This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.
I think there must be a better term for this Setting, especially as the article itself says that many of Christie's novels take place post-1940. I would suggest Interbellum, but hey, maybe that's just me.
Silent Hunter: I know many of Christie's novels are post-1940. Poirot on TV is set in the 1930s and the New Marples are in the 1950s. Feel free to change it.
Daibhid C: I can see what the article means. At Bertram Hotel, a 1960s Miss Marple novel, is set in a hotel where everything has been maintained so that it still looks like the 1920s, although there are concessions to modernity if you look more closely. It seems to me, sometimes, that the whole Christie universe is like that; it doesn't matter what year a novel is supposed to be set in, it feels like 1929.
Silent Hunter: Curtain is set in the mid-1970s (it has to be, since Elephants Can Remember is stated in that book as taking place in 1972), but was written in the 1940s (and locked away for many years). Hence there are references to the death penalty.
Unknown Troper: Now that we have The Roaring '20s can we merge/delete this?
Ununnilium: No. Although they take place during the same time, they're very different settings.
Unknown Troper: can you explain what you mean?
Ununnilium: Basically, this focuses more on upper-class English drawing-rooms, whereas The Roaring '20s focuses more on flappers, gangsters, and jazz.
Jordan: Might Christie time be somewhat Truthin Television- I kind of get the impression that the Great Depression had less impact on England and thus the whole period of 1920-1940 was fairly static.
Morgan Wick: This page and The Roaring '20s need rewrites if we are to keep the separateness.
Byzantine: The Curtain is a very poor example because the setting is rather improbable for the 1970s. But the entire setting of "The Third Girl" (1966) would fit poorly in a non-1960s setting. Poirot investigates a mystery involving twenty-something girls. Christie is off to a great start with negative commentary on high-healed leather boots, short skirts and oversized woolen sweaters. Poirot also comments on their unkempt looks and the overwhelming temptation to have them take a bath. Basically the author'sd views on 1960s fashions.
Ariadne Oliver comments on the youths of the day not trusting anyone over thirty-five. Many references to a drug culture, which actually foreshadow the conclusion of the story. Norma Restarick, the girl Poirot tries to help, thinks her sanity is sleeping. Actually a friendly roommate regularly subjects her to a cocktail of drugs intended to disorient her and make her susceptible to the suggestion that she is a murderer. Framing her for a couple of actual murders.
A comment about the social education of youths has them knowing by heart an endless list of singers, musical groups and disk jockeys. On the other hand having trouble naming a single doctor, lawyer or detective when the need for them arise. Much is made of the habit of young girls to move in together just for sharing the rent. As described, the first two girls are typically friends. The third and even fourth ones just answer a newspaper add. Christie points that moving in with persons you barely now is dangerous, no matter if you are all girls.
Some negative commentary on the male fashions of the day, particularly about long hair in men. Jokes about the difficulty of telling them apart from the girls point to this hairstyle being a relative novelty. Not sure if the velvet waistcoats and leather pants mentioned were really fashionable back in the day. Christie has them as typical of the London nightclubs. The beatniks and the Beatles are specifically named as introducing the styles everyone is emulating.
The "rockers" are also specifically mentioned. They were a subculture of late 1950s and 1960s British youth: young bikers with a fashion sense that set them apart. "Rockers generally bought standard factory-made motorcycles and stripped them down, tuned them up and modified them to appear like racing bikes. They raced them on public roads and travelled to cafes such as The Ace Cafe, Chelsea Bridge tea stall, Ace of Spades, Busy Bee and Johnsons. Largely due to their clothing styles and dirtiness, the rockers were not widely welcomed by venues such as pubs and dance halls." ... "The rocker fashion style was born out of necessity and practicality. They wore heavily-decorated leather motorcycle jackets; often adorned with metal studs, patches, pin badges, and sometimes an ESSO gas man trinket. When they rode their motorcycles, they usually also wore a classic open-face helmet, aviator goggles, and a white silk scarf (to protect them from the elements). Other common items included: leather caps called Kagneys, Levi's jeans, leather trousers, tall motorcycle boots (often made by Lewis Leathers), engineer boots, brothel creepers, T-shirts and Daddy-O-style shirts. Also popular was a patch declaring membership to the 59 Club of England, a church-based youth organization that later formed into a genuine motorcycle club with members all over the world. The rocker hairstyle, kept in place with Brylcreem pomade, was usually a tame or exaggerated pompadour hairstyle; as was popular with some 1950s rock 'n' roll musicians."
David Baker, a secondary character, is suppposed to be an artist but has a file for drug use, heroine, cocaine, etc. A police inspector familiar with him, suggests that Baker's only actual interest is sex. He is also later mentioned dealing LSD and marijuana.
Altogether the novel would be quite hard to be adapted to a pre-World War II setting.
