Agatha Christie’s ” And then there were none” Essay.

Essay Question: Analyse how the characters were used to explore the concept of justice.

Is murder ever justifiable? “And then there were none” is a powerful novel written by Agatha Christie, which is set in 1939 and based on the theme of justice which is explored through the characters. The characters are trapped on an isolated island, away from all civilization and society and forced to come to terms with their “death sentence”.

A character in the book named Judge Wargrave felt like he had to be responsible for punishing people that were held unaccountable for killing others and escaping the consequences of the law. He met people that told him about them, and decided they were not going to get away with their horrible acts. He chose selected people whom he thought deserved to die, and invited them to a mansion on an island in the middle of nowhere – called soldier island. The judge uses a man called Isacc Morris to buy the island so he is not a suspect when everyone starts dying, and then hides among the guests themselves.

The island seems like an actual “courtroom” to judge Wargrave, and the “ten indians” who are the guests are on trial and waiting for him to announce their death sentences. You could also say that the murders of some of the characters are unjustified because of their apparent ” crimes ” were a mistake and insignificant, so the punishment they recieved was not deserved. For example, anthony Marston ended the lives of two kids in a car accident. Similarly, Armstrong has killed one of his patients because he was operating while drunk. Surely, it can be agreed that since these characters has caused the deaths unintentionally it has been legally allowed to continue operating and so they aren’t guilty and shouldn’t be punishable through death. However, they are indeed guilty and this is reinforced by the character’s conscious awareness of their guilt. guilt is a result of wrong doing or criminal behaviour, the absense of which would give no reason to feel guilt.

Vera Claythorne, who voluntarily hangs herself out of realisation of her crime, is a striking example of how justice can take the form of one’s own guilty consciousness. Dr Armstrong on the other hand, often experienced dreams which recall the instance he had killed one of his patients. The inner conscience is a reminder to the characters of their crimes. It also puts justice into place by preoccupying the characters thoughts with guilt and tormenting them until their deaths. Wargrave punished them but so that the severity of their crime was also the same as how bad their crime was. – Anthony Marston died a quick and relatively painless death. He didn’t have to suffer as much as the other characters and go through the wait to die. Although, characters that did worse things, like Vera Claythorne, she was the last character to die and she had to go through the phycological pain and slowly went insane when waiting for her death. she hangs herself willingly after experiencing so much guilt on her shoulders and it all gets too much for her.

Wargrave inforces justice but also punishes himself – just like he punished his victims. At the end of the novel he commits suicide. Justice is usually put into place by putting people behind bars but in this case, they are killed. Although they did wrong things, murder is not justifiable.