"The devilish expression lacking" A study of moral in Agatha Christie`s Cards on the Table

Abstract

Kriminallitteratur er en sjanger om forbrytelser og deres oppklaring. Forbrytelsen i kriminallitteratur er ofte mord. Kriminalsjangeren er en iboende moralsk sjanger hvor rettferdigheten seirer til slutt. Denne masterundersøkelsen utforsker om kriminelle karakterer blir straffet i narrativet, og hvordan et krimnarrativ behandler et offer som også har begått kriminalitet? Dette spørsmålet kan være spesielt interessant i Cards on the Table, en kriminalroman av Agatha Christie hvor alle ofrene har begått en form for kriminalitet. Denne lesningen av romanen finner at kriminelle ofre er straffet for sin kriminalitet via mord. Forut for dette blir kriminelle ofre oftest sympatisk fremstilt. Lesningen finner også fire moralske temaer: tilgivelse, hybris, hykleri og rettferdighet.

Crime fiction is a genre about crimes and their investigation. Often, the crime in question is murder. Crime fiction is an inherently moral genre, in which justice prevails. This thesis will explore whether criminal characters are punished through the narrative, and how a crime fiction narrative treat a victim who has also committed a crime? This question can be especially interesting in Cards on the Table, a crime fiction novel by Agatha Christie in which all of the victims have themselves committed crime. This reading of the novel finds that criminal victims are punished via murder, but that, prior to this, they are sympathetically portrayed. This leads to the identification of four major moral themes: forgiveness, hubris, hypocrisy and justice.