Background of the Study
Who Was Arthur Conan Doyle?
In 1890, Arthur Conan Doyle’s novel, A Study in Scarlet introduced the character of Detective Sherlock Holmes. Doyle would go on to write 60 stories about Sherlock Holmes. He also strove to spread his Spiritualism faith through a series of books that were written from 1918 to 1926. Doyle died of a heart attack in Crowborough, England on July 7, 1930.
Early Life
On May 22, 1859, Arthur Conan Doyle was born to an affluent, strict Irish-Catholic family in Edinburgh, Scotland. Although Doyle’s family was well-respected in the art world, his father, Charles, who was a life-long alcoholic, had few accomplishments to speak of. Doyle’s mother, Mary, was a lively and well-educated woman who loved to read. She particularly delighted in telling her young son outlandish stories. Her great enthusiasm and animation while spinning wild tales sparked the child’s imagination. As Doyle would later recall in his biography, “In my early childhood, as far as I can remember anything at all, the vivid stories she would tell me stand out so clearly that they obscure the real facts of my life.”
At the age of 9, Doyle bid a tearful goodbye to his parents and was shipped off to England, where he would attend Hodder Place, Stonyhurst — a Jesuit preparatory school — from 1868 to 1870. Doyle then went on to study at Stonyhurst College for the next five years. For Doyle, the boarding-school experience was brutal: many of his classmates bullied him, and the school practiced ruthless corporal punishment against its students. Over time, Doyle found solace in his flair for storytelling and developed an eager audience of younger students.
Medical Education and Career
When Doyle graduated from Stonyhurst College in 1876, his parents expected that he would follow in his family’s footsteps and study art, so they were surprised when he decided to pursue a medical degree at the University of Edinburgh instead. At med school, Doyle met his mentor, Professor Dr. Joseph Bell, whose keen powers of observation would later inspire Doyle to create his famed fictional detective character, Sherlock Holmes. At the University of Edinburgh, Doyle also had the good fortune to meet classmates and future fellow authors James Barrie and Robert Louis Stevenson. While a medical student, Doyle took his own first stab at writing, with a short story called The Mystery of Sasassa Valley. That was followed by a second story, The American Tale, which was published in London Society.
During Doyle’s third year of medical school, he took a ship surgeon’s post on a whaling ship sailing for the Arctic Circle. The voyage awakened Doyle’s sense of adventure, a feeling that he incorporated into a story, Captain of the Pole Star.
In 1880, Doyle returned to medical school. Back at the University of Edinburgh, Doyle became increasingly invested in Spiritualism or “Psychic religion,” a belief system that he would later attempt to spread through a series of his written works. By the time he received his Bachelor of Medicine degree in 1881, Doyle had denounced his Roman Catholic faith.
Doyle’s first paying job as a doctor took the form of a medical officer’s position aboard the steamship Mayumba, traveling from Liverpool to Africa. After his stint on the Mayumba, Doyle settled in Plymouth, England for a time. When his funds were nearly tapped out, he relocated to Portsmouth and opened his first practice. He spent the next few years struggling to balance his burgeoning medical career with his efforts to gain recognition as an author. Doyle would later give up medicine altogether, in order to devote all of his attention to his writing and his faith.
Personal Life
In 1885, while still struggling to make it as a writer, Doyle met and married his first wife, Louisa Hawkins. The couple moved to Upper Wimpole Street and had two children, a daughter and a son. In 1893, Louisa was diagnosed with tuberculosis. While Louisa was ailing, Doyle developed an affection for a young woman named Jean Leckie. Louisa ultimately died of tuberculosis in Doyle’s arms, in 1906. The following year, Doyle would remarry to Jean Leckie, with whom he would have two sons and a daughter.
Books: Sherlock Holmes
In 1886, newly married and still struggling to make it as an author, Doyle started writing the mystery novel A Tangled Skein. Two years later, the novel was renamed A Study in Scarlet and published in Beeton’s Christmas Annual. A Study in Scarlet, which first introduced the wildly popular characters Detective Sherlock Holmes and his assistant, Watson, finally earned Doyle the recognition he had so desired. It was the first of 60 stories that Doyle would pen about Sherlock Holmes over the course of his writing career. Also, in 1887, Doyle submitted two letters about his conversion to Spiritualism to a weekly periodical called Light.
