Talk:Dead Man's Folly

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Betacommand (talk • contribs • Bot) 02:43, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

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TV

http://www.broadcastnow.co.uk/news/commissioning/itv-lines-up-new-poirot/5027819.article

Its going to be adapted into the show. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.222.227.22 (talk) 12:55, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Plot Summary: "who claims to have been sent down to the boathouse by Hattie with refreshments for Marlene at around the time that the girl was killed. This sounds very much out of character for Hattie."

This claim is in fact missing from the Inspector's interview with Amanda Brewis (in Chapter VII), and I have read the book many times, in more than one edition. Everyone thereafter speaks of the claim as having been made. I have never seen public comment on its absence. Could there have been misguided cuts made to the chapter at some stage? I have - though not in Christie - known an edition cut something essential to the denouement. Anyone know?

Rogersansom (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 08:37, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

I listened to the audio book (Audio Partners reader David Suchet), and Miss Brewis did say she was sent by Hattie to bring refreshments to Marlene in the boathouse. No, in fact the Inspector says it in Chapter 10 II, in his talk with the architect Michael Weyman, explaining the narrow window of time. So you are right, not in the dialogue reported in Chapter 7, when the Inspector interviews Miss Brewis, but brought up later as coming from that interview. It is an important point of the plot, as the denouement shows. I hope that helps. Text of Plot Summary is altered, so that exact sentence is not there, the one you used as the title to this section. --Prairieplant (talk) 14:17, 27 October 2013 (UTC)

--Prairieplant (talk) 15:33, 27 October 2013 (UTC)

Poor flow, confusing wording

The current text is unclear. I made revisions that clarified it, but they were entirely -- and unfairly -- reversed. I'm not going to get into an editing war, so here's what needs to be fixed (each number refers to a paragraph):

1. Missing "the" before activities. Last sentence way too long and confusing.

2. Too many topics crammed into one paragraph. Hattie's interests mentioned without specifying those are her only interests and that's why she appears simple. Secretary first mentioned here but name not included, which makes her naming later on confusing. Pronoun use not clear -- is it Hattie or Amy who is widowed? Sentences jump from George, to Hattie, to Amy, to Hattie: poor organization and flow. Last 3 sentences are completely out of place and should be in a separate paragraph (i.e., #2 is for character background, #3 [new] is for characters/suspects at house. The Legges should be mentioned in #3 as well).

3. Marlene is mentioned without distinguishing her from the other guests (i.e., she was brought in for the day). Second sentence is repetitive: "plays part of victim...pose as dead victim." It's also long and has unnecessary detail (e.g., "player finds the key to enter" -- that's not mentioned anywhere else in the summary). Miss Brewis is misspelled as Brevis. She's introduced here with zero explanation (i.e., she's George's secretary -- which is why I edited her name into the second paragraph). "Narrow the field" -- field of what? That's why I edited it to say "suspect field."

4. Poor sentence construction: "staying in...and whose marriage..." Parallel: "who are staying in...and whose marriage..."

5. Sentence 1 is confusing -- too many clauses, too many ideas crammed in. Facts needed to clearly delineated, not "Merdell, the old boatman, dead by accident was Marlene's grandfather" (which doesn't even make sense). Again, poor pronoun use: "she received small..." Who is she? The dead woman that was just mentioned? Again, unnecessary facts are included (younger sister has Marlene's small purchases) that add nothing except confusion.

6. More pronoun problems. "Amy had paired him with the orphan young woman Hattie, who gained her wealth on her marriage" -- is "her" Amy or Hattie? That third sentence also crams too much and is confusing -- paired the two, gained wealth, got married, wasn't penniless. Last sentence should be "was buried."

7. The first wife took on Hattie's identity, but she didn't "take on" the Italian tourist one. She created it. Sentence 4 and others have verb tense problems -- should be past, not present ("switched between," "sent Miss Brewis," etc).

8. "Folly" capitalized here and lowercase in paragraph 2.

Douvaine (talk) 18:39, 15 August 2014 (UTC)Douvaine

If you see a simple spelling error, why not fix it? Pronouns, like she and her, refer to the last female named before the pronoun. Those are in order. Hattie, who gained her wealth on her marriage, for example. Her refers to Hattie. As to your fifth point, those are the clues that Poirot listed, and then he solved the case. If those points are unimportant to you, well, what can I say. Poirot learned of the blackmail from the sister of the dead girl, so that is how it is in the summary. There is no need to say Marlene is brought in for the day -- she is there, in the plot, the murder victim of the fete, and the denouement makes it very clear why she is present at the event. There is no need to say it twice. This is a summary, not a novel. In the time the novel was written, backpack-wearing, hostel-using tourists were a new and common sight in England, so it is an identity to take on, just as she took on the identity of a dead woman. In the one case the unnamed Italian first wife takes on a very specific person's identity (Hattie), and in the other, a generic identity common at that moment in England, handy to her being Italian. She did not create either identity, she took them on for her convenience. Sorry, in making the new section, I forgot to sign my paragraph. Now it is signed. --Prairieplant (talk) 05:08, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

(Douvaine did not write the above, unsigned paragraph.) If you had carefully read through my revisions instead of 100% undoing them, you would have seen the simple spelling error I fixed and not reversed it. I know what pronouns are. I also know that poor pronoun use trips up readers. Gee, I thought this summary was for the benefit of Wikipedia readers, not Poirot. I also thought it supposed to be written collaboratively, not exclusively by you or according to your opinions. Fake Hattie didn't create "the" backpacker identity --- she created HER backpacker identity. I highly doubt her fellow backpackers called her "Generic."

http://facweb.furman.edu/~moakes/Powerwrite/pronouns.htm

MUDDY PRONOUN REFERENCES: these are the situations which create comical or very confusing sentences because your reader is not sure which noun the pronoun is supposed to refer to. You certainly want to avoid sentences such as these:

EX: I love the Spice Girls and chili cheese dogs --they're so hot!

Is this a comment on your musical or culinary taste?

EX: Monica told Sheila to pick up her brother at three.

What if Monica and Sheila both have brothers?

EX: Marlene's grandfather had seen a woman's body in the woods; she received small sums of money used to make small purchases...

Douvaine (talk) 20:35, 16 August 2014 (UTC) Douvaine Can we cool this off? If you do not like the list of clues, find the pronoun unclear, you can simply insert Marlene's name in the second clause, without providing any lessons on pronouns. A major issue of the plot summary is that it is too long. Improvements to style or clarity need to stay within the limits of brevity sought by Wikipedia. I think this is best continued on your talk page, where I have put one post. --Prairieplant (talk) 05:43, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

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