IN THIS ARTICLE: Crime writer Agatha Christie's endearing supersleuth Miss Marple started life in 1930, in Murder at the Vicarage, as "a nasty old cat" with an unpleasant habit of interfering.
" There are so many wonderful, unappreciated novels from the past, " says Hilary Strong, the former chief executive of Agatha Christie Limited, who co-founded ILP.
In one experiment, participants were more likely to say that a fictional character named Agatha should keep playing the cello if her husband had paid a lot for her initial lessons, rather than if he had paid little.