Sherlock Holmes Literary Analysis

In this essay, I am going to look at how Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, has

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s character, Sherlock Holmes, once said “I consider that a man's brain originally is like a little empty attic, and you have to stock it with such furniture as you choose.” This quote can be found in A Study in Scarlet and relates to how Sherlock feels about knowledge. Sherlock even seems to use this to help him reason and understand the characteristics of people who cross paths with him. Both The Great Mouse Detective (GMD) and Sherlock Holmes (SH) use characteristics, from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s short stories, but they are depicted and intertwined into the stories very differently.

The Hound of the Baskerville was written and takes place during the Victorian age. The Hound of Baskerville is one of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s most well-known stories. There have been many telling’s Doyle ‘story. The title character of the BBC series Sherlock owes many of his character traits to traditional Holmes qualities that are evident in the stories and novel that we read. However, there are also many changes to the character and his relationships that evidence the “updating” of other traditional Holmes qualities for the 21st century. There is a parallel between the novel versus the movie series, only a slight change in the relationship between Watson and Holmes, a slight change in Sherlock, yet attitudes towards women are significantly different from the time period in which it was originally written. As long as the relationship core between Watson and Holmes remains mostly consistent, then the changes between the novel and the BBC adaptation are useful for showing how elements of British culture have changed.

2. The exposition of the story is when Watson sets the stage by describing the weather and what he and his companion, Holmes, were doing. According to Watson, “It was a blazing hot day in August. Baker Street was like an oven, and the glare of the sunlight upon the yellow brickwork of the house across the road was painful to the eye.” Watson was sitting at a desk reading the newspaper; while Holmes was lying on the couch reading a letter he had received that morning. Watson became dissatisfied with paper and tossed it aside while Sherlock read his thoughts. Holmes astounded Watson by knowing exactly what he was thinking just by his facial features, eyes, and slight movements. After Holmes explained how he knew what Watson was thinking, Watson said, “And now that you have explained it, I confess that I am as amazed as before.”

(Page 95). Watson and the baronet were starting their expedition in search for Selden. The hound from the beginning is peculiar, and the moor is as well. At this time, Watson was hustling out of the moor, because of murkiness and rain that always fulfills the moor. This again gave

Holmes addresses Watson by asking a rhetorical question. When he gets back from his club, the detectives gives some advice. Holmes says that some answers are right in front of you and tries to build Watson as a detective.

“You can get up now, Watson. The war is over.” (Columbus) Many readers may be familiar with the Scottish physician and author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle who wrote short stories about a famous detective named Sherlock Holmes and his assistant, Dr. John H. Watson (Wilson). The 1985 film, Young Sherlock Holmes is an imaginative creation of how Holmes and Watson met during their younger years. In the beginning of the film, the viewers are introduced to the young detective Sherlock Holmes and later introduced to Holmes’ close friend, Dr. John H. Watson. The viewers are also introduced to Holmes’ nemesis Professor James Moriarty. The film displays a background for the creation of Sherlock Holmes and how Holmes and Watson “supposedly” met during

At the beginning of both the film and the movie, it is obvious that the detective's relationships between colleagues greatly shifted from the nineteenth century to the modern era. Holmes and his partner John Watson had a respectable friendship in the novel, as the detective always referred to him as his “helper in many of [his] most successful cases” (Doyle 21). Dr. Watson in the movie, contradictorily, continually delivered biting remarks to Holmes and believed Holmes was merely a “patient,” begrudgingly agreeing to go on adventures with him (Ritchie 00:14:45). However, Watson risked his life in order to save Holmes “when the time mattered most,” something that Dr. Watson never did in the novel (01:28:35). The differences in their relationships represented the social movement

However, the reason that this scene could even take place is because the conflict shapes the story in a way that this is the character’s course of action to resolve it. For the novel to proceed its plot, it must build a story that revolves around the conflict from beginning to end. Even after the conflict has been resolved, the final scenes of the book are of Sherlock talking about the conflict. During these events, Watson, Dr. Mortimer, and Sir Charles are asking him to “‘kindly give me [Watson] a sketch of the events from memory’” (Doyle 227).

In the first story, “Sherlock Holmes and the Blue Carbuncle” we can see that Watson’s perspective is that Sherlock Holmes is a very skilled detective, and we can see this through his dialogue. In the passage Older Watson says, “The greatest detective who ever lived!” From this quote we can obviously see how Dr. Watson believes that Sherlock Holmes is one of the best detective’s to ever live. Another piece of evidence from the passage to support Watson’s perspective is, “I have

In Sherlock Holmes short stories Holmes seems to be a bit more seeing and noticing type of guy and in the movie he doesn’t seem to catch all the events coming his way which is a big difference. In the short story A Scandal In Bohemia Holmes tells Watson that his servant girl is careless and he notices that quickly because he sees that Watson's shoes still have mud on them. In the movie Holmes doesn’t notice that Lord Blackwood does not die when he is hanged for the first time so therefore,

Even after Watson moves out of his old quarters in Baker Street in order to marry Mary Morstan, whom he meets in the second novel, The Sign of Four (1890), this epistemophilic desire for Holmes still haunts him: “As I passed the well-remembered door [ . . . ], I was seized with a keen desire to see Holmes again, and to know how he was employing his extraordinary powers. His rooms were brilliantly lit, and, even as I looked up, I saw his tall, spare figure pass twice in a dark silhouette against the blind” (161-2). The thought that Holmes might be on a new case proves too appealing, and Watson cannot resist stopping in to hear the news. While Watson’s desire is primarily epistemophilic, Holmes’s is exhibitionistic, but neither experiences their desire for one another as, in any straightforward way, erotic. Nevertheless, Holmes’s sexuality, especially as

If Sherlock were narrating the reader would feel as if Holmes would let out to many details before we even get to the middle of the story. Watson holds on and has the readers thinking what may happen next and how the scenes will be plotted out. This really

Most often, people have an image in their mind when they think of detectives, whether the image is a man in a trench coat holding a magnifying glass, a beloved childhood character like Nancy Drew or the Hardy Boys, or the classic Victorian detective. While all of these may hold true, one specific person comes to mind at the mention of a detective, Mr. Sherlock Holmes. Along with images of detectives come preconceived ideas of what a detective or mystery novel should be or what it should contain. Within the genre, numerous authors have stood out among the others and set their own standard for these works of literature. In The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Doyle employs juxtaposed settings, descriptive imagery, and the symbolism that each convey to establish an immense attention to detail which maximizes the effectiveness of his writing in the genre of detection in this classic Sherlock Holmes story.

Another reason Watson is effective as the storyteller, is that compared to Holmes' amazing powers of logic and deduction, he seems more like a normal person. He, like the reader, is amazed by Holmes' skills, yet he does not understand them. During the denouement of "The Red-Headed League", Watson helps the reader understand how Holmes' came to his conclusions by asking him the questions that are in the readers mind, such as, "But how could you guess what the motive was? " and, "how could you tell that they would make their attempt to-night?" This satisfies the reader and adds realism - it helps them accept it is possible.