Agatha Christie's The Mirror Crack'd Play
- andybarger
- Mar 14
- 3 min read
I recently attended "The Mirror Crack'd" play at the Asolo Repertory Theatre in beautiful Sarasota, Florida. The acting was top-notch and the set was exemplary, both of which the denizens of Sarasota have come to expect from the Asolo.
"The Mirror Crack'd" is originally Agatha Christie's classic Miss Marple mystery novel, originally published in 1962 in the UK as The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side (and in the US as The Mirror Crack'd).
The title draws from Alfred Lord Tennyson's poem "The Lady of Shalott":
Out flew the web and floated wide;
The mirror crack'd from side to side:
"The curse is come upon me," cried
The Lady of Shalott.
"The Lady of Shalott" is arguably Alfred Lord Tennyson's most famous narrative poem, first published in 1832 and significantly revised in 1842 (the 1842 version is the one most commonly read today). It's a haunting ballad set in the legendary world of King Arthur's Camelot, blending fairy-tale elements, medieval romance, and deep psychological symbolism.The poem tells the tragic story of a mysterious woman (the Lady of Shalott) who lives in isolation on an island in a river flowing toward Camelot. Cursed by an unknown force, she cannot look directly at the world outside her tower—only view its reflections in a magic mirror. She spends her days weaving a colorful tapestry that captures the scenes she sees in the mirror, singing as she works.The poem is divided into four parts:
Part I sets the idyllic yet eerie scene: fields of barley and rye, flowing river, bustling life heading to Camelot, contrasted with the silent, gray tower where the Lady is hidden. No one has ever seen her, though reapers hear her song.
Part II describes her routine: weaving "a magic web with colours gay," aware of the curse if she looks toward Camelot, yet growing weary ("half sick of shadows").
Part III brings the turning point: the dazzling Sir Lancelot rides by, singing and shining in his armor. Overcome by longing, the Lady turns from her loom, looks directly out the window at him, and the mirror cracks—"The curse is come upon me," she cries.
Part IV depicts her fate: she leaves the tower, finds a boat, writes her name on its prow ("The Lady of Shalott"), lies down amid her tapestry, and floats down the river toward Camelot. She sings her final song as she dies, and her body arrives at Camelot, where knights and ladies wonder at her beauty. Lancelot himself remarks on her lovely face and prays for God's mercy.
The poem draws loosely from Arthurian legend (echoing the story of Elaine of Astolat, who dies of unrequited love for Lancelot), but Tennyson transforms it into something more symbolic and introspective.Key Themes
Artistic Isolation vs. Real Life: The Lady is often seen as a metaphor for the artist (or poet) who must remain detached from the world to create true art. She views life only through reflections (like an artist through their medium), but direct experience shatters that detachment and destroys her work—and ultimately her.
Longing and Desire: Her fatal glance is sparked by romantic/sexual attraction to Lancelot, symbolizing the pull of human connection, passion, and lived experience over safe, solitary creativity.
Curse of Reflection: The mirror and weaving represent mediated experience—art as a "shadow" of reality. Breaking the rules brings doom, suggesting that full immersion in life can be fatal to pure art (or to those bound by rigid constraints).
Victorian Gender Roles: Some readings see the Lady as embodying the restricted Victorian woman—confined to domestic "weaving" (literal and metaphorical), denied direct agency or gaze at the world, punished for stepping outside prescribed boundaries.
In an article on Channing, Poe commented on Tennyson's most popular poems. “For Tennyson, as for a man imbued with the richest and rarest poetic impulses, we have an admiration — a reverence unbounded. His ‘Morte D’Arthur,’ his ‘Locksley Hall,’ his ‘Sleeping Beauty,’ his ‘Lady of Shalott,’ his ‘Lotos Eaters,’ his ‘Ænone,’ and many other poems, are not surpassed, in all that gives to Poetry its distinctive value, by the compositions of any one living or dead."
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