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The
killing of Sherlock Holmes It's a familiar
tale. A poor boy makes good, only to fall victim to his own success.
Except in this case, the boy was Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of
Sherlock Holmes, the master detective he came to detest for ruining
his chances of being taken seriously as an historical novelist. "Marry
him, murder him, do what you will," the frustrated writer once
told a friend planning to stage the exploits of his detective. "I am
fed up with Holmes," he complained on another occasion. "And
I think I must kill him off." Conan Doyle
did just that in 1893 in the December issue of The Strand, sending
Sherlock Holmes over the Reichenbach Falls in Switzerland as he
struggled with his arch enemy, Professor Moriarty. Unfortunately,
the public refused to let the detective rest, bombarding the author
with irate and sometimes threatening letters, demanding his resurrection.
After all, they argued, the intellectually gifted Holmes represented
all that was good, great and superior about the British Empire. His creator
may have seen Holmes in quite a different light, but in 1902, he
relented and wrote The Hound of the Baskervilles, hoping that the
story pre-dating the sleuth's demise would satisfy his readers and
publishers alike, leaving him to get on with the business of writing
serious fiction. But, like so much about his life, things did not
quite turn out as he had planned. Born in Edinburgh
on May 22, 1859, Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle was the third child
and eldest son of 10 siblings whose mother struggled to support
them while her husband, a city surveyor, battled epilepsy and alcoholism,
eventually dying in a psychiatric institution. Fiercely protective
of her son, Mary Doyle sent Arthur to the Jesuits to be educated
away from the emotional battlefield of their home. But the harsh
regimen of the Jesuits alienated Arthur and by the time he finished
his schooling in 1876, he had rejected religion in favour of science
to pursue a medical career. From 1876 to
1881 he studied medicine at Edinburgh University, supporting his
family by working as a surgeon on a Greenland whaler that voyaged
to the Arctic, and the Mayumba, a passenger ship bound for West
Africa. His studies and his travels would leave their mark on Conan
Doyle. At Edinburgh University, he worked under Dr. Joseph Bell,
the man whose observations about the history of his patients is
said to have provided the inspiration for the deductive powers of
Sherlock Holmes. And Conan Doyle's journeys were rooted in the sense
of adventure and imperialism that would soon permeate his writing. On his return
to England in 1882, he set up his own practice in Southsea near
Portsmouth. In the hope of supplementing his meagre income and emulating
his favourite novelist, Sir Walter Scott, the new doctor began penning
adventure stories. Five years
later, A Study in Scarlet was published in the Beeton Christmas
Annual, introducing Holmes - a master of observation and forensic
techniques - his sidekick Dr. Watson, and his sinister enemy Professor
Moriarty (named, it seems, after two boys from his school days). The story was
a hit and Conan Doyle quickly seized on its success to emulate Sir
Walter Scott by writing a long historical novel, Micah Clarke. Sadly,
though the book met with favourable reviews on its publication in
1889, it failed to capture the imagination or fiscal ambitions of
publishers the way his tale of Holmes had done. For the next
four years, then, Conan Doyle turned out scores of adventures featuring
the neurotic, violin-playing detective. Published in collections
of short fiction and journals such as The Strand, Sherlock Holmes
stories made the writer rich and famous. Yet, he quickly tired of
the sleuth and kept producing the historical novels (including The
Lost World) he believed would establish his reputation as a giant
of English literature. By 1891, Conan
Doyle had already begun plotting the detective's demise in The Final
Problem. "I think of slaying Holmes... and winding him up for
good and all," he admitted in a letter to his mother in November
that year. "He takes my mind from better things." Two years later,
readers were aghast when they opened the Strand magazine to the
pages of The Final Problem and learned that Holmes had disappeared
after meeting Moriarty at the fall of the Reichenbach in Switzerland.
His fate was made even clearer when Watson, narrator of all the
Holmes stories, found a letter from his friend. "I have
already explained to you, however, that my career had in any case
reached its crisis, and that no possible conclusion to it could
be more congenial to me than this." It was not,
however, a conclusion congenial to the public. Conan Doyle's fans
were so affected by the detective's death that they donned mourning
bands. The Strand magazine promptly lost 20,000 subscriptions and
the writer's publishers were inundated with letters. Conan Doyle
himself was threatened with the direst of consequences unless he
agreed to resurrect Holmes from the dead. In 1902, facing
growing pressure, he published The Hound of the Baskervilles, narrating
an earlier case which has since become perhaps the most famous of
all the detective's stories. Set in both London and Devon, it concerns
the mystery surrounding the death of Sir Charles Baskerville and
the West Country legends about a huge demon dog roaming the moors
seeking vengeance against the victim's family. But the tale
was still not enough to satiate the public and in 1903, Conan Doyle
published The Adventure of the Empty House, contriving to have Holmes
reappear to the faithful Dr. Watson and reveal that his apparent
death never actually took place - opening the way to further stories. Significantly,
The Hound of the Baskervilles also hinted at its author's growing
interest in spiritualism. Like many of his contemporaries, disillusioned
with religion but seeking some spiritual answers, Conan Doyle believed
that the living could communicate with the dead. By 1906, in grief
at the death of his wife from tuberculosis and still reeling from
the horrors he witnessed working at a field hospital during the
Boer War, he had begun writing extensively on the subject. Unfortunately,
his beliefs would shatter the reputation he had worked so hard to
establish when, in 1917, he was duped by two young English girls,
Elsie Wright and Frances Griffiths, who presented him with photographs
they said showed them playing with fairies in the woods of Cottingley
in Yorkshire. Conan Doyle believed so strongly that the pictures
were authentic that he wrote a book about them. Even when the
fairies proved no more real than Sherlock Holmes, Conan Doyle's
belief in the spirit realm remained undaunted. Indeed, he felt his
lectures and psychic crusade to be his most important work. It is somehow
fitting, then, that it was following his return from a psychic lecture
tour to Scandinavia and a meeting at the Home Office to urge the
repeal of the Witchcraft Act that he suffered a heart attack and
died at home on July 7, 1930. After his death,
his friends and fans gathered at the Albert Hall for a mass seance.
