Content Strategy of Agatha Christie

Agatha Christie

Several years ago, content strategy became a buzzword in the user experience design community. You can easily find content strategy books, conferences, and publications dedicated to talking about the importance of content strategy for creating, producing, finding, consuming, and managing content.

Within the digital realm, content strategy has grown to include the words, pictures, and video found in sites and apps. Editorial calendars, social marketing, SEO, and content management systems make it easier for consumers to find content and producers to create it.

Content strategy is not a novel concept (pun intended).

While the application of content strategy is different today, people have used different methods and tactics for writing, producing, and delivering content before the invention of the printing press. Content strategy is not a novel concept (pun intended).

In our endless search for the hip, new, and cool, we often forget the great artists, designers, writers, and leaders of the past. It is the arrogance, ignorance, and apathy of the human race that leads to missed opportunities of learning for the great masters of the past.

Let’s review some of the content strategies of Agatha Christie to see what we can learn from this prolific writer.

Why Agatha Christie?

Only the Holy Bible and the works of William Shakespeare have sold more copies that Agatha Christie. According to the Guinness Book of World Records, Agatha Christie has sold over 2 billion books.

Only the Bible and Shakespeare have sold more than Agatha Christie (and they had a head start).

Agatha Christie wrote short stories, novels, poems, radio dramas, and plays. Her complete works include 66 detective novels, 19 plays, 14 short story collections, and 6 romance novels. She would receive these accomplishments:

• The Mousetrap is the longest-running play ever produced.
• And Then There Were None is the best-selling mystery of all-time.
• The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is the greatest crime novel ever written.
• Won the Edgar Award (1955) as the best mystery writer.
• Won the Anthony Award (2000) for Best Mystery Writer of 20th century.
• Won the Anthony Award for Best Series of 20th century (2000) for Hercule Poirot.

Beyond the creation and distribution of her work, let’s review some of the methods that Agatha Christie used for her content strategy.

Editorial Calendar of Agatha Christie (1923–24)

During the early days of her career (1923–24), Agatha Christie would mostly write for Sketch Magazine, which had a daily and weekly publication. The magazine specialized in short stories and serials.

By 1923, Agatha Christie had written two novels. During this year, she would write 26 short stories for the Sketch Magazine. They ranged from 5–10 pages. The stories were written, edited, and approved. In her spare time, Agatha Christie would write her second Hercule Poirot novel, Murder on the Links.

Agatha Christie wrote 26 short stories in 1923 for the Sketch Magazine.

Bruce Ingram, the editor of the Sketch Magazine, was a fan of Agatha Christie’s early work. They worked out a system to write, edit, update, finalize, and publish the short stories within less than one week. Amazingly, the pace would go faster the following year.

Agatha Christie produced 32 short stories in 1924 for the Sketch Magazine.

In 1924, Agatha Christie produced an incredible 32 short stories for the Sketch Magazine. These short stories were produced almost weekly. Agatha Christie would publish The Man in the Brown Suit, her first Colonel Pace novel.

Lessons for Content Strategists

From a content strategy perspective, the best editorial calendar is a deadline. The frequency of the weekly magazine forced Agatha Christie and Bruce Ingram to focus on her short story deliverable. She honed her craft, including twist endings, catch phrases, red herrings, and comeuppance scenes in these short stories.

“The best editorial calendar is a deadline.” — Brian Sullivan

Her audience loved the frequency of the short stories because they acted as snippets into the lives of her characters — Hercule Poirot, Captain Hastings, and Inspector Japp. She focused on plot and pacing rather than character and setting in her short stories.

Plot Devices and Motifs of Agatha Christie

To produce so much content, Agatha Christie needed to streamline her plots to satisfy her audience and meet her deadlines. Most modern mysteries follow the structure and plot devices developed by Agatha Christie.

Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple (her two most famous detectives)

Surprisingly, the typical plot of a Hercule Poirot or Miss Marple mystery are very similar. They both have this same basic structure:

1. A murder (or scandal) occurs.
2. Multiple suspects exists with a motive.
3. A detective becomes aware of the murder.
4. Suspects are interviewed by the detective.
5. Several red herrings (or misleading clues) are revealed.
6. All suspects are gathered in one location.
7. The detective explains what they have learned.
8. Comeuppance occurs, as the detective publicly embarrasses each suspect.
9. The criminal is revealed, usually with a twist ending.

Agatha Christie honed these plot devices, while writing her short stories. They gave her stories structure. Plus, her audience craved this style. Each section leading (or misleading) the reader towards a satisfying climax.

