The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

by Arthur Conan Doyle Narrated by Sinead Dixon

Overview

THE ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES is a collection of twelve short stories by Arthur Conan Doyle, featuring his fictional detective Sherlock Holmes. It was first published on 14 October 1892, though the individual stories had been serialised in The Strand Magazine between June 1891 and July 1892. The stories are not in chronological order, and the only characters common to all twelve are Holmes and Dr. Watson. As with all but four of the Sherlock Holmes stories, those contained within The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes are told by a first-person narrative from the point of view of Dr. Watson.

In general, the stories in THE ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES identify, and try to correct, social injustices. Holmes is portrayed as offering a new, fairer sense of justice. The stories were well received, and boosted the subscriptions figures of The Strand Magazine, prompting Doyle to be able to demand more money for his next set of stories. The first story, 'A Scandal in Bohemia', includes the character of Irene Adler, who, despite being featured only within this one story by Doyle, is a prominent character in modern Sherlock Holmes adaptations, generally as a love interest for Holmes. Doyle included four of the twelve stories from this collection in his twelve favourite Sherlock Holmes stories, picking 'The Adventure of the Speckled Band' as his overall favourite.

Editorial Reviews

Library Journal

Conan Doyle's collection of short stories, first published in 1892 and featuring the world's most famous fictional detective, translates successfully to audio as narrated by Simon Prebble (www.simonprebble.com), who has previously read several other of Conan Doyle's later works for Tantor. Prebble's performance is spot on; he ably and admirably assumes the tales' many voices and dialects. With the recent success of the Sherlock Holmes movie, these 12 stories—which include "A Case of Identity," "The Boscombe Valley Mystery," and "The Man with the Twisted Lip"—will certainly appeal to a new generation of Holmes fans. [Includes a full-text PDF ebook; see also the review of CSA Word's production of this title, read by actor Edward Hardwicke, LJ 9/1/09.—Ed.]—Theresa Connors, Arkansas Tech Univ. Lib., Russellville

From the Publisher

He is unique in simultaneously bringing down the curtain on an era and raising one on another, ushering in a genre of writing that... has never been surpassed. His own life, as footballer... eye surgeon, champion of injustice and investigator into the paranormal, is the stuff of legend. Personally, I would walk a mile in tight boots to read his letters to the milkman—Stephen Fry, The Arthur Conan Doyle Collection

Peter D. McDonald

Conan Doyle did not just create Sherlock Holmes. He reinvented and popularised the mini-series with self-contained episodes — think not just Inspector Morse or Dr Who but Friends and The Simpsons. Andrew Glazzard's expertly curated new edition of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, Conan Doyle's first foray into this endlessly generative form, is a timely invitation for us to binge-read these brilliant stories once again.

The Strand Magazine

It is especially appropriate that the man who played Sherlock Holmes' chronicler in the popular series narrates these tales on audio. Hardwicke's reading is subdued, but clear and precise.

The Times Educational Supplement

First Rate

The Guardian

You should listen to these wonderfully atmospheric pieces...Edward Hardwicke has the perfect voice for this: resonant, old-fashioned, precise - everyone's idea of a Victorian gent.

FEBRUARY 2010 - AudioFile

In a gravelly voice, Ralph Cosham becomes the voice of Dr. Watson as he narrates 12 of his adventures with Sherlock Holmes. Dashing round London and the English countryside, Watson and Holmes search for villains, deceivers, and the perpetrators of crimes both physical and psychological. Cosham brings these immortal tales to life once again, replete with details both significant and trivial and the sights and sounds of late-nineteenth-century London. Cosham uses subtle accents to differentiate the characters. Watson is characterized with droll, smoky tones, and Holmes is portrayed with an even cadence and soft tones. The other characters have accents reminiscent of their stations, nationalities, and gender. Cosham captures the genius of Sherlock Holmes, the faithful friendship of Dr. Watson, the language of their time, and their zest for adventure. M.B.K. © AudioFile 2010, Portland, Maine

Product Details

BN ID:	2940178192108
Publisher:	FrontPage Publishing
Publication date:	07/15/2018
Edition description:	Unabridged

