A Study in Scarlet: Scholarly Introduction

Holmes meets Watson

       Arthur Conan Doyle’s A Study in Scarlet introduces one of the most well known literary characters of all time, the enigmatic detective Sherlock Holmes. A Study in Scarlet is Doyle’s first Holmes detective novel and this story launched the writer and the entire Victorian readership into four full length Holmes novels by Doyle, as well as an abundance of short stories and other related publications (Edwards). Surprisingly, Doyle initially struggled to find a publisher for his work, and Doyle received a mere 25 pounds for the rights to his work, and thus Sherlock Holmes became immortalized when he was first published in the Beeton Christmas Annual of 1887 (Edwards).
        Doyle had previously been working within a medical profession before emerging fully as a successful writer and his past experiences certainly informed his character and the development of his novel. Colin Loader identifies that “the irony presented in Holmes’ claims and shortcomings stems from the controversy over specialization in the medical profession” (148). Holmes unique set of skills and his attempt to be highly specialized in his skill as a detective admittedly creates gaps in his knowledge of other fields and thus Holmes unique character can fit strongly within the frame of Doyle’s representation of specialized labor and the consequences of this practice. Doyle abandoned medicine for writing, and thus the traces between his two fields have remained very “emotionally charged” for him, and thus his profession certainly informs his characters, most notably Watson the doctor and the abnormal detective Holmes (Krasner 20). And yet whatever social commentary Doyle may have intended in his novel, the true success and popularity of his work launched a greater social trend towards the detective novel, which became extremely popular throughout the Victorian period.
       The power and popularity of the detective novel stemmed from its ability to expose and sensationalize the dark potential which can exist within the private and ordinary domestic lives of regular people. Lydia Fillingham writes on Doyle’s work and explains that “the detective novel…opens the private realm suddenly to narration, an indiscreet narration that would not exist but for the crime” (670). A Study in Scarlet is perfectly representative of the heavily sensationalized and dramatic crime mysteries which were so popular in this time period, and the primary reason these works were so effective, as Fillingham explains, is that these detective novels draw readers into an otherwise private and unseen world where the ordinary melds with the sensational through these mysterious crimes.

Sherlock Holmes comes to embody and represent so many of the qualities and characteristics associated with the adventure novel and many of the sensationalized writings which were both contemporaries to A Study in Scarlet as well as those who were inspired by the success of Doyle’s style and content. Jasmin Yung Hall argues that “the sensational elements of the Holmes stories are in fact crucial to their appeal” (Hall qtd. in Haynsworth 460). Doyle’s writing was certainly influenced and inspired by many of the sensational writings which were popular at the time of A Study in Scarlet’s publication. Leslie Haynsworth cites sensational works such as Wilkie Collins’ The Moonstone, which apparently share many plot and stylistic features with Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes mysteries (Haynsworth 460). Yet while A Study in Scarlet and other Holmes novels were certainly born out of the sensationalized writings of Victorian Britain, the stylized process of detection has become synonymous with the character of Sherlock Holmes and this unique character continues to be an emblem for all detective writers.