But, despite all expectations and the precedent set by his fictional
detective, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle failed to reappear. That
funny thing called fashion I'm not saying
that I am a slovenly dresser. It's just that I choose my attire
according to two simple principles which I established early in
life, namely, the 'closest to the cupboard door' or the 'I just
got off the clothesline' method. These are very convenient but somehow,
fashion conscious folk freak out when I mention them! What never
ceases to amaze me is how most people constantly fret about their
attire. It's unthinkable to sport a green top with a pair of black
trousers and brown shoes. It should, they say, 'be teamed with something
that will enhance the outfit, a pair of green shoes with a green
handbag for instance'. Green shoes? I ask disbelievingly. Yup. Such
unimaginable items are now available at most shoe shops. (They also
say that shoes are available in a range of shades, there are the
dirty green sandals and the bright luminous sneakers, which sit
on the same shelf as apple green boots.) The television channels
now feature exclusive programmes on handbags and other accessories
in fear that duds such as myself will embarrass our now excessively
fashion conscious countrymen! But who has
the time, energy and more importantly, the financial capabilities
to equip oneself with shoes and accessories in all the colours of
the rainbow? 'Most do,' smile the endorsers of the trend. One is
garbed in blue jeans and a black top, a black belt sits at her waist
while a dainty denim shoulder bag with black trimmings sits on her
chair. I am dumbfounded
and not embarrassed to say so. Am I that out of date? Is it unthinkable
to carry a one and a half-year-old standard black, rather hefty
looking satchel on a daily basis regardless of whether the top is
green or not? (Someone please disagree.) I have a fantastic excuse
'there's no time to change bags as often as I am supposed to'. Even
my shoes come in one colour, black. The advantages of the said colour
are numerous. Black goes with anything and adds to the very chic
you. (I assume) So it's black I buy and black I wear day in and
day out! In the late
1300s, I've been told, the Greeks reached the peak of their civilisation.
At the time, their garb was the chiton, a simple cloth draped in
a simple manner, the only difference for men and women being the
length! If it were not for the wars that took place and the absence
of a microwave and refrigerator, I'd have wished myself there this
instant! Once you reach
the adventurous ages between 5 and 12 and the terrible teens, clothing
grows to be such a problem.There's this big difference between the
attire worn to a place of religious worship and a beach party. Accumulating
such an extensive wardrobe to only use each piece once is going
to guarantee that you'd be at the butt end of family jokes for a
long time to come. Another aspect
of this part of life that I find immensely tiring and worth a good
grumble is the fact that fashions change every three months. I tried
getting 'with it' a few years back and purchased a chocolate brown
skirt with an uneven hem, only to be told the following day that
'it's now officially out!' I sat down and moped. Someone was delicately
trying to make me come to terms with the fact that catwalk attire
was not for me. A friend of
mine was such a devout follower of the catwalks of Paris, Rome and
Milan that the minute the three quarter length skirt hit the runways
her sewing lady was blessed with a lump order! But as for me, I
stick to the bare basics and so far it's worked (I think). The tried
and tested jeans have proved to be the ideal solution to all my
woes. The number
one reason most people hate work and love school is the simple fact
that attire is uncomplicated. The tried and tested school uniform
has so many hidden advantages. You can wear it all through the year
and no one is going to ever say, 'Did you not wear that particular
top with X skirt and Y shoes three months ago?' You can happily
slip into Monday's uniform on Friday and not create a spectacle
of yourself. The males of our species have it so easy. There are no off the shoulder, sleeveless, cap sleeved, raglan sleeved tops to choose from. There's the shirt and the T-shirt, and the trousers and the shorts, what a simple life they lead. Sibling endorses the fact. Whether it's a wedding, a funeral or daily wear, the only aspect of his clothing that changes is (you guessed right!) the colour. So while I'm an advocate of women's liberation and human rights, when it comes to clothing, there are times I sincerely wish I were a man! Care to disagree? |
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Copyright © 2001 Wijeya Newspapers
Ltd. All rights reserved. |
reading
too many Vogue magazines?' No, but the truth has struck me only
now. Attire is so very important to us mortals.