Read an Excerpt

A Scandal in Bohemia

Chapter 1

To Sherlock Holmes she is always the woman. I have seldom heard him mention her under any other name. In his eyes she eclipses and predominates the whole of her sex. It was not that he felt any emotion akin to love for Irene Adler. All emotions, and that one particularly, were abhorrent to his cold, precise but admirably balanced mind. He was, I take it, the most perfect reasoning and observing machine that the world has seen, but as a lover he would have placed himself in a false position. He never spoke of the softer passions, save with a gibe and a sneer. They were admirable things for the observer excellent for drawing the veil from men's motives and actions. But for the trained reasoner to admit such intrusions into his own delicate and finely adjusted temperament was to introduce a distracting factor which might throw a doubt upon all his mental results. Grit in a sensitive instrument, or a crack in one of his own high-power lenses, would not be more disturbing than a strong emotion in a nature such as his. And yet there was but one woman to him, and that woman was the late Irene Adler, of dubious and questionable memory.

I had seen little of Holmes lately. My marriage had drifted us away from each other. My own complete happiness, and the home centred interests which rise up around the man who first finds himself master of his own establishment, were sufficient to absorb all my attention, while Holmes, who loathed every form of society with his whole Bohemian soul, remained in our lodgings in Baker Street, buried among his old books, and alternating from week to week betweencocaine and ambition, the drowsiness of the drug and the fierce energy of his own keen nature. He was still, as ever, deeply attracted by the study of crime, and occupied his immense faculties and extraordinary powers of observation in following out those clues, and clearing up those mysteries which had been abandoned as hopeless by the official police. From time to time I heard some vague account of his doings: of his summons to Odessa in the case of the Trepoff murder, of his clearing up of the singular tragedy of the Atkinson brothers at Trincomalee, and finally of the mission which he had accomplished so delicately and successfully for the reigning family of Holland. Beyond these signs of his activity, however, which I merely shared with all the readers of the daily press, I knew little of my former friend and companion.

One night—it was on the twentieth of March, 1888—I was returning from a journey to a patient (for I had now returned to civil practice), when my way led me through Baker Street. As I passed the well remembered door, which must always be associated in my mind with my wooing, and with the dark incidents of the Study in Scarlet, I was seized with a keen desire to see Holmes again, and to know how he was employing his extraordinary powers. His rooms were brilliantly lit, and, even as I looked up, I saw his tall, spare figure pass twice in a dark silhouette against the blind. He was pacing the room swiftly, eagerly, with his head sunk upon his chest and his hands clasped behind him. To me, who knew his every mood and habit, his attitude and manner told their own story. He was at work again. He had risen out of his drug-created dreams and was hot upon the scent of some new problem. I rang the bell and was shown up to the chamber which had formerly been in part my own.

His manner was not effusive. It seldom was; but he was glad, I think, to see me. With hardly a word spoken, but with a kindly eye, he waved me to an armchair, threw across his case of cigars, and indicated a spirit case and a gasogene in the corner. Then he stood before the fire and looked me over in his singular introspective fashion.

"Wedlock suits you," he remarked. "I think, Watson, that you have put on seven and a half pounds since I saw you."

"Seven!" I answered.

"Indeed, I should have thought a little more. Just a trifle more, I fancy, Watson. And in practice again, I observe. You did not tell me that you intended to go into harness."

"Then, how do you know?"

"I see it, I deduce it. How do I know that you have been getting yourself very wet lately, and that you have a most clumsy and careless servant girl?""My dear Holmes," said I, "this is too much. You would certainly have been burned, had you lived a few centuries ago. It is true that I had a country walk on Thursday and came home in a dreadful mess, but as I have changed my clothes I can't imagine how you deduce it. As to Mary Jane, she is incorrigible, and my wife has given her notice; but there, again, I fail to see how you work it out."

He chuckled to himself and rubbed his long, nervous hands together."It is simplicity itself," said he; "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. As to your practice, if a gentleman walks into my rooms smelling of iodoform, with a black mark of nitrate of silver upon his right forefinger, and a bulge on the right side of his top hat to show where he has secreted his stethoscope, I must be dull, indeed, if I do not pronounce him to be an active member of the medical profession."

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