Colegiul Naional Ioan Slavici Satu Mare Lucrare pentru obinerea atestatului de limba englez

The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

Profesori coordonatori: Luisa Morna Ioana Vsu

Nume: Sergiu Brbu Clasa a XII-a C Profil: matematic-informatic bilingv englez

An colar 2010-2011

Argument

"Holmes assists a broad range of clients. These are the classic tales, setting the standard by which every other detective is measured."
Leslie S. Klinger

If someone was to ask people whether they know who Sherlock Holmes was, the answer would certainly be a Yes in ninety percent of the cases. Although Sherlock Holmes is not the original fiction detective (he was influenced by Edgar Allan Poe's C. Auguste Dupin and mile Gaboriau's Monsieur Lecoq), his name has become a byword for the part. His stories also include several detective story characters such as the loyal but less intelligent assistant, a role for which Dr Watson has become the archetype. The investigating detective became a popular genre with many authors such as Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers after the demise of Holmes, with characters such as Hercule Poirot and Lord Peter Wimsey. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was an extraordinary novelist, as he was able to capture the minds of his readers by bringing the character of Sherlock Holmes to life. Although Doyle was able to create a life for the detective unlike any other, there are many similarities and routines in the way that he told each of his stories. These things are not necessarily bad as they add to the reality of Detective Sherlock Holmes. I have chosen this theme because I am one of the many afficionados of not only this genre, but of Conan Doyles genius which brought the brilliant Sherlock Holmes to life. I think that everyone should read The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes as they are a series of classic short stories that can capture the minds of people, whether they are novices or experienced readers.

Table of contents
1.

Introduction.2
1.1 1.2 1.3

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle2 Life2 Works3

2.

Chapter 1: Sherlock Holmes4

2.1

Inspiration for the character and the name of Holmes4

3.

Chapter 2 : Life5
3.1 3.2 3.3

Early life5 Life with Dr. Watson.6 Retirement.7

4. 5.

Chapter 3: Habits and personality...8 Chapter 4: Methods of detection...10

5.1 5.2 5.3

Holmesian detection10 Disguise...11 Knowledge and skills..11

6. 7.

Conclusion.12 References.13

Introduction Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle, (22 May 1859 7 July 1930) was a Scottish physician and writer, most noted for his stories about the detective Sherlock Holmes, which are generally considered a major innovation in the field of crime fiction, and for the adventures of Professor Challenger. He was a prolific writer whose other works include science fiction stories, historical novels, plays and romances, poetry, and nonfiction.

Life
Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle was born on 22 May 1859 in Edinburgh, Scotland, the eldest son born to Roman Catholic parents Mary ne Foley (1838-1921) and artist Charles Altamont Doyle (1832-1893). Charles would lead a life troubled by alcoholism and depression; after spending much time in mental institutions, he died in Scotland in 1893. Supported by an uncle, young Arthur's education started in 1868 at the Jesuit preparatory school Hodder in the Ribble Valley of Lancashire, England. He then attended Stonyhurst College, graduating in 1875; next he travelled to the town of Feldkirch in Austria to study at the Jesuit college. At Edinburgh University he studied medicine and met his mentor, professor and doctor Joseph Bell. Conan Doyle worked as doctor's assistant and ship's doctor, travelling to Africa on the steamer Mayumba. He graduated in 1885, publishing his thesis "An Essay Upon the Vasomotor Changes in Tabes Dorsalis". During his years of studies and afterwards he wrote numerous articles and stories for such publications as the Edinburgh Journal, The Lancet, The Pall Mall Gazette, London Society, William Makepeace Thackeray's The Cornhill, and Charles Dickens's All The Year Round. They include "The Captain of the Pole-Star", "The Five Orange Pips", "The Heiress of Glenmahowley", "J. Habakuk Jephson's Statement", and "The Man From Archangel". In June of 1882 Conan Doyle settled in Southsea, Portsmouth, England, where he opened his own successful medical practice. He continued to write and travelled often to London. In August of 1885 he married Louise Hawkins (1856-1906), with whom he would have two children.Arthur and Louise honeymooned in Ireland and while Conan Doyle continued to practice medicine he also kept up his prodigious output of fiction. First published in Beeton's Christmas Annual in 1887 and favourably reviewed, A Study in Scarlet was published in book form in 1888. The same year, his first novel The
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Mystery of Cloomber (1888) was released. Based on the Monmouth Rebellion of 1865, Micah Clark was next published in 1889. It was followed by The Sign of the Four (1890) and The Firm of Girdlestone (1890). The same year that The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1891) was published, Conan Doyles moved to London, settling in South Norwood. In 1900 Conan Doyle served as a doctor at the Longman Hospital during the South African War. His first of many war-related works, The Great Boer War (1900), was followed by The War in South Africa: its Cause and Conduct (1902), which earned him the title Knight bachelor in 1902 from King Edward VII. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle died at his home "Windlesham" in Crowborough, Sussex, on 7 July 1930. He was first buried in the rose garden of Windlesham. When "His Beloved, His Wife" Jean died in 1940 he was reinterred to rest with her, "reunited", in the Minstead churchyard of Hampshire, England. His grave memorial in part reads "Steel True, Blade Straight, Arthur Conan Doyle, Knight, Patriot, Physician, & Man of Letters."

