University of Baghdad

College of Arts
English Department

The Themes and Characteristics

of Sherlock Holmes in Doyle’s Writings

prepared by:

Ali Abd-Alhassan dilli

Zahraa Qasim

Supervised by:

ASST.Lectuer Sara Fasial

2020 ‫ هــ‬۱ ٤ ٤ ۱

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 Acknowledgments

Thank you to our supervisor, ASST.Lectuer Sara Fasial, for providing

guidance and feedback throughout this project. Sara continuously
provided encouragement and was always willing and enthusiastic to
assist in any way she could throughout the research project.

Thank you to our lovely parents, without whom I would not have
been able to complete this research, and without whom I would not
have made it through my Bachelor's degree!

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 Table of Content

Subject Page.
No
Title Page 1
Acknowledgment 2
Table Of Content 3
The Purpose Of The Research 4
Introduction 5
Section One 6-9
Section Two 10-15
Section Three 16-18
Conclusion 19
References 20

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 The purpose of The Research

The purpose of this study was to explore Themes, Personality and

Characteristic of the most famous detective Sherlock Holmes.
Furthermore, to glimpse in Doyle’s style of Victorian greediness,
imperialism and women’s effectiveness.

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 Introduction

Sherlock Holmes is one of the most popular and famous detectives in literary
history. we explore the fame, success, trials and tribulations that Holmes
brought to his creator, Arthur Conan Doyle.

Sherlock Holmes is perhaps the most popular detective in literary history,

famous around the world for his brilliant analytical skills and his ability to sort
carefully through the subtleties of complex clues. Inspiration for the character
came from one of Conan Doyle’s medical professors, Joseph Bell of Edinburgh,
who had ‘the most remarkable powers of observation’. While other fictional
detectives, Conan Doyle stated, obtained their information by chance rather
than science, in his detective fiction he wanted science to ‘take the place of
chance’. The first novel featuring Sherlock Holmes was published in 1887; the
character would subsequently appear in three more novels and 56 short stories.

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 Section One: Arthur Conan Doyle
1.1 Early life
Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle was born on May 22, 1859, in Edinburgh, Scotland. The
Doyles were a prosperous Irish-Catholic family. Charles Altamont Doyle, Arthur's
father, a chronic alcoholic, was a moderately successful artist, who apart from
fathering a brilliant son, never accomplished anything of note. At the age of twenty-
two, Charles had married Mary Foley, a vivacious and well educated young woman of
seventeen.

Mary Doyle had a passion for books and was a master storyteller. Her son Arthur
wrote of his mother's gift of "sinking her voice to a horror-stricken whisper" when
she reached the culminating point of a story. There was little money in the family
and even less harmony on account of his father's excesses and erratic behaviour.
Arthur's touching description of his mother's beneficial influence is also poignantly
described in his autobiography, "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."(1)

1.2 Name
Doyle is often referred to as "Sir Arthur Conan Doyle" or "Conan Doyle", implying
that "Conan" is part of a compound surname rather than a middle name. His baptism
entry in the register of St Mary's Cathedral, Edinburgh, gives "Arthur Ignatius Conan"
as his given names and "Doyle" as his surname. It also names Michael Conan as his
godfather. The catalogues of the British Library and the Library of Congress treat
"Doyle" alone as his surname.

Steven Doyle, editor of The Baker Street Journal, wrote, "Conan was Arthur's middle
name. Shortly after he graduated from high school he began using Conan as a sort of
surname. But technically his last name is simply 'Doyle'." When knighted, he was
gazetted as Doyle, not under the compound Conan Doyle(2)

1.3 Education
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1.3.1 School
After Arthur reached his ninth birthday, the wealthy members of the Doyle family
offered to pay for his studies. He was in tears all the way to England, where he spent
seven years in a Jesuit boarding school. Arthur loathed the bigotry surrounding his
studies and rebelled at corporal punishment, which was prevalent and incredibly
brutal in most English schools of that epoch.

