ANALYSIS OF THE MURDER OF ROGER ACKROYD

Abstract

The plot of The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is built around a love triangle. Mrs. Ferars who commits suicide in the beginning of the novel has had an affair with Roger Ackroyd, the richest person in King’s Abbot. She poisons her alcoholic husband who she can no more stand and hopes thus to marry Roger Ackroyd, the richest person in King’s Abbot. However, someone who is aware of this affair blackmails Mrs. Ferrars. Mrs. Ferars, unable to resist guilty conscience and the pressure of the blackmail, commits suicide. It is Doctor James Shepard, the family doctor that blackmails her. At the same time with his intervention, the doctor functions just like Mrs. Ferars and by killing Roger Ackroyd in the third corner of the triangle he condemns himself. The novel is the story of these condemnations. Yet, with a strange twist of fate, Roger Ackroyd and Mrs. Ferars leave behind two healthy loves as they depart this life. All events in the work are shaped by the use of space, time, characters, diversions and solution. The novel takes place in a narrow space where everyone knows each other (in a mansion named Fernley Hall in King’s Abbot). Space is narrow and defined within the limits of the village. The murderer makes a change in space and this change, by creating suspicion, helps in the discovery of truth. Time is very important in this work where events begin in media res. The story begins with “near past”. “Past” comprises Mrs. Ferrets death and the events related with Ackroyd. “Now” is the time dimension when the murder is solved and the murderer confesses .There are twenty-seven sections and fifteen characters. Three different incidents in the novel constitute the diversions, but the biggest diversion is that the murderer is the narrator. The discrepancy between appearance and reality complicates the plot and postpones the solution.

Keywords: Murder, characters, space, time, diversion, solution.

REFERENCES

Christie, A. (1961). The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, Glasgow: William Collins Sons and Co.Ltd., 1926.

Leibniz, G. W. (1961). Grand Larousse Encyclopedia, Paris:1961.

Lubbock, P. (1961). “Picture, Drama and Point of View” Approaches to the Novel, ed. les. San Francisco: University of Virginia, Chandler Publishing Co. 1961.

Marleau-Ponty, M. (1962). The Phenomenology of Perception. London:1962.

Saussure, Ferdinand de Genel Dilbilim Dersleri. Çev. Berke Vardar. Ankara: TDK Yayınları, 1976.

Todorov, T. (1988). The Typology of Detective Fiction” Modern Criticism and Theory. S.1500-1527. Ed. David Lodge. New York: Longman Inc., 1988.