Critical Analysis of Sherlock Holmes Mystery Stories by Arthur Conan Doyle

I have studied five of Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes mystery stories. A mystery story is a piece of fiction writing where the crime of some kind is central to its plot. By that I mean the crime is a significant part of the story, to the point that if you remove the crime from the story, the plot has no meaning. 

Sherlock Holmes made his first appearance in 'A Study of Scarlet', published in Beeton's Christmas Annual in 1887. Conan Doyle was paid a lot for this. Its success encouraged Conan Doyle to write a full-length novel, and two years later, Micah Clarke was published to critical acclaim. Doyle added to this success with a series of Holmes stories for The Strand Magazine in 1891. Although his stories were popular, Conan Doyle felt that he had yet to make a lasting name in English literature and he referred to Holmes as taking his mind 'from better things. 

The Holmes stories were all set in the Victorian city of London, which was a city of startling contrasts. New building and affluent development went hand in hand with horribly overcrowded slums where people lived in the worst conditions imaginable. The population surged during the 19th century, from about 1 million in 1800 to over 6 million a century later. This growth far exceeded London's ability to look after the basic needs of its citizens. The titles of all the Sherlock Holmes stories I read gave small clues about what would happen in the story. 

The titles vary in length and content, the first two stories I studied had titles with people in the “The Engineers Thumb” and “The Man with the Twisted Lip”. The next two titles simply had an object in them. “The Speckled Band” and “The Cardboard Box” and the last story that I studied had an animal as the main part of the title. Although these titles are different they all have the same importance to the stories, the title of the story must grab the reader's attention so that they pick up the book and read it. 

All of these titles grab the reader's attention because they are short and make the reader think for instance “What has a man with a twisted lip got to do with the story?”and 'How did the man come to end up with a twisted lip?'. When people see the title “The Cardboard Box” they think 'What is in the cardboard box?' and 'What does a cardboard box have to do with a mystery story?'. In this way, people are interested in the book and are intrigued enough to want to read on. 

The beginnings of the stories grab people’s attention by using lots of descriptive detail to describe the characters at the beginning of “The Man with the Twisted Lip” says Whitney was described as having yellow teeth, a yellow pasty face with drooping lids and pinpoint pupils. There is also a lot of descriptive detail at the beginning of the stories to set the scene e.g. at the beginning of 'The Engineers Thumb' we learn that it is the summer of 1889 and Dr. Watson got lots of patients who were railway officials because he lived near Paddington Station. 

Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories are written in the first person view of Watson. This makes the reader feel more involved with the story because it is even as if Watson is just talking to you. “In glancing over my notes of the past seventy-odd cases in which I have during the last eight years studied the method of my friend Sherlock Holmes” Doyle gets the reader to read on by giving hardly anything away about the plot in the first two pages. 

In “The man with the twisted lip” there is a different story for the first three pages, this story is of Kate Whitney's Husband Isa Whitney. He has been taking the drug Opium and has not come home, Dr. Watson was sent out to find him at the Opium den. Watson did find Isa and sent him home only to then to find Sherlock Holmes and go out to solve the mystery of the disappearance of Neville St. Clair. This makes the reader want to read on because it gets them guessing about what the mystery is and who did it? 

The settings used in Arthur Conan Doyle's mystery stories are very typical of the settings used in other mystery stories. In the Engineers Thumb, Mr. Hatherley (the engineer) was taken into a dark house, where he was asked to wait in another room by himself. He describes the room to be 'decorated with a round table that has some German books on it'. Setting the scene is an important device used by mystery writers, they try to make the reader be able to see what they are reading about. This also creates fear and tension in the reader because now the reader can see the scene in their minds, they can imagine themselves there which could scare them. 

Doyle hooks the reader's attention by using streams of consciousness we had walked several times up and down the lawn, neither Miss Stoner nor I liked to break in upon his thoughts before he roused himself from this puts the reader in the characters shoes and this also creates empathy within the reader. 

I think that the tension in the texts gradually builds up to the climax Arthur Conan Doyle does this by using long complex sentences at the beginning of the stories. The habit grew upon him, as I understand, from some foolish freak when he was at college, for having read De Quincey's description of his dreams and sensations, he had drenched his tobacco in laudanum in an attempt to produce the same effects' this makes the reader feel relaxed and gives a lot of information about the setting and the mystery to the reader. Then as the tension is rising using short simple sentences towards the climax “Let me introduce you to Mr. Neville St Clair of Kent “this gets the reader anxious and builds up the tension. At the climax of the texts there is a lot of repetition e.g. 'the band, the speckled band' this adds to the sense of panic and at the climax reassures the reader. Doyle uses very short paragraphs throughout the stories to create tension. Punctuation is also used throughout the texts for effect. I pulled out my knife, and well, there!' the use of exclamation mark suggests emotion, fear, panic, tension and it introduces a sense of urgency. 

I think that the climax of the stories is very satisfying for the reader, as the reader has been thinking as he/she has been reading the texts 'Who done it' and there is always a twist towards the end of the text so that that person who is found guilty is never whom you think it will be. In “The Man with the Twisted Lip” you never think that the man who is found in the room above the opium den is Neville St. Clair right until the end of the text so Arthur Conan Doyle has kept you guessing. 

Endings are very important to mystery stories because of the whole of the the mystery story is focused to the end, so if the end of the story is not entertaining and does not leave you surprised than the whole of the story will seem pointless. 

The story that I preferred most was “The Man with the Twisted Lip” because at first glance the mystery seemed so easy to solve, then some strange clues did make sense until then end when we found out that the man with the twisted lip was Mr. Neville St. Clair. There are many underlying meanings in the stories, which are supposed to teach you a lesson or maybe just to make you think about your situation. 

I think Arthur Conan Doyle's use of language is what makes these stories interesting and easy to read. There are lots of different emotions used and portrayed throughout the text from sadness to happiness and from nervous panic to humor. ​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

References ​​

• https://helios.flipswitch.com/CourseContent/pages/2017/p3175c56reading_the_adventure_of_the_speckled_band_(excerpts).html