Agatha Christie - The Moving Finger (2)

The Moving Finger
Agatha Christie
The Moving Finger
Agatha Christie
Plot summary:
Brother and sister Jerry and Joanna Burton bought a country house in an idyllic English town called Lymstock so that Jerry could recover from injuries received in a wartime plane crash. They had been living in London their whole life and thus were excited but intimidated to go.
Lymstock was much like any other English village , no more than 300 people. Those that live there enjoy the peace of rural life and form a union to where it can be difficult for strangers to blend in. Fortunately, it wasn't much of a problem for Jerry and Joanna.
They were just getting to know the town's strange members and their characters when an anonymous letter arrived, accusing the two of not being brother and sister, but lovers. The letter started a series of poison pen letters all over the village, which destroyed the safety the villagers took for granted . Right away , they knew it wasn't true and thought somebody was doing it just for laughs.
The second letter went to Mrs Symmington, the local solicitor Mr Symmington's wife. It turned out the letters were no trick at all, when she committed suicide, after reading a letter that stated her last child wasn't her husband 's. Her body was discovered with the letter, a glass containing potassium cyanide and a torn suicide note which read: I can't go on. Few days after, Mr Symmington's maid was murdered. Shockingly, the body was found by Megan, Mr Symmington's 20 year old step - daughter .
Scotland Yard sent someone to investigate, and came to the conclusion that the letter-writer/murderer was a middle -aged woman who must be one of the citizens of Lymstock. The village was plunged into suspicion and terror . Once a village of trust, now all inhabitants were on the verge of accusations.
There was a break in the case when the Symmington's beautiful young governess, Elsie Holland , received an anonymous letter typed with the same typewriter that had been used to create previous letters. The doctor 's sister, Aimee Griffith, was arrested, since she had been seen both typing the letter and delivering it.
Everything fell back into place for a moment, which lasted a bit longer than usual. Jerry and Megan went to London to run some errands, visit his doctor and buy new clothes for Megan. He also began to realise that he had fallen in love with her and as they returned, Jerry asked Megan to marry him but she refused. Miss Marple had seen that coming all along and knew how it would come to benefit . Jerry went to Mr Symmington to ask his permission and of course , Mr Symmington agreed as he wanted Megan out of his way.
He soon realised it wasn't going to be as easy , when Megan came to blackmail him, telling she had seen everything. Mr Symmington tried to get rid of her by drugging her with sleeping pills and pulling her to a gas stove, trying to murder her. He was stopped by Jerry and the police . It was then revealed that Miss Marple wished to prove Mr. Symmington’s guilt in that way, and Megan was brave enough to assist her.
He committed the murders because he wished to marry his children 's governess. Aimee Griffith, in love with Symmington, had written only the letter to Miss. Holland, out of jealousy and trying to protect the man she loved from marrying the wrong woman.
Megan, in light of recent events, finally realised that she loved Jerry after all. His sister Joanna married the local doctor, and both couples settled down in Lymstock.
Main characters:
Jerry Burton:
He is the 'I' character in the book, everything is described from his perspective. An injured pilot in his thirties. A great man, good looks , nice soul. He sincerely cared for everybody , his sister the most because he is the one who made her leave London. He was never mad at anybody, except himself after the accident when he discovered he probably wouldn't be able to fly any kind of plane again . He didn't seem like a true city person who would think themselves better than some villagers, quite the opposite. He was the first one to show some respect for Megan, he saw her wisdom and cleverness. Thus came the love.
Megan Symmington:
A quiet innocent 20 year old girl who had lived in Lymstock her whole life. Nobody understood her, her parents , other villagers and not even her coevals. Everybody, even her mother , wanted her to make a use of herself , get some training, go to school, which was a problem throughout the book. She had no friends , nowhere to go, but she saw everything. Her main activity during the days was riding her bicycle all around the town. She was already lacking confidence and the discovering of the maid's body was just the last drop. Nobody wanted her except for Jerry and Joanna, who housed her for couple of days after the incident. Finally, she went along with Jerry to London, which was a life-changing experience for her and for Jerry as well. Unfortunately , Megan was still too naive to understand what love is, how could she, when she had her parent 's marriage as a role model. But she wasn't too naive nor afraid to go along with Miss Marple's plan to reveal Mr Symmington's true identity.
Joanna Burton:
Jerry's younger single sister who was forced to go along with Jerry to remedy his leg. She was emotionally extremely close with her brother but regrettably always a step behind. She was a bystander in everything and saw everything objectively, including the growing situation between Jerry and Megan. She had a hard time managing the ''being my brother's shadow '', especially when she came to a knowledge that there are some pretty nice men living in Lymstock. For example, Mr Pye, Aimee Grifith's brother, she tried everything to intimate that she likes him. But Mr Pye was too much focused on the case happening around them , which kept them apart and prolonged their dating. He didn't see what was happening right in front of his eyes until the very end. Luckily, she did reach her happy ending .
The book:
The book was first published in 1942 in the USA, it's first revelation in the UK was in 1943. It is a detective novel with the elderly lady Miss Jane Marple.
The book's title is taken from the 51st verse of the Edward Fitzgerald's translation of the poem The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyam, written in between 1048 and 1131.
The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.
Meaning , whatever one does in one's life is one's own responsibility and cannot be changed.
The Moving Finger is emphasised twice. The first is how the letters point blame from one town member to another . The second, the addresses on the letters, which the Scotland Yard uses to identify that the envelopes were all "typed by someone using only one finger" in order to avoid a 'touch', which could be recognised as one certain person.
The Moving Finger was one of Christie’s favourite books , and in her autobiography she recalls the experience of writing it during the difficult time of the Second World War. ''It is a great test to re-read what one has written some seventeen or eighteen years later. One’s view changes. Some do not stand the test of time, others do.'' The moving Finger has successfully been adapted for television , firstly in 1985 and the latest film in 2006, starring James D'Arcy as Jerry, Talulah Riley as Megan and Emilia Fox as Joanna, as seen on previous pictures.
My opinion:
I enjoyed reading it, though I found it difficult to follow all the characters, they got mixed up a lot. But they were believable and the reader can relate to each one. I didn't like the stalling before the exciting parts, which were the murders and the revealing of the murderer. I often got bored and wanted to find another book to read but after finishing it I understood it was necessary in order to paint a clear image for the reader of all the different personalities and their behaviour.
Because of the misunderstanding of the characters the ending took me by surprise . I didn't see a murderer in Mr Symmington, but I did see the love between Jerry and Megan coming. Although I didn't think Megan would refuse and that she had developed a mind of her own after all, taking into account that she had to follow orders throughout her life and didn't have a friend to talk to.
I would definitely recommend it to others, because it is an easy reading. Firstly, due to the fact that it is a detective novel, which can keep the excitement until the end. Also, it contains a lot of sophistication and truth to understand why a certain man acts the way he does. And finally, it is an easy read for those who have English as their second language , at least easier that a lot others. There are words to which you might not know the exact replica, but the meaning of the whole sentence doesn't get lost because of that single word.
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