The Hound of the
Baskervilles
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Sherlock Holmes
In 1891, Doyle published six Adventures of
Sherlock Holmes in Strand magazine. Six more
appeared the next year.
 The stories are also owed in part to Edgar Allan
Poe, who is credited as having created the
detective tale. In fact, his stories are considered
“prequels” to Doyle’s stories.
 http://www.biography.com/video.do?name=hist
oricalfigures&bcpid=1740031454&bclid=177283
4530&bctid=1726714856

Background
Doyle was initially a struggling young
doctor who spent his hours unfilled with
patients creating the character of Sherlock
Holmes.
 His first Holmes story was published in
1887.
 Holmes grew in popularity, and Doyle
grew tired of him.

Sherlock Holmes’ demise
In 1893, Doyle published The Final
Problem. In this installment, Holmes’ arch
enemy, Professor Moriarty, sends him to
his death over the Reichenbach Falls.
 People were so outraged over his death
that newspapers actually ran an obituary.
People placed flowers on the streets of
London.

The resurrection
Doyle was forced to resurrect Holmes.
 The Hound of the Baskervilles was the
first story published after Holmes’
supposed death.
 Despite being published afterwards, Doyle
set the novel as prior to Holmes’ death so
that he could avoid resurrecting the
character.
 At the release of this story, The Strand’’s
readership grew by 30,000 subscriptions
instantly.

Inspiration for the detective
The ideas for Holmes’ unique detective
skills were based in-part on one of Doyle’s
professors from the University of
Edinburgh, Dr. Joseph Bell.
 Bell could draw medical conclusions about
his patients simply from observing the
mud on his shoes.

Inspiration for this novel
Black Shuck and the Whisht Hounds are
spectral, demon dogs from British
folklore. These ghostly dogs were the
inspiration for The Hound of the
Baskervilles.
 The origin of these legends springs from
Norse (Viking) mythology. They are
derived from tales of the black Hound of
Odin.

Doyle’s mystery novel
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is known as the
“father of the Golden Age of mystery.”
 His novels followed a usually predictable
pattern including the following:

A
closed setting like an isolated house or train
 A corpse
 A small group of people who are all suspects
 An investigating detective with extraordinary
reasoning powers
Complications
As are common in the rising action of
most novels, Doyle’s stories are full of
complications.
 As the story progresses, the reader learns
that nearly all the suspects had the means
and the motive.
 Clues accumulate and are often revealed
to the reader through a narrator like
Watson, Holmes’ trusty sidekick.

Red Herring
A diversion intended to distract attention from
the main issue
 Simply put, a red herring is an item which has
no use in the story except to distract the reader
from the real culprit.
 The red herring can take the form of a character,
which the reader may believe to be the killer,
only to discover later that he is innocent. It can
also take the form of an item which readers
believe to be the clue to a discovery, but which
turns out to be worthless.

English v. American
At the same time the English
detective/mystery novel became popular,
the private detective made his debut in
America.
 While Holmes and his counterparts were
gentlemen, the private eye of the U.S. was
a hard-drinking, tough talking investigator
whose stories went not in a logical order
but shifted from scene to scene. The
leader of the American mystery was
Dashiell Hammett.

Setting
221 B Baker Street, London, England
(Holmes’ residence)
 Baskerville Hall in Dartmoor, England
 Victorian London
 1880-90s*

*The Hound was published in 1902, but it is
set prior to Holmes’ death in 1893.
Major Characters
While Sherlock Holmes serves the
protagonist and central character, Dr.
Watson is the narrator of the tale. Watson
plays the role of Holmes’ sidekick.
 The antagonist will not be revealed until
the mystery is solved.

Holmes and Dr. Watson
Victorian England
Doyle’s work comes at the height of the
Victorian Era (the period of Queen
Victoria’s reign over England from 1837
until 1901).
 The era is characterized as a long period
of peace (following the Revolutionary War
with the U.S.).
 Inventions marked much of the period as
science and technology flourished.

Victorian England
At the time of Sherlock Holmes’ creation,
Victorian society was in a state of unease as
new thoughts and ideas threatened to
undermine traditional beliefs. The Industrial
Revolution had brought about the rapid
development of industry, railways,
commerce and engineering.
 Along with this came revolutionary scientific
theories which shocked many people.
Darwin’s Origin of Species, published in
1859, put forward the theory of evolution,
and so questioned the Christian beliefs that
had been dominant until then.

Victorian England Continued
There also occurred the rise of a new class
of rich factory owners, who capitalized on
the poor, particularly women and children.
The Victorian conscience was eventually
stirred by the revelation of this exploitation
in the works of authors such as Dickens and
Charles Kingsley.
 Tales of mystery, where social problems
were rarely confronted, grew in popularity
during the Victorian age.