Works
Inspired by Sir Walter Scott, Robert Louis Stevenson, Edgar Allan Poe, Guy de Maupassant, and Emile Gaboriau, Arthur Conan Doyle's now-iconic mastermind sleuth and his companion Dr. John H. Watson redefined the detective genre. Conan Doyle's medical training under Dr. Joseph Bell and practical experience as a doctor in several locales and as ship's doctor are the foundation for Holmes's methods of deductive reasoning. "It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."--from "The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet". The Edwardian and Victorian era stories are set in London, England, and places abroad. Sherlock Holmes first appeared in A Study in Scarlet in 1887 and Conan Doyle would write fifty-five more stories and four novels starring Holmes. He wrote many other notable fiction and non-fiction works including The Stark Munro Letters (1895), The Exploits of Brigadier Gerard (1896), The Hound of the Baskervilles (1902), The Lost World (1912), The Coming of the Fairies (1922), and Memories and Adventures (192430), many which have been translated to dozens of languages and are still in print today.

Chapter 1 Sherlock Holmes

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Sherlock Holmes is a fictional detective created by Scottish author and physician Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. A brilliant London-based "consulting detective", Holmes is famous for his astute logical reasoning, his ability to take almost any disguise, and his use of forensic science skills to solve difficult cases. Holmes, who first appeared in publication in 1887, was featured in four novels and 56 short stories. The first story, A Study in Scarlet, appeared in Beeton's Christmas Annual in 1887 and the second, The Sign of the Four, in Lippincott's Monthly Magazine in 1890. The character grew tremendously in popularity with the beginning of the first series of short stories in Strand Magazine in 1891; further series of short stories and two novels published in serial form appeared between then and 1927. All but four stories are narrated by Holmes's friend and biographer, Dr. John H. Watson; two are narrated by Holmes himself ("The Blanched Soldier" and "The Lion's Mane") and two others are written in the third person ("The Mazarin Stone" and "His Last Bow"). In two stories ("The Musgrave Ritual" and "The Gloria Scott"), Holmes tells Watson the main story from his memories, while Watson becomes the narrator of the frame story. The first and fourth novels, A Study in Scarlet and The Valley of Fear, each include a long interval of omniscient narration recounting events unknown both to Holmes and to Watson.

Inspiration for the character and the name of Holmes.

Doyle said that the character of Holmes was inspired by Dr. Joseph Bell, for whom Doyle had worked as a clerk at the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary. Like Holmes, Bell was noted for drawing large conclusions from the smallest observations. Sir Henry Littlejohn, Lecturer on Forensic Medicine and Public Health at the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh, is also cited as a source for Holmes. Ben Macintyre notes a theory that Arthur Conan Doyle, a keen cricketer, combined the names of two Norwich cricketers: Mordecai Sherwin and Frank Shacklock, to get the name "Sherlock".

