Vorlage:Infobox Book The Murder on the Links is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in 1923 and in the UK by The Bodley Head in May of the same year. It features Hercule Poirot and Arthur Hastings. The UK edition retailed at seven shillings and sixpence.
Plot summary
Poirot receives a telegram from millionaire Paul Renauld, begging him to come to his estate in France. When Poirot arrives, Renauld is dead, his body found stabbed, lying on a golf course. His wife claims he had been kidnapped by some mysterious Chileans. It turns out that Renauld had been planning to fake his own death, but things had gone disastrously wrong. Although the police think they have the murderer, a second murder sees Poirot desperately trying to prove his theory.
The book is notable for a subplot in which Hastings meets his future wife, Dulcie Duveen.
First Publication
The novel received its first true publication as a serialisation in The Grand Magazine from 1922 to March 1923 under the title of The Girl with the Anxious Eyes before it was issued in book form by The Bodley Head in 1923. Christie's autobiography recounts how she objected to the illustration of the dustwrapper, stating that it was both badly drawn and unrepresentative of the plot. It was the first of many such objections she raised with her publishers over the dustwrappers.
The Times Literary Supplement review the novel in its issue of June 7 1923. The review compared the methods of detection of Poirot to Sherlock Holmes and concluded favourably that the book "provides the reader with an enthralling mystery of an unusual kind".
Film, TV and theatrical adaptations
Saturday Night Theatre (BBC Radio 4)
The Murder on the Links was presented as a one hour, thirty minute radio play in the Saturday Night Theatre strand on BBC Radio 4 on September 15 1990. It was repeated on July 8 1991. John Moffatt starred as Poirot. The play's recording took place on June 21 1989.
Adapator: Michael Bakewell
Producer: Enyd Williams
Cast:
John Moffatt
Geoffrey Whitehead
Brian Miller
Stephen Tompkinson
David King
Joan Matheson
Danny Schiller
Vincent Brimble
Jeremy Clyde
Joanna Mackie
Ken Cumberlidge
Barbara Atkinson
Madeline Smith
Petra Davies
Francesca Buller
Agatha Christie's Poirot
The book was also adapted by Carnival Films as a 94 minute drama and transmitted on ITV in the UK on Sunday February 11 1996 as a special episode in their series Agatha Christie's Poirot.
The two major changes in this version from the book were:
- In the book, Hercule Poirot is invited by Paul Renauld while in the adaptation Poirot is on holiday with Hastings in Paris and the hotel they are staying is owned by Paul. It is in the hotel that Paul and Poirot meet.
- Dulcie Duveen was called Bella Duveen in the adaptation.
The episode was filmed on location in Deauville, France
Adapator: Anthony Horowirz
Director: Andrew Grieve
Cast:
David Suchet played Hercule Poirot
Hugh Fraser played Arthur Hastings
Bill Moody played Giraud
Damien Thomas played Paul Renauld
Sophie Linfield played Marthe Daubreuil
Katherine Fahey played Bernadette Daubreuil
Jacinta Mulcahy played Bella Duveen
Bernard Latham played Lucien Bex
Ben Pullen played Jack Renauld
Diana Fletcher played Eloise Renauld
Terence Beesley played Stonor
Andrew Melville played Dr Hautet
Henrietta Voigts played Leonie
James Vaughan played Adam Letts
Ray Gatenby played a Station Master
Randal Herley played the Judge
Peter Yapp played a Lawyer
Terry Raven played a Tramp
Margaret Clifton played a Concierge
Tim Berrington played a Golfer
Howard Lee played a Golfer
Joseph Morton played a Policeman
Christopher Hammond played a Policeman
Belinda Stewart-Wilson played a Dubbing Secretary
Richard Bebb played a Newsreader