Agatha Christie Quotes

A mother's love for her child is like nothing else in the world. It knows no aw no pity it dares all things and crushes down remorselessly all that stands in its path.

This was genius at close quarters, and genius had that something above normal in it that was a great strain upon the ordinary mind and feeling. All five were different from each other, yet each had that curious quality of burning intensity, the single-mindedness of purpose that made such a terrifying impression. She did not know whether it were a quality of brain or rather a quality of outlook, of intensity. But each of them, she thought, was in his or her way a passionate idealist.

Nowadays, no one believes in evil. It is considered, at most, a mere negation of good. Evil, people say, is done by those who know no better - who are undeveloped - who are to be pitied rather than blamed. But, M. Poirot, evil is real! It is a fact! I believe in Evil as I believe in Good. It exists! It is powerful! It walks the earth!' He stopped. His breath was coming fast. He wiped his forehead with his handkerchief and looked suddenly apologetic. 'I'm sorry. I got carried away.

What I feel is that if one has got to have a murder actually happening in one's house, one might as well enjoy it, if you know what I mean.

I never gossip - but after all, a tongue is given one to speak with, and I'm not deaf mute.That you most certainly are not. A tongue, Henet, may sometimes be a weapon. A tongue may cause a death - may cause more than one death. I hope your tongue, Henet, has not caused a death.

I've always jumped on sentiment—and here I am being more sentimental than anybody. What idiots girls are! I've always thought so. I suppose I shall sleep with his photograph under my pillow, and dream about him all night. It's dreadful to feel you've been false to your principles.

When a man's neck's in danger, he doesn't stop to think too much about sentiment.

Don't you know, you idiot, that that is what every fool of a woman says about her child?Miss Bulstrode's thoughts.

When you find that people are not telling you the truth---look out!

Women can accept the fact that a man is a rotter, a swindler, a drug taker, a confirmed liar, and a general swine, without batting an eyelash, and without its impairing their affection for the brute in the least. Women are wonderful realists.

I gather," he added, "that you've never had much time to study the classics?""That is so.""Pity. Pity. You've missed a lot. Everyone should be made to study the classics, if I had my way."Poirot shrugged his shou

She looked at them with shining eyes. Her chin went up. She said: "You regard it as impossible that a sinner should be struck down by the wrath of God! I do not!" The judge stroked his chin. He murmured in a slightly ironic voice: "My dear lady, in my experience of ill-doing, Providence leaves the work of conviction and chastisement to us mortals-and the process is often fraught with difficulties. There are no short cuts.

[Murder] doesn't concern the victim and the guilty only. It affects the innocent too. You and I are innocent, but the shadow of murder has touched us. We don't know how that shadow is going to affect our lives.

Death, mademoiselle, unfortunately creates a prejudice. A prejudice in favour of the deceased. I heard what you said just now to my friend Hastings. ‘A nice bright girl with no men friends.’ You said that in mockery of the newspapers. And it is very true—when a young girl is dead, that is the kind of thing that is said. She was bright. She was happy. She was sweet-tempered. She had not a care in the world. She had no undesirable acquaintances. There is a great charity always to the dead. Do you know what I should like this minute? I should like to find someone who knew Elizabeth Barnard and who does not know she is dead! Then, perhaps, I should hear what is useful to me—the truth.

It is clear that the books owned the shop rather than the other way about. Everywhere they had run wild and taken possession of their habitat, breeding and multiplying, and clearly lacking any strong hand to keep them down.

Once I went professionally to an archaeological expedition- and I learnt something there. In the course of an excavation, when something comes up out of the ground, evEryThing is cleared away very carefully all around it. You take away the loose earth, and you scare here and there with a knife until finally your object is there, all alone, ready to be drawn and photographed with no extraneous matter confusing it. That is what I have been seeking TO do- clear away the extraneous matter so that we can see the truth-the naked shining truth.

A man travels fastest who travels alone.

It seems odd that as far as I know nobody has yet been murdered for having too perfect a character! And yet perfection is undoubtedly an irritating thing!

And how do you know that these fine begonias are not of equal importance?

Edna restored the toffee to the centre of her tongue and sucking pleasurably, resumed her typing of Naked Love by Armand Levine. Its painstaking eroticism left her uninterested--as indeed it did most of Mr. Levine's readers, in spite of his efforts. He was a notable example of the fact that nothing can be duller than dull pornography.

How well you express it! That is exactly the curse of a politician's life. He has to bow to the country's feeling, however dangerous and foolhardy he knows it to be.

Somehow, the more I get older, and the more I see of people and sadness and illness and everything, the sorrier I get for everyone.

You've a pretty good nerve," said Ratchett. "Will twenty thousand dollars tempt you?"It will not."If you're holding out for more, you won't get it. I know what a thing's worth to me."I, also M. Ratchett."What's wrong with my proposition?"Poirot rose. "If you will forgive me for being personal - I do not like your face, M. Ratchett," he said.

Ah, but you must have a Christmas uncomplicated by murder.

The longer the time that has elapsed, the more things fall into proportion. One sees them in their true relationship to one another.

People more often kill those they love than those they hate. Possibly because only the people you love can really make life unendurable to you.