Chapter 2 Life
Early life
Explicit details about Sherlock Holmes's life outside of the adventures recorded by Dr. Watson are few and far between in Conan Doyle's original stories; nevertheless, incidental details about his early life and extended families portray a loose biographical picture of the detective.
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An estimate of Holmes' age in the story "His Last Bow" places his birth in 1854; the story is set in August 1914 and he is described as being 60 years of age. Commonly, the date is cited as January 6. However, an argument for a later birthdate is posited by author Laurie R. King, based on two of Conan Doyle's stories: A Study in Scarlet and "The Gloria Scott" Adventure. Certain details in "The Gloria Scott" Adventure indicate Holmes finished his second and final year at university in either 1880 or 1885. Watson's own account of his wounding in the Second Afghan War and subsequent return to England in A Study in Scarlet place his moving in with Holmes in either early 1881 or 1882. Together, these suggest Holmes left university in 1880; if he began university at the age of 17, his birth year would likely be 1861. Holmes states that he first developed his methods of deduction while an undergraduate. The author Dorothy L. Sayers suggested that, given details in two of the Adventures, Holmes must have been at Cambridge rather than Oxford and that "of all the Cambridge colleges, Sidney Sussex (College) perhaps offered the greatest number of advantages to a man in Holmes position and, in default of more exact information, we may tentatively place him there". His earliest cases, which he pursued as an amateur, came from fellow university students. According to Holmes, it was an encounter with the father of one of his classmates that led him to take up detection as a profession, and he spent the six years following university working as a consulting detective, before financial difficulties led him to take Watson as a roommate, at which point the narrative of the stories begins. From 1881, Holmes was described as having lodgings at 221B Baker Street, London, from where he runs his private detective agency. 221B is an apartment up 17 steps, stated in an early manuscript to be at the "upper end" of the road. Until the arrival of Dr. Watson, Holmes worked alone, only occasionally employing agents from the city's underclass, including a host of informants and a group of street children he calls "the Baker Street Irregulars". The Irregulars appear in three stories, "The Sign of the Four", "A Study in Scarlet" and "The Adventure of the Crooked Man". Little is said of Holmes's family. His parents were unmentioned in the stories and he merely states that his ancestors were "country squires". In "The Adventure of the Greek Interpreter", Holmes claims that his great-uncle was Vernet, the French artist. His brother, Mycroft, seven years his senior, is a government official who appears in three stories and is mentioned in one other story. Mycroft has a unique civil service position as a kind of memory-man or walking database for all aspects of government policy. Mycroft is described as even more gifted than Sherlock in matters of observation and deduction, but he lacks Sherlock's drive and energy, preferring to spend his time at ease in the Diogenes Club, described as "a club for the most un-clubbable men in London."
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Life with Dr. Watson

Holmes shares the majority of his professional years with his good friend and chronicler Dr. John H. Watson, who lives with Holmes for some time before his marriage in 1887, and again after his wife's death; his residence is maintained by his landlady, Mrs. Hudson. Watson has two roles in Holmes's life. First, he gives practical assistance in the conduct of his cases; he is the detective's right-hand man, acting variously as look-out, decoy, accomplice and messenger. Second, he is Holmes's chronicler (his "Boswell" as Holmes refers to him). Most of the Holmes stories are frame, written from Watson's point of view as summaries of the detective's most interesting cases. Holmes is often described as criticising Watson's writings as sensational and populist, suggesting that they neglect to accurately and objectively report the pure calculating "science" of his craft. Detection is, or ought to be, an exact science and should be treated in the same cold and unemotional manner. You have attempted to tinge it ["A Study in Scarlet"] with romanticism, which produces much the same effect as if you worked a love-story ... Some facts should be suppressed, or, at least, a just sense of proportion should be observed in treating them. The only point in the case which deserved mention was the curious analytical reasoning from effects to causes, by which I succeeded in unravelling it. Sherlock Holmes on John Watson's "pamphlet", "A Study in Scarlet". Nevertheless, Holmes's friendship with Watson is his most significant relationship. In several stories, Holmes's fondness for Watsonoften hidden beneath his cold, intellectual exterioris revealed. For instance, in "The Adventure of the Three Garridebs", Watson is wounded in a confrontation with a villain; although the bullet wound proves to be "quite superficial", Watson is moved by Holmes's reaction: It was worth a wound; it was worth many wounds; to know the depth of loyalty and love which lay behind that cold mask. The clear, hard eyes were dimmed for a moment, and
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the firm lips were shaking. For the one and only time I caught a glimpse of a great heart as well as of a great brain. All my years of humble but single-minded service culminated in that moment of revelation. In all, Holmes is described as being in active practice for 23 years, with Watson documenting his cases for 17 of them.

