^{[19, p. 541]}.

It's always better to look at everything from this height, Emily thought admiringly. – It's like you're looking inside a doll's house from above," says the novel "The Riddle of Sittaford" ^{[8, p. 146]}. This phrase is an allusion to Chesterton's frequently encountered image of a doll's house as the embodiment of comfort and peace, indicating which tradition Agatha Christie relies on.

The story "The Case of a disgruntled military man" from the cycle about Mr. Pine is a variation of the plot from Chesterton's story "The Incredible Incident with Major Brown", which is part of the cycle "The Club of Incredible Crafts". The main character of Agatha Christie, Major Wilbraham has the same military rank as the hero of Chesterton, in the finale of the story he also marries a participant in a staged adventure. Only unlike Chesterton's work, the hero of Agatha Christie himself turns to Parker Pine, while Major Brown becomes a participant in the events by mistake. The heroine, who becomes the wife of Major Wilbraham, also paid money to Parker Pine, while Chesterton's role of the victim is played by a professional actress. Parker Pyne's goal was originally to arrange the major's marriage, with Chesterton it becomes a consequence of a combination of circumstances. The most significant difference between the stories is that "The Incredible Incident with Major Brown" reveals important motives for Chesterton (love, modern civilization, the city, family, surprise, etc.). Agatha Christie's story is primarily entertaining, all interest is focused exclusively on unexpected plot twists, small psychological comments by Pine and humorous moments.

 Agatha Christie, like many English authors of detective novels, was strongly influenced by P. G. Wodehouse. The writer was well acquainted with the work of Wodehouse and dedicated the novel "Halloween Party" to him ^[20]. But the novel itself hardly makes sense to correlate with the works of an English humorist. This dedication looks first of all like a tribute to the writer, and not an attempt to indicate the orientation of this text on his work. In the novel, which is uncharacteristic for Agatha Christie in general, there is only one humorous fragment. It is curious that Wodehouse himself dreamed of writing a detective novel, in his own works there are elements of a detective story ^[21].

Parallels with Wodehouse's work are found in other works by Agatha Christie. There are especially many of them in the novel "Why not Evans?", the characters of which, young lovers involved in the investigation of a mysterious death, very much resemble the characters of Wodehouse. The main character, Bobby, on whose behalf the narration is conducted, looks like the hapless Bertie Wooster. Like Wooster and other Wodehouse heroes, he loves second-rate entertainment novels with a criminal plot. "He had enough patience for five minutes. For a mind nourished on the "Third Bloodstain", "The Case of the Murdered Archduke" and "The Outlandish Adventure of the Florentine Dagger", "John Halifax, gentleman" was rather boring" ^[22]. In the novel, Wodehouse's favorite motif is played out – the motif of putting on a fake beard, this issue is discussed by the characters, eventually settling on a fake mustache. The novel also gives an arbitrary interpretation of Shakespeare's work, the tragedy "Macbeth", which is perceived comically. Such naive interpretations are quite often present in the arguments of the characters of Wodehouse.

One of the minor characters, Badger, resembles the heroes of an English humorist who constantly get involved in various adventures, fail and borrow five pounds from friends. About Badger in the novel, we learn that he kept chickens, tried to be a stockbroker, he was sent to Australia, now he runs a used car company. The whole novel is designed in the spirit of Wodehouse. Ronnie Marsh, the hero of the novel "The Death of Lord Edgware", who borrows five pounds and leads a frivolous lifestyle, is also similar to the hero of Wodehouse.

There are references to Wodehouse's texts in other novels by Agatha Christie. In the manner of Wodehouse, whose characters often worry about the despotism of their aunts ^[23], Ronnie's complaints ("The Riddle of Sittaford") about his aunt are sustained. The character himself is in many ways similar to Wooster and other similar Wodehouse characters, carefree, frivolous, not able to approach the matter seriously. And those old bastards are always making a fuss, Ronnie thought to himself. "They have no idea what a curse their punctuality is for everyone, their desire to do everything minute by minute, their stupid exercises to keep vigor and health." A mischievous thought about the marriage of the major and his aunt pleasantly dawned in his head. "Which of them, I wonder, will be the master of the situation? Undoubtedly, Aunt. It's funny to imagine how she, clapping her hands and screaming shrilly, calls the major" ^{[8, p. 198]}. Similar attempts to use the imagination of impossible things about relatives (aunts and uncles) to brighten up their real situation can often be found in the cycle about Jeeves and Wooster. The story "Nemean Lion" from the cycle "The Exploits of Hercules", in which the maid replaces the Pekingese, refers to the plot of Wodehouse's story "Bingo and Pekingese".