During those gruelling years, Arthur's only moments of happiness were when he
wrote to his mother, a regular habit that lasted for the rest of her life, and also when
he practised sports, mainly cricket, at which he was very good. It was during these
difficult years at boarding school that Arthur realized he also had a talent for
storytelling. He was often found surrounded by a bevy of totally enraptured younger
students listening to the amazing stories he would make up to amuse them. (3)

1.3.2 University
From 1876 to 1881, Doyle studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh Medical
School; during this period he spent time working in Aston (then a town in
Warwickshire, now part of Birmingham), Sheffield and Ruyton-XI-Towns, Shropshire.
Also during this period, he studied practical botany at the Royal Botanic Garden in
Edinburgh. While studying, Doyle began writing short stories. His earliest extant
fiction, "The Haunted Grange of Goresthorpe", was unsuccessfully submitted to
Blackwood's Magazine.[9] His first published piece, "The Mystery of Sasassa Valley",
a story set in South Africa, was printed in Chambers's Edinburgh Journal on 6
September 1879. On 20 September 1879, he published his first academic article,
"Gelsemium as a Poison" in the British Medical Journal, a study which The Daily
Telegraph regarded as potentially useful in a 21st-century murder investigation. (4)

1.4 Inspiration

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While a medical student, Conan Doyle was deeply impressed by the skill of his
professor, Dr. Joseph Bell, in observing the most minute detail regarding a patient’s
condition. This master of diagnostic deduction became the model for Conan Doyle’s
literary creation, Sherlock Holmes, who first appeared in A Study in Scarlet, a novel-
length story published in Beeton’s Christmas Annual of 1887. Other aspects of Conan
Doyle’s medical education and experiences appear in his semiautobiographical
novels, The Firm of Girdlestone (1890) and The Stark Munro Letters (1895), and in
the collection of medical short stories Round the Red Lamp (1894). (5)

1.5 Holmes’s Early life

In His Last Bow, set in 1914, Holmes is described as being 60, indicating that he was
born in 1854. He lived in London at 221B Baker Street and shared rooms with Dr.
Watson until the latter’s marriage in 1887 and then again after his wife’s death. (6)

1.5.1 Holmes’s debut

Sherlock Holmes, fictional character created by the Scottish writer Arthur Conan
Doyle. The prototype for the modern mastermind detective, Holmes first appeared
in Conan Doyle’s A Study in Scarlet, published in Beeton’s Christmas Annual of 1887.
As the world’s first and only “consulting detective,” he pursued criminals throughout
Victorian and Edwardian London, the south of England, and continental Europe.
Although the fictional detective had been anticipated by Edgar Allan Poe’s C. Auguste
Dupin and Émile Gaboriau’s Monsieur Lecoq, Holmes made a singular impact upon
the popular imagination and has been the most enduring character of the detective
story.(7)

1.5.2 Holmes’s character

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Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote about the private detective Sherlock Holmes in twelve
stories. Sherlock Holmes was a man committed to his work of solving crimes, often
consumed by the details. He observed details that often seemed insignificant to
others and pulled clues together using logic to solve many different cases. Holmes’s
uncanny ability to gather evidence based upon his honed skills of observation and
deductive reasoning paralleled Bell’s method of diagnosing a patient’s disease.
Holmes offered some insight into his method, claiming that “When you have
excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the
truth.” His detecting abilities become clear, though no less amazing, when explained
by his companion, Dr. John H. Watson, who recounts the criminal cases they jointly
pursue. Although Holmes rebuffs praise, declaring his abilities to be “elementary,”
the oft-quoted phrase “Elementary, my dear Watson,” never actually appears in
Conan Doyle’s writings.(8)

1.5.3 Dr.John Watson

Watson’s narrations describe Holmes as a very complex and moody character who,
although of strict habit, is considerably untidy. His London abode at 221B, Baker
Street, is tended by his housekeeper, Mrs. Hudson. Holmes appears to undergo
bouts of mania and depression, the latter of which are accompanied by pipe
smoking, violin playing, and cocaine use. Throughout the four novels and 56 short
stories featuring Holmes, a number of characters recur, including the bumbling
Scotland Yard inspector Lestrade; the group of “street Arabs” known as the Baker
Street Irregulars, who are routinely employed by Holmes as informers; his even wiser
but less ambitious brother, Mycroft; and, most notably, his formidable opponent,
Professor James Moriarty, whom Holmes considers the “Napoleon of crime.” (9)

Section Two: A Sample of His Novels

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2.1 The sign of four
The Sign of the Four (1890), also called The Sign of Four, is the second novel
featuring Sherlock Holmes written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Doyle wrote four
novels and 56 short stories featuring the fictional detective. (10)

2.2 The Plot

The story is set in 1888. The Sign of the Four has a complex plot involving service in
India, the Indian Rebellion of 1857, a stolen treasure, and a secret pact among four
convicts ("the Four" of the title) and two corrupt prison guards. It presents the
detective's drug habit and humanizes him in a way that had not been done in the
preceding novel, A Study in Scarlet (1887). It also introduces Doctor Watson's future
wife, Mary Morstan.(11)