Her sleep was enlivened by several dreams. One where Professor Wanstead's bushy eyebrows fell off because they were not his own eyebrows, but false ones. As she woke again, her first impression was that which often follows dreams, a belief that the dream in question had solved everything. 'Of course,' she thought, 'of course!' His eyebrows were false and that solved the whole thing. He was the criminal.

Jealousy, you know, is usually not an affair of causes. It is much more-how shall I say?-fundamental than that. Based on the knowledge that one's love is not returned. And so one goes on waiting, watching, expecting...that the loved one will turn to someone else.

Such nice people, the Hillingdons, though she's not really very easy to know, is she? I mean, she's always very pleasant and all that, but one never seems to get to know her better.'Miss Marple agreed thoughtfully. 'One never knows what she is thinking.''Perhaps that is just as well.''I beg your pardon?''Oh nothing really, only that I've always had the feeling that perhaps her thoughts might be rather disconcerting.

Your idea of a woman is someone who gets on a chair and shrieks if she sees a mouse. That's all prehistoric.

I think people more often kill those they love than those they hate. Possible because only the people you love can really make life unendurable to you.

Use your little grey cells mon ami" (Hercule Poirot in 'The Mysterious Affair At Styles')

… one can never go back, that one should not ever try to go back – that the essence of life is going forward. Life is really a One Way Street.

He felt a strange pang. It was, perhaps, the fault of old Mr Jonathan, speaking of Juliet... No Juliet here - unless perhaps one could imagine Juliet a survivor - living on, deprived of Romeo... Was it not an essential part of Juliet's make-up that that she should die young?

Child's evidence is always the best evidence there is. I'd rely on it every time. No good in court, of course. Children can't stand being asked direct questions. They mumble or else look idiotic and say they don't know. They're at their best when they're showing off.

In the midst of life, we are in death.

I looked at her. Sheila was my girl--the girl I wanted--and wanted for keeps. But it wasn't any use having illusions about her. Sheila was a liar and probably always would be a liar. It was her way of fighting for survival--the quick easy glib denial. It was a child's weapon--and she'd probably never got out of using it. If I wanted Sheila, I must accept her as she was--be at hand to prop up the weak places. We've all got our weak places. Mine were different from Sheila's, but they were there.

I did not deceive you, mon ami. At most, I permitted you to deceive yourself.

Intuition is like reading a word without having to spell it out. A child can't do that because it has had so little experience. A grown-up person knows the word because they've seen it often before.

... one may live in a big house and yet have no comfort.

When a man's neck's in danger, he doesn't stop to think too much aboutsentiment.

One little Indian left all alone, he went out and hanged himself and then there were none.

What a queer topsy turvy world it was. It used to be the man who went to the wars, the woman who stayed at home. But here the positions were reversed.

It is romantic, yes,’ agreed Hercule Poirot. ‘It is peaceful. The sun shines. The sea is blue. But you forget, Miss Brewster, there is evil everywhere under the sun’.

An appreciative listener is always stimulating.

The popular view that a child forgets easily is not an accurate one. Many people go right through life in the grip of an idea which has been impressed on them in very tender years.

Sitting here, literally amongst the dead, reckoning up gains and losses, casting accounts, I have come to see gains that cannot be reckoned in terms of wealth, and losses that are more damaging than loss of a crop... I look at the River and I see the lifeblood of Egypt that has existed before we lived and that will exist after we die... Life and death, Renisenb, are not of such great account.

When engaged in eating, the brain should be the servant of the stomach.

It's extraordinary, the amount of misunderstandings there are even between two people who discuss a thing quite often - both of them assuming different things and neither of them discovering the discrepancy.

No, my friend, I am not drunk. I have just been to the dentist, and need not return for another six months! Is it not the most beautiful thought?--Poirot

Speech, so a wise old Frenchman said to me once, is an invention of man's to prevent him from thinking. It is also an infallible means of discovering that which he wishes to hide.

Two young adventurers for hire. Willing to do anything, go anywhere. Pay must be good. No reasonable offer refused.

An archaeologist is the best husband a woman can have. The older she gets, the more interested he is in her.

Popular feeling is very often sentimental, muddle-headed, and eminently unsound, but it cannot be disregarded for all that.

I loved her- I always loved her- no matter what she was-I wanted her safe- not shut up- a prisoner for life, eating her heart out. And we did keep her safe- for many years" Phillip Stark

I am pointing to you that under these conditions--mental strain, physical malaise--it is highly probable that dislikes that were before merely mild and disagreements that were trivial might suddenly assume a more serious note. The result of pretending to be a more amiable, a more forgiving, a more high-minded person than one really is, has sooner or later the effect of causing one to behave as a more disagreeable, a more ruthless and an altogether more unpleasant person than is actually the case! If you dam the stream of natural behavior, mon ami, sooner or later the dam bursts and cataclysm occurs.

When you're in the middle of a nightmare, something ordinary is the only hope. Anyway, ordinary things are the best. I've always thought so.

I should have known when I first saw that picture. For it is a very remarkable picture. It is the picture of a murderess painted by her victim-it is the picture of a girl watching her lover dies.

Why do you decry the world we live in? There are good people in it. Isn't muddle a better breeding ground for kindliness and individuality than a world order that's imposed, a world order that may be right today and wrong tomorrow? I would rather have a world of kindly, faulty, human beings, than a world of superior robots who've said goodbye to pity and understanding and sympathy.

Wwhat the hell? Weve all got to die sometime!