Thesis 2.

1: Conan Doyle created a series of detective stories based on his main

character, Sherlock Holmes. These stories were popular because they contained
reflections of the audience and the environment. Leroy Panek, and George N. Dove
discuss the factors and reasons that led to the popularity of the Holmes stories. A main
component for Holmes popularity

Leroy Panek, author of An Introduction to the Detective Story, argues Doyles
popularity was because of his ability to reflect the middle class audience, their
environment, and their need for entertainment. Panek explains that the middle class was
growing because of new and recent education laws along with the rise of technology, so
for the first time, a growth in reading and producing books and short stories were
introduced to the public (9). In order to understand more of Paneks argument for why the
middle class enjoyed the Holmes novels we must look at the history of the 1900s. During
the Victorian Era, police were inadequate and had little or no training. Many officers
were discharged on charges of being intoxicated on the job and the norm was criminals
could escape and justice would not prevail (8). An example of the publics distrust of the
police is illustrated in The Sign of the Four, written by Conan Doyle, when Thaddeus
Sholto did not want to involve the police because he knows they will automatically
accuse him of killing his brother. Sholto also did not have high hopes for the police to
catch the criminals. In fact, before the detective stories, authors wrote about criminals
who used evidence and wit to commit crimes instead of detectives (Panek 4). A
criminals clever way of thinking and use of evidence were the beginning of conventions
that would lead to aspects of the mystery genre (Panek 3). This clever way of thinking
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attracted an audience who enjoyed watching and playing the game of looking for clues
and using ones intelligence to solve a crime. Dove says, play becomes a game when the
player faces some kind of opponent (15). With knowledge that criminals are clever and it
would take a hero who is even brainier than the criminal, a sense of intellectual battle
excited the reader. George N. Dove, writer of The Reader and the Detective Story wrote
about the collection of different stories and fiction to create the mystery genre. Dove and
Panek both state that evidence and the cleverness of the audience and the characters is
what makes the detective genre so unique. Dove says, Dr. Thorndyke stories, who
argues for the detective novel as a work of both imagination and ratiocination, as an
exhibition of mental gymnastics, in which the reader is invited to take part (2). The
detective stories are made to be an intellectual game between the reader and the author,
and betweenand the hero and the criminal. Previous stories during this time focused on
criminals and not the police because the police did not have a stable reassuring
relationship with the public. Panek comments on the police force, it is easy to see why
the public asked not, why do we need snooping policemen, but why arent the police
doing anything (76). The British grew up in a world where justice and a happy ending
did not exist in reality. With the increasing anxiety and fear about crime, the audience
needed an outlet to end their sense of fear. Dove suggests a reason for the popularity of
the genre: the detective story is transitory without long-range goals or purposes; it is
fundamentally an intellectual undertaking; it is recreational, intended primarily to relax
(2). Dove continues on to describe how a reader can curl up with a good detective novel
and expect, in the end, the criminal would be caught. The consistent knowledge of a
happy ending is what appealed to the audience. The two authors do not completely agree
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with each other but both state the theory of a source of leaving reality to enjoy a simple
story.