Agatha Christie’s translations in Finland

Images and bibliography courtesy of Ilari Haapasalo

Agatha Christie’s books have been translated into more than 100 languages. The world’s bestselling author, she has sold, according to the Guinness Book of Records, 2 billion copies of her mysteries. Initial sales were slow, however. The first edition of her first novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles (1920) sold 2 000 copies. Published six years later, her seventh book, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (Collins, 1926) sold 5 000, and it would be more than 20 books and more than 15 years later before the first edition of her Three-Act Tragedy (1935) would pass the mark of the 10 000. The French translation of The Murder of Roger Ackroyd was the first book in the famous and perennially successful “Le Masque” series, launched by the Librairie des Champs Elysées in 1927. There too, success came slowly. It took all of three years to sell 3000 copies. In the same year, the same book was translated in Finland. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd was actually published there under three different titles and by 3 different publishing houses : Odottamaton Ratkaisu (Satakunnan kirjateollisuus, 1927); Kello 9,10 (Otava, 1929) and Roger Acroydin murha (WSOY, 1959)