Doyle continued to actively participate in the Spiritualist movement from 1887 to 1916, during which time he wrote three books that experts consider largely autobiographical. These include Beyond the City (1893), The Stark Munro Letters (1895) and A Duet with an Occasional Chorus (1899). Upon achieving success as a writer, Doyle decided to retire from medicine. Throughout this period, he additionally produced a handful of historical novels including one about the Napoleonic Era called The Great Shadow in 1892, and his most famous historical novel, Rodney Stone, in 1896.
The prolific author also composed four of his most popular Sherlock Holmes books during the 1890s and early 1900s: The Sign of Four (1890), The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1892), The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes (1894) and The Hound of Baskervilles, published in 1901. In 1893, to Doyle’s readers’ disdain, he had attempted to kill off his Sherlock Holmes character in order to focus more on writing about Spiritualism. In 1901, however, Doyle reintroduced Sherlock Holmes in The Hound of Baskervilles and later brought him back to life in The Adventure of the Empty House so the lucrative character could earn Doyle the money to fund his missionary work. Doyle also strove to spread his faith through a series of written works, consisting of The New Revolution (1918), The Vital Message (1919), The Wanderings of a Spiritualist (1921) and History of Spiritualism (1926).
In 1928, Doyle’s final twelve stories about Sherlock Holmes were published in a compilation entitled The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes.
Death
Having recently been diagnosed with Angina Pectoris, Doyle stubbornly ignored his doctor’s warnings, and in the fall of 1929, embarked on a spiritualism tour through the Netherlands. He returned home with chest pains so severe that he needed to be carried on shore and was thereafter almost entirely bedridden at his home in Crowborough, England. Rising one last time on July 7, 1930, Doyle collapsed and died in his garden while clutching his heart with one hand and holding a flower in the other.
The prolific author also composed four of his most popular Sherlock Holmes books during the 1890s and early 1900s: The Sign of Four (1890), The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1892), The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes (1894) and The Hound of Baskervilles, published in 1901. In 1893, to Doyle’s readers’ disdain, he had attempted to kill off his Sherlock Holmes character in order to focus more on writing about Spiritualism. In 1901, however, Doyle reintroduced Sherlock Holmes in The Hound of Baskervilles and later brought him back to life in The Adventure of the Empty House so the lucrative character could earn Doyle the money to fund his missionary work. Doyle also strove to spread his faith through a series of written works, consisting of The New Revolution (1918), The Vital Message (1919), The Wanderings of a Spiritualist (1921) and History of Spiritualism (1926).
In 1928, Doyle’s final twelve stories about Sherlock Holmes were published in a compilation entitled The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes.
Literature Review
The third of the four crime novels featuring the famous detective Sherlock Holmes, The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was serialised in The Strand Magazine from August 1901 to April 1902. It is set largely in Dartmoor in Devon, and tells the story of murder and attempted murder committed by a fearsome, supernatural, huge and glowing hound.
After gathering preliminary information in London, Holmes and Watson are summoned to Baskerville Hall in Dartmoor to investigate the sudden death of its last resident, Sir Charles Baskerville. Holmes opts to stay behind, and sends Watson there alone. The supernatural hound is said to have first appeared in the 18th century after killing the then-owner Hugh Baskerville. Rumours swirl in the village about the circumstances of Charles’ death, and many suspects, such as house staff Mr. and Mrs. Barrymore, are scrutinised by Watson. At the same time, an escaped convict is on the loose and is said to be roaming the moors.
All the while, the heir to Baskerville Hall, Henry Baskerville, is worried that he is being followed. In London, he received a note that warned him to not come to Baskerville, and discovered that one of his shoes had been stolen. He spends time with neighbours Jack and Beryl Stapleton, who are siblings. Many strange occurrences happen in quick succession: Barrymore is caught creeping around the mansion at night, Watson sees a mysterious figure wandering the moors, a dog’s howling is heard and Watson learns that Charles and a local woman called Laura Lyons had an encounter on the night of his death.