2.3 Characters

2.3.1 The Main Characters

 Sherlock Holmes, the story’s protagonist, is the infamous detective and
occupant of 221b Baker Street. He has a supreme, almost superhuman
intelligence that allows him to solve difficult cases
 Dr. Watson is the narrator of the story and Sherlock Holmes’ loyal assistant.
He is a doctor by profession and has a background as a surgeon in the British
Army.
 Miss Morstan comes to Sherlock Holmes to see if he can help her find out
what happened to her father, Captain Morstan, who disappeared a few years
previously.
 Athelney Jones is the hapless detective from Scotland Yard, the official police
agency. He is described as a fat and bumbling man and is in a position of high
authority(12)
 Jonathan Small is the wooden-legged man who seeks vengeance on Major
Sholto for the theft of the Agra treasure. He is one of “the four” original men
who acquired the treasure
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  Tonga is a native of the Andaman Islands who was aided by Jonathan Small
when suffering from ill health
 Thaddeus Sholto is one of Major Sholto’s sons, brother to Bartholomew
Sholto. He is an eccentric character with an anxious manner.
 Bartholomew Sholto is one of Major Sholto’s sons and lives at the family
home, Pondicherry Lodge.
 Captain Morstan was an officer in the British army who served in India. He is
Mary Morstan’s father, and his unexplained disappearance is the catalyst for
the novella’s plot.
 Major Sholto is the father of Bartholomew and Thaddeus Sholto and was a
friend to Captain Morstan, with whom he served in India.

2.3.2 The Minor Characters

 Mrs. Forrester employs Miss Morstan as a governess, but the
relationship between the two women is more like that of close friends
than employer and employee

 Mordecai Smith is the proprietor of the Aurora boat and is portrayed as

a common, working-class man.
 Mrs. Hudson is the landlady and housekeeper at 221b Baker Street, the
famous London address of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson

 Mrs. Bernstone is the housekeeper and Pondicherry Lodge, the family

of the Sholtos

 Mahomet Singh is an Indian man and one of the signatories of “the sign
of the four.” He colluded with Jonathan Small, Abdullah Khan and Dost
Akbar to seize the Agra treasure.

 Dost Akbar is an Indian man and one of the signatories of “the sign of
the four.” He lures the merchant—the man who is carrying the Agra
treasure—into the trap set by the other men.(13)

2.4 Key Events

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 i. Miss Mary Morstan arrives and asks for help with a mystery.
ii. Holmes and Watson accompany her to Thaddeus Sholto's house and
learn about the Agra treasure.
iii. Bartholomew Sholto is found dead at Pondicherry Lodge.
iv. Holmes investigates the clues and calls the police. Athelney Jones
arrests Thaddeus Sholto. Holmes sends Watson to borrow Toby, the
dog.
v. Holmes employs the Baker Street Irregulars as spies and eventually
puts on a disguise to track down the Aurora launch.
vi. Watson, Holmes and Inspector Jones pursue the villains along the River
Thames and catch up with them. The treasure chest is empty.
vii. Jonathan Small is arrested and confesses his whole story. Watson and
Mary Morstan are engaged to be married.(14)

2.5 Themes

2.5.1 The Emptiness of Wealth

Central to The Sign of Four is the idea of wealth and opulence—the Agra

treasure at the heart of this Sherlock Holmes story represents a life-changing
amount of riches. The book asks whether this kind of wealth equates to
happiness, and whether it is right to pursue wealth at all costs. Different
perspectives are presented by the life stories of different characters, ultimately
culminating in a sense that being rich does not mean being happy.

Miss Morstan’s main motivation for contacting Holmes is to try and find out
what happened to her father, Captain Morstan. But a knock-on effect looks
likely to be that, if Holmes is successful in cracking the case, Miss Morstan will
inherit a large share of the treasure and be catapulted into the upper class by
virtue of her newfound wealth. Through Dr. Watson and Miss Morstan’s
developing relationship, Doyle examines what effect this wealth might have.

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 In the fourth chapter, Holmes, Watson and Miss Morstan go to visit Thaddeus
Sholto. He is the son of Major Sholto, who was a friend of Miss Morstan’s
father. He reveals the story of the treasure, and that his brother, Bartholomew,
had discovered it hidden in the family home after their father died. Thaddeus
reveals the immense worth of the treasure, which sets up the plot point that, if
the treasure is found, Miss Morstan’s life will be changed beyond recognition
by her new riches. This makes Watson uneasy. As the novella progresses
and his feelings towards Miss Morstan intensify, he is afraid to mention them
because he feels that she will assume he is hoping for a part of the fortune.
Watson assesses that Miss Morstan’s impending wealth will make her part of
the upper classes and, essentially, put her out of his league. 

