Scribbles & Bits

So here it is, the inaugural post to Scribbles and Bits, a blog that celebrates writing and creativity.

We start with an excerpt from a literary analysis by Natalie. What I admire about this essay is the attention to details from the play and clear explanation of how those details work to "build a better Mousetrap," to put it most cleverly.

There is one change I made to this excerpt. Originally, the piece below was all one paragraph. Sometimes, we try so hard to fit everything into a five-paragraph form that we forget paragraphs are used to show slight shifts in focus. Notice how the focus shifts where I inserted the paragraph break in Natalie's piece. Is it OK to hand in a six paragraph essay when the material demands it? Absolutely!

In The Mousetrap, Agatha Christie adds a lot of elements, such as bizarre characters into her play, and when she does this she made her play the best one ever. In the beginning of the play, as guests start arriving at Monkswell Manor, every character has his/her own personality and background that is in a way, very suspicious and weird all at the same time. One specific character with a strange background is Christopher Wren. When Sergeant Trotter got to the manor and says that there was a murder Christopher states, “A murder? Oh I like murder!” (11). That statement really gave everyone in the house a reluctant friendship with him because he was so mysterious. While that moment happens the audience does not know how to react to certain things he says. Another reason why Christopher Wren was such a bizarre character in The Mousetrap was because he loved nursery rhymes; he liked them because they were so deliciously macabre. When Christopher says, “But just wait Mrs. Boyle. Till I creep up behind you, and you feel my hands on your throat,” (28) he set a creepy reputation for himself towards all the guests and especially Mrs. Boyle. Also, when he was alone in the living room he was looking through the desk drawers and he found a knife. As he was looking around the room to make sure no one was watching him, he started stabbing the couch with the dull side of the knife. The audience watching the play thinks that this moment is funny, and that is just another reason why Agatha Christie created the best play ever, because she adds a little bit of humor to each guest in the house. She did that just to throw off the suspicions of the guests.

Now that is how red herrings come into play in this story. An example of a red herring that Agatha Christie put into this play was Ms Casewell having the mannerisms of man. She was definitely a bizarre character because from the second she stalked into the house and shook Giles’ hand, she was acting very manly and shaking his hand firmly, she was also sitting on the couch in a peculiar way for a woman to sit. Another example of a red herring and a bizarre character is Mr. Paravincini. Throughout the story he would play “Three Blind Mice” on the piano. That is a great example of the one of the many red herrings that Agatha Christie put into this play. He made him play that theme song of the murderer when he was not close to being the one on the killing spree. Mr. Paravincini is a bizarre character because as he says, “My dear Sergeant, I am not, perhaps, quite as old as I look,” (53). Paravincini gives the impression that he is a man of mystery and no one should no where he comes from or who he really is. Not only do the eerie setting, and bizarre characters make this play a success, but the ironic twists that Agatha Christie adds to the story really brings it all together.