In the novels, one can find ironic references to the works of Russian classical literature, which is quite common in the works of Wodehouse. For example, in the novel "Sleeping Murder" there is the following dialogue: "Miss Marple replied that she had seen a play by a Russian author, which seemed to her very interesting, although a little long.

– Oh, these Russians are for me!  The colonel was indignant, remembering Dostoevsky's novel, which he was given to read when he was lying in the clinic" ^[24].

In the novel "The Secret of the Seven Dials", Lady Coote's reverent attitude towards her gardener is a reference to Wodehouse's story "The Pumpkin Keeper". Actually, the description of the castle, in which the novel "The Secret of Chimneys Castle" also takes place, is a reference to the cycle about Blandings Castle, in which an eccentric owner, many comic characters act and there are love vicissitudes described in a humorous spirit. References to Wodehouse's texts serve primarily to create a humorous background in many of Agatha Christie's works, which is an important part of them.

It seems interesting to ask about the relationship of detective novels by Agatha Christie and contemporary "high" literature. In particular, it is important in this regard to consider psychologism. Analyzing a fragment of the writer's novel in this context, P. N. Moiseev writes: "a detail can be introduced into a work as psychological (this gives it the right to be mentioned), but its true meaning turns out to be not psychological at all. So, in the novel "Coast of Luck" the heroine has to make a difficult choice. Immersed in thought, everything around her reminds her of her problem, and even the smoke of a locomotive in the distance seems like a question mark. Before us is a typical "psychologization" of the landscape for "high" literature. But needless to say, all this psychological passage is needed by Christie solely for the sake of mentioning the smoke from the locomotive, which will turn out to be important evidence in the case" ^{[25, p. 193]}. One should largely agree with this judgment. But at the same time, it should be noted that psychologism is present in some detective novels without any connection with the description of the crime or as a distracting maneuver for the reader. It can be traced, among other things, in other fragments of this novel. For example, in the dialogues between Lin and Rowley, in Lin's internal monologues, in the description of the relationship between Jeremy Cloade and his wife Frances.

In some of her detective novels, Agatha Christie demonstrates following the trends of modern literature. She also uses psychologism (for example, the depiction of relations in the Farraday family in the novel "Sparkling Cyanide"), shows the loss of modern man ("At 16.50 from Paddington", "The End of human stupidity", "Coast of Luck"), the crisis of modern consciousness and civilization ("Bertram Hotel"). In the novel "The White Horse Villa" it is said that the modern world is "a dangerous world, truly dangerous" ^[26]. The heroine of the novel "The Riddle of the Endhouse" portrays in one of the episodes a person of the "lost generation". "Suddenly the nerves gave up – and the end. And then there's this... (...) Yes, actually, nothing. In my opinion, this is what the newspapers call the overstrain of modern life. Too many cocktails, too many cigarettes, too much of everything else. I just have some kind of stupid state right now" ^{[9, p. 297]}. Here she seems to be quoting an essay by F. Scott Fitzgerald's "Echoes of the Jazz Age" (1931), which talks about "all this nervous energy that accumulated and remained unspent during the war years", about "a state of nervous tension" ^[27]. It is interesting to note that Agatha Christie's novel was published a year later than the publication of the American writer's text.

It should be noted that with rare exceptions ("Passenger from Frankfurt", "Villa "White Horse", Hotel "Bertram", "Hickory, Dickory, Doc...", "Mirror cracked") Agatha Christie avoids immersion in the problems of modernity and confines herself to mentioning minor signs of the era. As her heroine, the author of detective novels, the writer Ariadne Oliver, says in the novel "The White Horse Villa": "Beatniks, satellites, "The Broken Generation" and all that. I don't write about them, I'm afraid to confuse the names. It's better to write about what you know. Calm down" ^[26].

There is also criticism of the main trends of modern literature in the novels of Agatha Christie. In the novel "The Caribbean Mystery", for example, Miss Marple talks about modern novels: "It is almost impossible to read them – they usually talk about very unpleasant people who commit incomprehensible acts, apparently without experiencing any pleasure from it" ^[28]. In the novel "Murder in the vicarage", the narrator, who seeks to describe the investigation of the murder, focusing on the rules of his beloved (confirmation of this is in the text) detective genre, expresses his ironic attitude to modernist literature. About the writings of Miss Marple's nephew, which are ridiculed by her herself, he remarks: "He doesn't have a single capital letter in his poems; as I understand it, this is the main sign of avant-gardism. All his novels are about unpleasant people who drag out an incredibly miserable existence" ^{[19, p. 572]}.

In the novel "The Hollow" Agatha Christie demonstrates mastery of the technique of modernist storytelling, uses the technique of stream of consciousness. It seems that the use of this technique is not accidental here. After all, one of the central problems of the novel is the problem of the interaction of genius with everyday life (the image of genius in other angles is revealed in the novels "Five Piglets", "Halloween Party"). Consideration of this topic certainly brings the novel closer to modernism.

