Description
The Worlds of Sherlock Holmes: The Inspiration Behind the World’s Greatest Detective by Andrew Lycett
Questing was Sherlock Holmes’s business. He famously adopted the latest forensic techniques, channelled the Victorian passion for enquiry, kept abreast of the key scientific breakthroughs of his age, and conducted his investigations in an enigmatic and stylised manner. And the brains behind it all was, of course, the great Arthur Conan Doyle.
In this deep dive into the contemporary world of Holmes and Conan Doyle, biographer Andrew Lycett explores all that encompasses the world of the great detective – tracing the infamous character’s own interests, personality and mythologised biography alongside that of his creator’s.
From the Victorian crazes for detection and séance, to contemporary developments in science and psychology, Lycett weaves together everything that inspired Conan Doyle in creating the world’s most famous detective and one of fiction’s most enduring, enigmatic and recognisable characters.
Review Quotes:
“This companion embarks on a lively tour of the politics, cultural and social circumstances of Holmes’s era [and] takes us inside Holmes’s mind, a mix of imagination to read a criminal’s intentions with a scientific approach to solving riddles…We discover what lies behind that famous image, the man who created him and the world into which both were born and shaped by.”
— Dan Carrier, Camden New Journal
Table of Contents:
INTRODUCTION
A SHERLOCKIAN SENSE OF PLACE
BRITAIN AND THE WIDER WORLD
THE ADVANCE OF SCIENCE
WATCHING THE DETECTIVES
SCREEN AND STAGE REPRESENTATIONS
GETTING INTO PRINT
ART IN THE BLOOD
A FEW ATHLETIC TASTES
STAYING THE COURSE
POSTSCRIPT
CHRONOLOGY OF CONAN DOYLE AND WORLD EVENTS
CHRONOLOGY OF HOLMES AND WATSON
FURTHER READING
INDEX
PICTURE CREDITS
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