When Watson takes the box of treasure to Miss Morstan towards the novella’s
end, they are both relieved to learn that it is empty—the life-changing treasure
is nowhere to be seen. This gives Watson the confidence to confess his love,
which Miss Morstan reciprocates. Wealth, then, was a kind of threat hanging
over their heads rather than an indicator of happiness; with that threat
removed, they are allowed to give an honest account of how they feel. In the
case of Miss Morstan, then, wealth is linked to upper-class superiority and
exclusivity. The slightly glib point suggested by Doyle is that love is the “true”
treasure of the novella.

Alongside the question of whether wealth can lead to happiness is whether or

not it is a good idea to actively pursue wealth. In truth, all of the characters
associated with the treasure—those that want to possess it—meet a bad end
one way or another. Doyle thus suggests that the pursuit of wealth itself can
become a kind of sickness, corrupting the very lives of those who wish to
benefit from its potential riches. The treasure seems to act as a kind of curse
throughout, both in the main narrative and in Jonathan Small’s retelling of his
life story. Because it holds such promise of wealth, it possesses a deadliness
of equal intensity. For example, the merchant tasked with looking after the
treasure is killed by Small and his accomplices. Captain Morstan dies from a
heart attack in an argument about the treasure. Likewise, the deaths of Major
Sholto and his son, Bartholomew, are a direct result of the treasure.
Bartholomew’s face is stuck with a rictus grin, suggesting something of the
paradox of the supposed happiness of wealth versus the deadliness of its
pursuit. Jonathan Small’s life has been ruined by pursuit of the treasure, and

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all of his efforts have been in vain. The best he has managed is to cast the
treasure into the Thames river, thereby denying anybody else the wealth that
he feels was his due. Tonga, his accomplice, dies too.

Not a single character in the novella, then, ever actually benefits from the
treasure; in fact, most of them die or have their lives ruined.(15)

2.5.2 The Imperialism and Sexuality

The novella is set in the late nineteenth century, a time when the British
Empire was immensely powerful and wide reaching under the reign of Queen
Victoria. The Empire is a significant presence in the book.

The first key way in which The Sign of the Four reflects the Imperialist mindset is in
the plot itself. The story revolves around the Agra treasure, a bedazzling array of
jewels that originates in India. This association of “the East” with luxury and riches
ripe for the picking is typically Imperial; for the British Empire and its subjects, “the
East” was a place of mystery and luxury. The treasure at the heart of the story
originally belongs to an Indian rajah (a prince-like figure), and neither the thieves nor
Sherlock Holmes ever consider whether the treasure should be returned to its
original owner. Instead, Holmes and his assistant, Dr. Watson, try to track it down in
order to give it to Miss Morstan. Her father, Captain Morstan, was involved in the
second stage of the original theft (the first was Jonathan Small and three Sikh
soldiers). If Holmes and Watson can find the treasure, Miss Morstan will be rich for
life. In this way, then, the story itself mimics the power dynamic at play during the
British Empire. That is, foreign lands like India were plundered for their riches,
considered fair game because they were populated by inferior peoples. Of course,
this is a simplified account of a complicated state of affairs, but the general operation
of infrastructures like the British East India Company saw the exploitation of
resources from “the East” for the Empire’s gain.

In this way, The Sign of Four participates in the construction of the Indian
subcontinent and the female body. The vision of India, and, im- plicitly, of women,
conjured up by Watson's account of "the wild, dark business which had absorbed"
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himself, Holmes, and Mary Morstan has its effect (Doyle 1930a, 1:116). Associated in
Watson's imagination and in her own with the pearls, the treasure, Agra fort, and all
the fort sug- gests, Mary Morstan internalizes male fears that have been displaced
upon the projected India of imperialism. In the process, she seeks to rede- fine
herself over against the dark potentialities attributed to her by re- pressing them.
She and Mrs. Forrester-"two graceful, clinging figures" illuminated by "the hall light
shining through stained glass" (1:116)- become fixed in the roles that Watson desires
for them, embodying a par- ticular vision of woman that consecrates the hearth and
justifies imperial- ist adventures abroad. In the stance she adopts, seated by an open
win- dow, "dressed in some sort of white diaphanous material,. .. the soft light of a
shaded lamp [falling] upon her" (1:141), she presents herself to Watson as she
intuitively knows he desire(16)(17)

Section Three: A Sample of His Short Stories

3.1 A Scandal in Bohemia

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Armstrong, Nancy. 1987. Desire and Domestic Fiction: A Political History of the Novel. New York: Oxford
University Press

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A Scandal in Bohemia" is a short story by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in which King
Wilhelm of Bohemia hires Sherlock Holmes to prevent Irene Adler from publishing
compromising photos.(18)

3.2 The Plot

Holmes is hired to find some compromising photos that King Wilhelm of Bohemia's
former lover, Irene Adler, has threatened to publish in order to prevent Wilhelm's
wedding.

