Sir
Arthur Conan Doyle
Elementary ...
Sir
Arthur Conan Doyle
Time
Line
22
May 1859 Arthur Conan Doyle is born in Edinburgh.
1876
Studies medicine at Edinburgh University and meets Dr.
Joseph Bell.
1887
Publishes A Study in Scarlet, his first Sherlock Holmes
story.
1893
Kills off Sherlock Holmes in The Final Problem.
1902
Brings Holmes back to life in The Hound of the Baskervilles.
Is knighted for his services as a doctor in the Boer War.
7
July 1930 Dies in Crowborough, Sussex. |
Além de médico, escritor e criador do famoso Sherlock Homes,
Conan Doyle também se interessava pelos fenômenos espirituais.
ir
Arthur Conan Doyle is chiefly remembered for having invented
the great detective, Sherlock Holmes. Were Doyle to know this,
it would irritate him immensely. He spent most of his career
trying to free himself from Holmes in order to write more serious
literature (his 1912 book, The Lost World, for example, was
the model for Jurassic Park). He "killed off" Holmes at least
once, but popular demand invariably obliged him to bring him
back to life. Indeed Holmes has outlived his creator: Doyle
died in 1930, but his detective is immortal.
Arthur
Conan Doyle was born in Edinburgh in 1859. After graduating
from Edinburgh University, he opened a medical practice in Portsmouth,
but the patients were few and far between(1).
In order to pass the time, he started writing detective stories.
When Strand magazine began serialising The Adventures of Sherlock
Holmes in 1890, the stories reached an international audience.
Doyle described Holmes's presumed death in 1893, in The Final
Problem, but the public outcry(2)
in both Britain and the United States was immense. Sir Arthur
Conan Doyle was forced to revive Holmes in The Hound of Baskervilles
in 1902 and to keep on writing about him until his own death.
Inventing
Sherlock
rthur Conan Doyle created the world's greatest detective, Sherlock
Holmes. Here, he explains the idea for this famous character.
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Arthur Conan
Doyle
Writer |
Arthur
Conan Doyle (Mild Scottish accent): There are two
questions which my friends continually ask me: one is how I came
to write Sherlock Holmes and the other is why I became a spiritualist
and about spiritualism generally. With regard to Sherlock Holmes,
I was, when I wrote it, a young doctor and had been educated in
a very severe and critical medical school of thought, especially
coming under the influence of Dr. Bell of Edinburgh, who had most
remarkable powers of observation. He prided himself(3)
that, when he looked at a patient, he could tell not only their
disease but very often their occupation and place of residence.
Reading some detective stories, I was struck by the fact that
their results were obtained, in nearly every case, by chance.
I accept, of course, Edgar Allan Poe's splendid stories which,
though only three in number, are a model for all time. I thought
I would try my hand at writing a story where the hero would treat
crime as Dr. Bell treated disease and where science would take
the place of chance. The result was Sherlock Holmes and I confess
that result has surprised me very much, for I learn that many
schools of detection, working in France, in Egypt, in China and
elsewhere, have admittedly founded their system upon that of Holmes.
I have had numerous letters from time to time addressed to him,
from all parts of the world and the most
quaint(4)
requests, including what was virtually an offer of marriage. His
autograph also is much in demand. Now, as to the more serious
subject: the result of my medical education in the days of (Thomas)
Huxley and Haeckel, was to make me agnostic in matters of religion.
And, certainly, I had no belief that we survived death. I have
always, of course, kept my mind open to new ideas, for the day
a man's mind shuts is the day of his mental death. In 1887 some
curious psychic experiences came my way and, especially, I was
impressed by the fact of telepathy, which I proved for myself
by experiments with a friend.
The question then arose: if two incarnate minds could communicate,
is it possible for a discarnate one to communicate with one that
is still in the body? For more than 20 years, I examined the evidence
and came finally to the conclusion beyond all doubt, that such
communication was possible. (1)
few and far between - escassos, raros.
(2) outcry - protesto.
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