A century ago, the golden age of British detective fiction had begun to flower. Agatha Christie had written and finally published her first novel, a Hercule Poirot affair. If the current age of detective fiction can be said to be flowering, it is the famously rank blossom of a titan arum plant. Let’s consider the two and see whether their differences might be resolved.

Poirot notwithstanding, the Christie crowd preferred amateur sleuths or private detectives, independent actors who could be counted on to best the bumbling local constabulary. One hundred years ago, in 1922, Christie introduced a stylish young couple, Tommy and Tuppence, who go into the detective business together. In 1927, Christie added to her stable of characters the little old lady who would do more than any of Christie’s other snoops to make the novelist’s bank account look like Scrooge McDuck’s bank vault: Miss Marple.