Retirement
In "His Last Bow", Holmes has retired to a bee farm on the Sussex Downs in 19031904, where he takes up the hobby of beekeeping as his primary occupation, eventually producing a "Practical Handbook of Bee Culture, with some Observations upon the Segregation of the Queen". The story features Holmes and Watson coming out of retirement one last time to aid the war effort. Only one adventure, "The Adventure of the Lion's Mane", which is narrated by Holmes as he pursues the case as an amateur, takes place during the detective's retirement.

Chapter 3 Habits and personality

Watson describes Holmes as "bohemian" in habits and lifestyle. According to Watson, Holmes is an eccentric, with no regard for contemporary standards of tidiness or good order. In The Musgrave Ritual, Watson describes Holmes thus: Although in his methods of thought he was the neatest and most methodical of mankind ... [he] keeps his cigars in the coalscuttle, his tobacco in the toe end of a Persian slipper, and his unanswered correspondence transfixed by a jack-knife into the very centre of his wooden mantelpiece ... He had a horror of destroying documents.... Thus month after month his papers accumulated, until every corner of the room was stacked with bundles of manuscript which were on no account to be burned, and which could not be put away save by their owner. What appears to others as chaos, however, is to Holmes a wealth of useful information. Throughout the stories, Holmes would dive into his apparent mess of random papers and artefacts, only to retrieve precisely the specific document or eclectic item he was looking for. Watson frequently makes note of Holmes's erratic eating habits. The detective is often described as starving himself at times of intense intellectual activity, such as during "The Adventure of the Norwood Builder", wherein, according to Watson: [Holmes] had no breakfast for himself, for it was one of his peculiarities that in his more intense moments he would permit himself no food, and I have known him to presume upon his iron strength until he has fainted from pure inanition. His chronicler does not consider Holmes's habitual use of a pipe, or his less frequent use of cigarettes and cigars, a vice. Nor does Watson condemn Holmes's willingness to bend the truth or break the law on behalf of a client (e.g., lying to the police, concealing evidence or breaking into houses) when he feels it morally justifiable. Even so, it is
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obvious that Watson has stricter limits than Holmes, and occasionally berated Holmes for creating a "poisonous atmosphere" of tobacco smoke. Holmes himself references Watson's moderation in "The Adventure of the Devil's Foot", saying, "I think, Watson, that I shall resume that course of tobacco-poisoning which you have so often and so justly condemned." Watson also did not condone Holmes's plans when they manipulated innocent people, such as when he toyed with a young woman's heart in The Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton although it was done with noble intentions to save many other young women from the clutches of the villainous Milverton. Holmes is portrayed as a patriot acting on behalf of the government in matters of national security in a number of stories. He also carries out counter-intelligence work in His Last Bow, set at the beginning of the First World War. As shooting practice, the detective adorned the wall of his Baker Street lodgings with "VR" (Victoria Regina) in bullet pocks made by his pistol. Holmes is a loner and does not strive to make friends. He attributes his solitary ways to his particular interests and his mopey disposition. In The Adventure of the Gloria Scott, he tells Watson that during two years at college, he made only one friend, Victor Trevor. Holmes says, "I was never a very sociable fellow, Watson, always rather fond of moping in my rooms and working out my own little methods of thought, so that I never mixed much with the men of my year... my line of study was quite distinct from that of the other fellows, so that we had no points of contact at all." He is similarly described in A Study in Scarlet as difficult to draw out by young Stamford.

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Chapter 4 Methods of detection

Holmesian deduction
Holmes's primary intellectual detection method is deductive reasoning of the solution to a crime. "From a drop of water", he writes, "a logician could infer the possibility of an Atlantic or a Niagara without having seen or heard of one or the other." Holmes stories often begin with a bravura display of his talent for "deduction". It is of some interest to logicians and those interested in logic to try to analyse just what Holmes is doing when he performs his deduction. Holmesian deduction appears to consist primarily of drawing inferences based on either straightforward practical principles which are the result of careful inductive study, such as Holmes's study of different kinds of cigar ashes or inference to the best explanation. One quote often heard from Holmes is "When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth". Sherlock Holmes's straightforward practical principles are generally of the form, "If 'p', then 'q'," where 'p' is observed evidence and 'q' is what the evidence indicates. But there are also, as may be observed in the following example, intermediate principles. In "A Scandal in Bohemia" Holmes deduces that Watson had got very wet lately and that he had "a most clumsy and careless servant girl." When Watson, in amazement, asks how Holmes knows this, Holmes answers: It is simplicity itself ... My eyes tell me that on the inside of your left shoe, just where the firelight strikes it, the leather is scored by six almost parallel cuts. Obviously they have been caused by someone who has very carelessly scraped round the edges of the sole in order to remove crusted mud from it. Hence, you see, my double deduction that you had been out in vile weather, and that you had a particularly malignant boot-slitting specimen of the London slavey.