In this novel, the writer seems to show that she is quite capable of writing in a modernist way, knows the techniques of "high" literature. It is especially significant that a significant part of the novel actually shows different streams of consciousness that exist in a closed, impenetrable, autonomous from each other (John Christow, Gerda, Midge, Henrietta). In this way, the novel not only shows the different points of view of the characters on the events taking place, but also there is an effect of an extreme degree of alienation of the characters from each other. But the consciousness of the heroes is also distinguished by internal fragmentation. One example in the text is Henrietta's monologue: "The car is like a tiger... yellow and black... in stripes… It's a jungle… There is a river nearby... a large tropical river flowing towards the sea, towards the port, from where white steamers leave... Hoarse voices are shouting: "Goodbye!"... She's on deck… And John is next to her… They both go into a completely blue sea… At lunch he smiled at her… It was as if they were in a golden palace… Poor John!.. Car, speed... crazy driving, further and further away from London... dunes… Woods... Worship... "Valley"... Lucy... John... Ridgeway's disease... Dear John..."^[29]. The novel also identifies the motive of alienation of a person from himself, one of the leading motives of the literature of the XX century. One of the heroes, Eduard, says about himself, "I don't exist in the full sense of the word, I know it" ^[29]. In the novel "Coast of Luck" it is said about the heroine: "She stood in the room, curiously looking at her face in the mirror. A complete stranger's face, she thought. Suddenly she was seized with a fit of anger. She came down as if in a dream. Dreams, she thought, can be very dangerous..." ^[14]. There is a similar episode in the novel "The Trial of Innocence": "Stopping the chair at the dressing table, he took a brush and carefully combed back the hair hanging over his forehead. His own face seemed unfamiliar to him. "Who am I? he asked himself. – Where am I going" ^{[30, pp. 558-559]}? The moment when the hero looks in the mirror and perceives himself aloof is present, for example, in the novel "Nausea" by J. P. Sartre. In this regard, it is interesting to note that K. Chapek in his essay "Holmsiana" writes that the detective "does not reflect on what a person is, he reflects on where he is. His world is filled with concrete questions and concrete facts" ^{[31, p. 330]}. The hero of the quoted fragment, Philip, just acts as an amateur detective. Thus, it can be argued that Agatha Christie sometimes goes beyond the detective genre, in this case it happens with the help of literary allusion.

Literary allusions in the detective genre are directly related to the problem of escapism. Detective is often seen as a phenomenon associated with escapism, a departure from the problems of the real world. This applies to all genres of formulaic literature. B. Brecht wrote: "On one side are a literary novel and real life, on the other — a detective novel, a special slice of real life" ^{[32, p. 282]}. The same property is noted by D. Sayers, who calls the detective "a kind of escapist literature" ^{[33, p. 76]}. W. H. Auden in his essay "The Guilt of the vicarage" writes: "While mimetic literature gives the reader a sense of immersion in being, helps him to comprehend reality and his place in it, formulaic literature gives him oblivion" (Our translation – Yu. P.) ^[34]. As D. Kavelti notes: "the formula element creates an ideal world in which there is no disorder, ambiguity, uncertainty and limitation of the real world" ^{[35, p. 45]}.

Literary allusions in a detective novel, on the one hand, are a manifestation of escapism inherent in this genre, an indication that we are not facing reality, namely literature (a striking example, apart from the novels of Agatha Christie, is, for example, the novel "Honeymoon in the Hive" by D. Sayers, in which the number of allusions is how large, that creates a feeling of complete literariness of what is happening), on the other hand, immersion in the world of high literature, an indication of the literature that the detective focuses on as a sample. This is in many ways similar to what P. G. Wodehouse does in his works. ^[21].

With the help of literary allusions, the boundaries of the work of formulaic literature are expanded, at the same time the secondary nature of the text is emphasized and at the same time its belonging to high culture is emphasized. D. Kavelti argues that "in formulaic works a special emphasis is placed on intense and immediate experiences in contrast to the more complex and ambiguous analysis of characters and motivations underlying mimetic literature" ^{[35, p. 54]}. With the help of literary allusions, Agatha Christie, remaining within the framework of formulaic literature, just introduces the ambiguity of characters and motivations that Cavelty writes about. Allusions in many ways allow us to consider complex psychological problems, to portray ambiguous characters in the spirit of classical English literature.  

 Emphasizing belonging to formulaic literature, removing the claim to novelty, the author has the opportunity to focus not on modern modernist literature, but on tradition, in which, according to W. S. Maugham, one of the most important components is "history" ^{[36, p. 136]}. Literary allusions in Agatha Christie's novels often refer to specific texts of classical literature and emphasize the orientation towards them.