Holmes determines the location of the photos, but when he goes to retrieve them,
he learns that he has been outsmarted and that Adler has already moved the photos.
However, she has just gotten married, and she no longer plans to publish them. (19)

3.3 The Characters

 Sherlock Holmes is a private detective who has been contracted by Wilhelm
von Ormstein, King of Bohemia, to confiscate photographic evidence of the
King’s previous affair with a woman named Irene Adler.
 Dr.John Watson is a medical doctor and close friend of Sherlock
Holmes, Watson narrates “A Scandal in Bohemia” and assists Holmes
in his investigation.
 Grand Duke of Cassel-Felstein is the King of Bohemia, and Sherlock
Holmes’s client in this case.
 Irene Adler is an opera singer, world traveler, and former lover
of Wilhelm von Ormstein, King of Bohemia. She has kept letters and
photographs that are evidence of her relationship with the King.
 Godfrey Norton is a lawyer who is Irene Adler’s new husband. Not much
is known about Norton, except that he is a lawyer and has been seeing
Irene for some time. (20)

3.4 The Main Themes

3.4.1 Feminist Themes

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 The main theme of ''A Scandal in Bohemia'' is how Irene Adler defies
Victorian ideas about women as obedient, helpless victims who are
dependent on men for happiness. In several ways, Adler proves herself a
resourceful and empowered individual who makes her own way in the
world - all while outwitting a king and the best detective in England.(21)

3.4.2 Logic vs. Emotion

Unlike many Sherlock Holmes adventures, “A Scandal in Bohemia” does
not present an unsolvable mystery for modern fiction’s preeminent
detective. Instead, Holmes must trick a young woman, Irene Adler, into
divulging the whereabouts of a photograph that could damage the
reputation of his latest client, the King of Bohemia. While Holmes is famous
for his use of the powers of observation and deductive reasoning to solve
crimes—his assistant, John Watson, portrays Holmes as more machine
than man, rejecting emotion in favor of logic and intellect—“A Scandal in
Bohemia” provides a brief glimpse of the detective’s human side when he
meets the unique and mysterious Adler. When Holmes finds himself bested
by Adler, he comes to admire—and perhaps feel a certain affection for—
this woman whose cunning matches his own. The story explores the
tension between Holmes’s cold and almost inhuman deductive abilities and
his uncharacteristic response to Ms. Adler in order to question whether
emotion is incompatible with reason.(22)

3.4.3 A Career Woman

Many middle and upper-class women during the Victorian period did not have
careers, but depended on their husbands to support them financially while they
raised children and managed the household. However, Adler as a single woman not
only had a career singing opera, but was once the prima donna (best singer) of the
Imperial Opera of Warsaw. She's highly successful and continues to perform at
(23)
London concerts. She apparently makes enough money to live in a 'bijou villa,' or a
small but elegant residence.

3.4.4 Intelligence vs. Force

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In ''A Scandal in Bohemia,'' major male characters use forms of force and illegal
invasions to (try to) get what they want from Adler. The king ordered burglaries of
Adler's property no less than five times in three different ways when she wouldn't
sell him the photograph he wanted. Similarly, Holmes stages a fake fight in Adler's
street as she exits her carriage, hoping to physically intimidate her so he can pretend
to rescue her. He also instructs Watson to throw a smoke rocket into her house,
which is an illegal and aggressive form of manipulation. However, Adler manages to
prevent both parties from succeeding using her own intelligence and forethought
rather than force or criminal action. Later, the king tells Holmes and Watson: ''Did I
not tell you how quick and resolute she was?''(24)

Conclusion
Doyle shows the whole world the intelligence of Sherlock Holmes character in
his writings and use this character to criticizes British imperialism throughout
many short stories and novels

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He is also Glorifies woman characteristic, effectiveness and intelligence
especially in his writing, a Scandal of Bohemia, and insurgents against woman’s
persecution.

References
Arthurconandoyle official site

19
Armstrong, Nancy. 1987. Desire and Domestic Fiction: A Political

History of the Novel. New York: Oxford University Press

wikipedia.org

Britannica.com

study.com

enotes.com

bbc.com

litcharts.com

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