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Disguise
Holmes displays a strong aptitude for acting and disguise. In several stories, he adopts disguises to gather evidence while 'under cover' so convincing that even Watson fails to penetrate them, such as in "The Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton", "The Man with the Twisted Lip", "The Adventure of the Empty House" and "A Scandal in Bohemia". In other adventures, Holmes feigns being wounded or ill to give effect to his case, or to incriminate those involved, as in "The Adventure of the Dying Detective".

Knowledge and skills

In the very first story, A Study in Scarlet, something of Holmes's background is given. In early 1881, he is presented as an independent student of chemistry with a variety of very curious side interests, almost all of which turn out to be single-mindedly bent towards making him superior at solving crimes. (When he appears for the first time, he is crowing with delight at having invented a new method for detecting bloodstains; in other stories he indulges in recreational home-chemistry experiments, sometimes filling the rooms with foul-smelling vapors.) An early story, "The Adventure of the Gloria Scott", presents more background on what influenced Holmes to become a detective: a college friend's father richly complimented his deductive skills. Holmes maintains strict adherence to scientific methods and focuses on logic and the powers of observation and deduction. Holmes also makes use of phrenology1, which was widely popular in Victorian times but now regarded as pseudo-scientific: In "The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle", he infers from the large size of a man's hat that the owner is intelligent and intellectually inclined, on the grounds that a man with so large a brain must have something in it. In A Study in Scarlet, Holmes claims he does not know that the Earth revolves around the Sun, as such information is irrelevant to his work. Directly after having heard that fact from Watson, he says he will immediately try to forget it. He says he believes that the mind has a finite capacity for information storage, and so learning useless things would merely reduce his ability to learn useful things.

Phrenology is a pseudoscience primarily focused on measurements of the human skull, based on the concept that the brain is the organ of the mind, and that certain brain areas have localized, specific functions or modules.

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Conclusion
Though Holmes may not be the first detective in fiction, in my opinion he was the best. When you hear the word "detective," one of the first things that comes into your mind is the sharp-featured, pipe-smoking, Sherlock Holmes. He is like Frankenstein or Dracula one of those characters who becomes so fundamental to his genre that, even if you have never read a single Conan Doyle story, you probably still know who Sherlock Holmes is.

Everyone in Victorian London, from the lowliest governess to the highest nobleman, eventually comes to see Holmes when they need help. And it's reassuring to read about a man who just goes around making sure that life is fair for everyone. Sure, Holmes may be in his business of private detective work mostly for the intellectual work rather than the moral judgment, but for me, reading Holmes is watching a very good sitcom and waiting anxiously for the next episode to be aired; he's so sure, and so good at getting things right, that reading his stories leave us with a comfortable glow.

In conclusion, Sherlock Holmes was a character who was loved by every reader because of his wits, genius and because he was a man who priced justice and intellect more than everything. Conan Doyle succeeded in shaping a character whose brilliance reflected his own, and fascinated thousands of people even until this day.

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References

"Holmesian". The Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. 1989. Klinger, Leslie (2005). The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes. New York: W.W. Norton Lycett, Andrew (2007). The Man Who Created Sherlock Holmes: The Life and Times of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Free Press Matthew Bunson (1994-10-19). Encyclopedia Sherlockiana Radford, John (1999). The Intelligence of Sherlock Holmes and Other Three-pipe Problems. Sigma Forlag "Sherlock Holmes Mystery Solved". Blog.newsarama.com. 2009-05-07 www.sherlockian.net: Sherlock Holmes reference with Original Stories, Pictures, articles and links to other holmesian websites.

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