The characters of Hercule Poirot, Captain Hastings, and Inspector Japp would essentially remain the same. She could swap out the victim, suspects, motive, and murder weapon to create a new story.

The stories were different, yet the same.

Lessons for Content Strategists

We all know audiences crave consistency. It goes beyond certain formats and specific locations, too. Audiences want their content to have similar structures and the same type of patterns. They crave it.

For example, you can find many YouTube videos on how to use various Adobe products, such as Photoshop and Illustrator. Many of these videos follow the same basic structure:

1. The instructor introduces you to the feature they want to show.
2. They show their screen in full view mode.
3. A zoom feature is used to focus in on specific areas.
4. A picture or illustration is manipulated in the video.
5. Keyboard shortcuts are explained to the viewer.
6. The instructor shows a before and after image.

Some of these You Tube videos are produced on a weekly basis, which reminds me of the frequency of the weekly short stories of Agatha Christie.

Agatha Christie’s Switching Mediums

Amazingly, the writing career of Agatha Christie would require her to switch to different mediums. She began her career writing two novels before switching to the weekly grind of the Sketch Magazine. Agatha Christie moved back to writing novels, switched to writing plays, and went back to novels.

Agatha Christie wrote in many different mediums — magazine, radio, novels, and theater.

The short stories helped Agatha Christie to hone her craft as a mystery writer. She never really stopped writing novels. Christie would have several pivots, where she made career-altering choices.

First Pivot (1925–1944)

After 1924, Agatha Christie focused her writing to producing detective novels. For the 20 years, she wrote over 30 novels. These mystery novels included Hercule Poirot, Miss Marple, and Superintendent Battle. Several of her great detective novels written at this time were:

• The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (my favorite Christie book)
• Murder in Three Acts
• The ABC Murders
• Murder on the Orient Express
• Death on the Nile
• Appointment with Death
• And Then There Were None
• Evil Under the Sun

During this time, Agatha Christie would collect several of her earlier short stories. Plus, she would write some radio plays. Her primary focus was detective novels for almost 20 years.

Second Pivot (1944–1955)

Between 1944–1955, Agatha Christie would write in several different mediums. She would produce 4 short stories and 6 detective novels. During this time, Agatha Christie would write most of her plays.

Since she was not a playwright, Agatha Christie would end up working with Samuel French to produce many of her famous plays. She limited the use of Hercule Poirot. Instead, Agatha Christie opted to focus on other stories.

Some of Agatha Christie’s great plays.

Samuel French would work with Agatha Christie to adapt several of her novels to make them more presentable on the stage. They would significantly change the twist ending of And Then There Were None to make it more acceptable to a theater audience.

Third Pivot (1956–2013)

After 1955, Agatha Christie would primarily focus on her writing novels. She would produce some collected volumes of short stories during this time. During this time, she would kill off Hercule Poirot, who was working on a final case with Captain Hastings that had them revisiting their first case together.

Several of her great detective novels written at this time were:

• Caribbean Mystery
• Dead Man’s Folly
• The Mirror Crack’d
• Third Girl
• Elephants Can Remember
• Halloween Party
• Curtains

Agatha Christie would die on January 12, 1976. While she had killed off Hercule Poirot in Curtains, her estate would find a lost novella. It would end up getting published in 2013.

Hercule Poirot and the Greenshore Folly (2013)

Lessons for Content Strategists

Agatha Christie had a long career, which would see the introduction on new technology. Novels and short stories were the main ways to produce content at the start of her career. Radio, stage, and television would be new mediums for Agatha Christie.

The writer makes the most of the medium. — Brian Sullivan

Clearly, Agatha Christie changed her writing style to suit the medium. She wrote short stories rather than serial stories for the Sketch Magazine. In her first pivot, she focused solely on detective novels with a few romance stories. The second pivot was to write new plays or adapt existing stories to the theater. Finally, she would return to writing novels.

During her pivots, Agatha Christie would frequently work with collaborators. When she wrote her short stories, Bruce Ingram would help her with plot and pace. When Agatha Christie wrote her plays, Samuel French would work with her to overcome the constraints of working in the theater.

Most importantly, the exploration of the different mediums was always successful for Agatha Christie. She became a master at short stories, stage plays, and novels. Many of her stage plays were easily adapted into radio plays, movies, and television shows.

Conclusions

• Content strategy is not a novel concept.
• Agatha Christie offers many lessons for modern day content strategists.
• She was successful as a short story writer, novelist, and playwright.
• Agatha Christie used her deadline to drive her editorial calendar.
• A common structure, patterns, and plot devices helped her with content.
• Agatha Christie reused (or adapted) content to fit the medium.
• She produced in different mediums with the help of a collaborator.

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