A* AQA ENGLISH LITERATURE B CRIME WRITING UNSEEN EXTRACT Explore the significance of elements of crime writing in this extract?
Received 24/25 marks A*
Unseen Crime Extract – ‘ABC Murdersʼ By
Agatha Christie (Chapter 25)
Unseen Crime Extract – ‘ABC Murdersʼ By Agatha Christie (Chapter 25)
The significance of washing away blood signifying guilt.
The murder weapon.
Psychology of the criminal.
Idea of luck playing a role in crime.
The extract introduces the assumed criminal, Mr Cust, whose blood-stained clothes, and hand
mark him as the apparent criminal in the extract. His attempts to wash away the blood which
acts as a guilty confession for his crime are witnessed by the maid who enters causing him to
escape the hotel. Due to this the extract explores the elements of crime of blood, guilt, the
psychology of a criminal, and role luck plays in succeeding to get away with a crime. In this
essay I will therefore discuss the importance of this extract in relation to the genre of crime
writing as a whole.
As the extract begins focus is immediately placed on the setting where “Mr Cust came out of
the Regal Cinema” and looks up at the sky, almost in reflection suggesting that the cinema was
the locale where the crime was committed. The repetition of the line “A beautiful evening… A
really beautiful evening…” reflecting Mr Custʼs thoughts places Mr Cust as the focalising
homodiegetic character of the novel, who the third person narrator focuses on yet does not
reveal any external information on, making the narrative tightly closed like a puzzle box for the
reader to attempt to collect up any clues or suggestions surrounding what may have occurred.
Through this tension and anticipation is created as the author establishes many questions
within the narrative which the reader wants to get answers to yet delays the answer forcing
them to read on and pressure to build.
For example, the question of if Mr Cust is the criminal and committed the apparent crime which
he is covered in blood for, then why is he shocked when he “entered the room” and “his smile
faded suddenly”. The dynamic adverb suddenly emphasises the extent of this shock unusual for
a man who must have harmed someone early. The way in which “his eyes shot around the room
like those of a hunted animal” appear to make Mr Cust more of a victim than criminal
suggesting that this extract surrounds a framing of a crime. The portrayal of Cust as
zoomorphised prey through the linkage to an animal in relation to the real predator minimises
him and diminishes him as a character making him appear harmless. The pathetic and shameful
way he states “It isnʼt my fault” with the simile of him being a “schoolboy pleading to his
headmaster” emphasising his innocence and pitiful nature. He does not appear a man capable
of committing crimes, yet he appears the criminal, which creates a conflict of interpretation in
the novel of what truly makes a criminal and places focus on the criminals psychology forcing
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