And Then There Were None is a 1939 mystery novel by the English writer Agatha Christie. It is the world's best-selling mystery novel and one of the best-selling books of all time, with more than 100 million copies sold by 2007. It has been adapted for film, television, radio, theatre, and other media more often than any other of Christie's works. In 2015, it was named the "World's Favourite Christie" in a global vote organised by the author's estate.
The story takes place on an isolated island off the coast of Devon. Ten individuals are accused of past crimes and are killed one by one according to the lines of a popular rhyme. Christie described the book as the most difficult of her novels to write because of the complexity of the plot and its solution, and regarded it as a better piece of craftsmanship than anything else she had written.
The novel received largely positive reviews on first publication, with critics praising the ingenuity of its plot, and it has since been frequently named among the greatest crime novels ever written. In 1990 the Crime Writers' Association ranked it nineteenth on its list of the best crime novels, and in 1995 the Mystery Writers of America placed it tenth on a comparable list.
The book was first published in the United Kingdom by Collins Crime Club in 1939 as Ten Little Niggers, after an 1869 minstrel song that forms the central element of the plot. It appeared in the UK under that title until 1985. The first American edition, published in 1940, was called And Then There Were None from the start, as the original was considered unacceptably racially loaded in the United States; the book was also issued there as Ten Little Indians between 1964 and 1986. Later editions in both countries revised the text and the rhyme to remove the original racial language, and the novel is now published in English only as And Then There Were None.
Plot
Eight people are invited to a small, isolated island off the Devon coast. They are met by the butler and housekeeper, Thomas and Ethel Rogers, who explain that their hosts, Mr and Mrs U.N. Owen, have not yet arrived. A framed copy of an old rhyme hangs in every guest's room, and on the dining room table sit ten figurines. Acting on written instructions, Mr Rogers puts on a gramophone record, which accuses each person present of being culpable for a death. The group realise that none of them know the Owens. Anthony Marston finishes his drink and promptly dies from cyanide poisoning.
Next morning, Mrs Rogers is found dead in her bed. Suspecting their unknown host, some of the guests search the island, but find nobody else. After General MacArthur dies from a blow to the head, the guests conclude that one of the seven remaining persons must be responsible. The following day, Mr Rogers is found dead at the woodpile, having been attacked with an axe, and Emily Brent is found dead in the drawing room, having been sedated and then injected with potassium cyanide. The guests realise that one figurine in the dining room is being removed after each death, and that the manner of the deaths corresponds with the wording of the rhyme.
Mr Justice Wargrave, a recently retired judge, suggests that all drugs and firearms should be secured, and that everyone should submit to a search. Philip Lombard's gun cannot be found. Vera Claythorne goes up to her room and screams when she finds seaweed hanging from the ceiling. Most of the remaining guests rush upstairs; when they return they find Wargrave in his chair, wearing what looks like a judicial wig and scarlet robes. Dr Armstrong pronounces him dead from a gunshot wound to the forehead. That night, Lombard's gun is returned, William Blore sees someone leaving the house, and Armstrong mysteriously disappears.
After breakfast next morning, Vera, Lombard, and Blore go out. When Blore returns for food, he is killed by a bear-shaped marble clock that falls from Vera's window sill. Vera and Lombard find Armstrong's drowned body washed up on the beach; it seems as though they are the only two left alive. Vera distracts Lombard, then grabs his gun and shoots and kills him. She returns to her room, and finds that a noose and chair have been set up. Her mind wandering, and believing that her former love is watching, she hangs herself in accordance with the last line of the rhyme.
Scotland Yard officials arrive to find ten bodies. They discover that a sleazy agent named Isaac Morris had purchased the island and made the arrangements on behalf of an unknown buyer; he had subsequently died from an overdose of barbiturates. From the victims' diaries, the police reconstruct the first six deaths. They deduce that neither Armstrong, Lombard, nor Vera could have been the last person alive, as objects had been moved after their deaths, and they consider Blore's death unlikely to have been suicide. It seems no one else was on the island during this time, leaving the police mystified.
A message in a bottle is recovered from the sea, containing a written confession by Wargrave. It explains that from an early age he had a strong sense of justice but also a lust to kill, contradictory traits that led him to become a judge. He derived satisfaction from sentencing criminals to death, but increasingly yearned to actually commit murder. Inspired by a conversation about murders which could never be proven, he located ten individuals who had caused someone's death but not faced justice. He lured nine of them onto the island, hiring Morris to make the arrangements then tricking him into overdosing. Posing as one of the guests, Wargrave killed the others one by one. He persuaded the gullible Dr Armstrong to help him fake his own death as part of a fictitious scheme to uncover the killer. After all the others were dead, Wargrave shot himself, making sure that his true death matched his staged death recorded in the guests' diaries, leaving "ten dead bodies and an unsolved problem".
