Xiang Luan

Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None (1939) represents a seminal work that transcends the boundaries of conventional detective fiction. This study conducts a comprehensive examination of three groundbreaking narrative techniques employed in the novel: the structural utilization of nursery rhymes, the innovative generation of suspense through narrative absence, and the sophisticated implementation of metaphorical constructions. Departing radically from traditional detective novels that feature a central investigator figure, Christie pioneers a collective protagonist model through which she explores profound jurisprudential themes. The analysis demonstrates how Christie’s strategic use of spatial isolation and poetic justice mechanisms serves as penetrating social commentary on legal deficiencies in early 20th-century Britain. Through meticulous textual analysis and theoretical contextualization, this paper reveals how the novel’s intricate narrative architecture facilitates its meditation on moral accountability, the nature of justice, and the social contract. The study ultimately positions And Then There Were None not as mere genre fiction, but as a sophisticated literary work that demands and rewards serious critical attention.

And Then There Were None; narrative patterning; suspense architecture; metaphorical dimensions

[1] Christie,A.(1939).And Then There Were None.Collins Crime Club. [2] Foucault,M.(1975).Discipline and Punish:The Birth of the Prison.Gallimard. [3] Hugo,V.(1827).Cromwell.Ollendorf. [4] Smith,J.(2018).“The Critical Reception of Agatha Christie.”Journal of Popular Literature,42(3),45-67.

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