Watson soon discovers that at night, Barrymore is attempting to help the escaped convict, who is his brother-in-law. He also learns that the mysterious figure on the moors is none other than Sherlock Holmes himself, who wanted to keep a low profile in order to be better able to investigate. Holmes deduces that Mr. Stapleton is in line to inherit the Baskerville fortune. Laura Lyons was used by Stapleton, who promised to marry her and also convinced to request then miss a late night appointment with Sir Charles. At the late night appointment, Charles was lured onto the moors, at which point Stapleton released his terrifying, phosphorescent hound which frightened the nobleman to death.
In a dramatic final scene, Holmes and Watson use Henry as bait to catch Stapleton in the act of attempting to kill Henry with his hound on the moor. In his panic to escape, Stapleton drowns in a marshland on the moors. Beryl Stapleton, who it emerges is actually Jack’s wife and not his sister, is discovered tied up in their house, because she refused to participate in the scheme. She was also responsible for sending Henry the advance warning note in London. Holmes also deduces that Henry’s shoe was stolen to provide a scent for the hound to trail him. At the end of the novel, Henry Baskerville goes on holiday to calm his frayed nerves
Significance of the Study: Dr James Mortimer
Dr James Mortimer, M.R.C.S. is a British physician and client of Sherlock Holmes. After working for two years in a junior capacity at Charing Cross Hospital, he married and moved to Dartmoor to set up a country practice, where he made the acquaintance of the Baskerville family of Baskerville Hall. After the mysterious death of his close friend, Sir Charles Baskerville, Dr Mortimer sought out Sherlock Holmes’ help in protecting the only remaining heir, Henry Baskerville.
Though a man of science, he somewhat accepts the legend of the hound because of a lack of evidence to the contrary.
Mortimer is of average height and build, is an all-around nice guy and the executor of Charles’s estate. Mortimer is also a phrenology enthusiast (he is interested in the study of skulls) , and he wishes and hopes to some day have the opportunity to study Holmes’ head.
Doctor James Mortimer starts out the novel as a figment of Watson’s imagination. By looking at Doctor Mortimer’s forgotten walking stick, Watson guesses that he is a “successful elderly medical man, well-esteemed” (1.6), a “country practitioner who does a great deal of his visiting on foot” (1.8), and that he got the walking stick as a present from “the local hunt to whose members he has possibly given some surgical assistance” (1.12).
Holmes, of course, laughs at him, and points out all of the reasons that we should be able to see Doctor Mortimer for what he really is from his walking stick: “a young fellow under thirty, amiable, unambitious, absent-minded, and the possessor of a favorite dog” (1.29). When Doctor Mortimer shows up at their door with a curly-haired spaniel, he only confirms Holmes’ assessment of his character.
As we’ve mentioned in our “Character Analysis” of Sherlock Holmes, this early scene of deduction goes to show Holmes’ brilliance and Watson’s, well, less-than-brilliance (though, as we keep saying, he’s plenty smart!). It also shows a common mode of characterization in this novel: Holmes’ assessment of people is always right. The whole point of Holmes’ detecting technique is that he can read people like books.
So Doctor Mortimer comes into the story mainly as a handy plot device to show how brilliant Holmes is. We know that he has this unusual habit of investigating the shapes of skulls to see what they can tell him about different people (and different races, which is the ugly side of his “scientific” practice). But beyond this weird detail of Doctor Mortimer’s interest in phrenology and physical anthropology, he’s not much of a fully rounded character.
Doctor Mortimer does provide us with lots of important information about the case. He’s the one who tells Holmes about the old family legend of the Hound of the Baskervilles, and he’s the one who brings Sir Henry to meet Holmes before they go down to Baskerville Hall together. Doctor Mortimer also happens to be riding by in his cart just as Watson needs to ask someone about a local woman with the initials “L.L.” We also see a flash of his intelligence when he figures out from examining the ashes of the late Sir Charles’ cigar that Sir Charles waited for Laura Lyons for about five or ten minutes.
Doctor Mortimer happily fills Watson in on the background of Laura Lyons, who turns out to be key to the case against Stapleton. But when Doctor Mortimer isn’t required to give us plot exposition or some comic relief about skulls, he disappears from the narrative.
(There’s a very minor linguistic joke going on here, by the way: “Mors” is the personification of Death in Roman mythology, and many Latin medical terms to do with death (rigor mortis, livor mortis, and so on) all use the sound “mort.” Doctor Mortimer’s name emphasizes his association with dead things—in his case, skulls. Hopefully not his patients.)