Principal characters
Edward George Armstrong – a Harley Street doctor William Henry Blore – a former police inspector, now a private investigator Emily Caroline Brent – an elderly, pious spinster Vera Elizabeth Claythorne – a sports mistress at a girls' school and former governess Philip Lombard – a soldier of fortune John Gordon MacArthur – a retired World War I general Anthony James Marston – a wealthy and irresponsible young man Ethel Rogers – the cook and housekeeper, and Thomas Rogers's wife Thomas Rogers – the butler and Ethel Rogers's husband Lawrence John Wargrave (Mr Justice Wargrave) – a retired criminal judge
Motivating rhyme The plot is structured around the ten lines of the rhyme "Ten Little Niggers", a popular 1869 minstrel song written for the Christy's Minstrels by the British songwriter Frank Green."", song written in 1869 by Frank Green, for music by Mark Mason, for the singer G. W. "Pony" Moore. Green had modelled his lyrics on an American comic song "Ten Little Indians" [or Injuns]"", song by Septimus_Winner, American lyricist residing in Philadelphia, published in July 1868 in London. by Septimus Winner that had been published the year before. In later editions of the novel, the characters of the rhyme are replaced by "Ten Little Indians" or "Ten Little Soldier Boys".
This is the rhyme as published in a British 2008 edition:
Each of the ten main characters is killed on the island in a manner that reflects one of the lines of the rhyme. An additional victim, Isaac Morris, dies on the mainland outside of the main storyline.
Correspondence between the rhyme and the deaths
+ Modes of death of the victims vs the wording of the rhymeNo.CharacterAccusationMode of deathRhyme – Isaac Morris Sold illegal drugs to a woman who became an addict and later died by suicide Tricked into taking a lethal drug overdose to combat his imagined ailments N/A 1 Anthony James Marston Struck and killed two young children while recklessly speeding Drinks a glass of cyanide-laced whisky ... one choked his little self and then there were nine. 2 Mrs Ethel Rogers Withheld an employer's medicine in order to cause her death and collect an inheritance Dies in her sleep after drinking brandy spiked with an overdose of chloral hydrate ... one overslept himself and then there were eight. 3 General John Gordon MacArthur Ordered his wife's lover, an officer under his command, on an unsurvivable mission Killed by a blow to the head, after concluding that he would never leave the island ... one said he'd stay there and then there were seven. 4 Thomas Rogers Withheld an employer's medicine in order to cause her death and collect an inheritance Struck in the head with an axe ... one chopped himself in halves and then there were six. 5 Emily Caroline Brent Dismissed her teenage maid for becoming pregnant out of wedlock, thus causing the maid to drown herself Injected with cyanide after being sedated with chloral-laced coffee; bumblebee buzzing nearby ... a bumblebee stung one and then there were five. 6 Lawrence John Wargrave (Mr Justice Wargrave) Influenced a jury to deliver a guilty verdict against a man thought to be innocent, then sentenced him to death Shot in the head, dressed as a judge ... one got in Chancery and then there were four. 7 Dr Edward George Armstrong Operated on a patient while drunk, resulting in her death Drowns after being pushed off a cliff into the sea, during a secret meeting with the person who is actually the killer ... a red herring swallowed one and then there were three. 8 William Henry Blore Gave perjured evidence in court, resulting in an innocent man being convicted and sentenced to life in prison, where he died a year later Head crushed by a marble clock shaped like a bear ... a big bear hugged one and then there were two. 9 Philip Lombard As a soldier of fortune, stole food from a group of East African tribesmen he was working with, then left them to die Shot by Vera on the beach with his own revolver ... one got frizzled up and then there was one. 10 Vera Elizabeth Claythorne As a governess, allowed her young charge to drown so that his uncle could inherit the family estate and marry her Hangs herself ... he went out and hanged himself and then there were none.
Reception And Then There Were None received largely positive reviews on publication. Writing for The Times Literary Supplement in November 1939, Maurice Percy Ashley observed that although the novel contained little actual detection, it had no shortage of murders; he found the regular succession of deaths somewhat monotonous, better suited to a serialised newspaper story than a full-length novel, but praised the ingenuity of the central problem of naming the murderer: "It will be an extremely astute reader who guesses correctly." In The Observer, Maurice Richardson declined to draw comparisons with Roger Ackroyd but called the novel "one of the very best, most genuinely bewildering Christies yet written"; he praised its storytelling and characterisation as among her finest and considered the plot, though highly artificial, to be neat, cunningly constructed and free of the misleading red herrings that he felt sometimes marred her work.
Reviewing the first American edition in The New York Times Book Review in 1940, Isaac Anderson wrote that readers would find the events following the gramophone recording impossible to believe yet impossible to stop reading. He called the novel utterly fascinating and the most baffling mystery Christie had yet written — unmatched in his memory for sheer puzzlement — and concluded that, however far-fetched, the story was just plausible enough to have happened. A reviewer in the Toronto Daily Star similarly compared the novel close to Christie's The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, well above her recent work, and rated her unrivalled for ingenious plotting and surprise endings.