The Hound of the Baskervilles

The Hound of the Baskervilles

Cover of the first edition
Author Arthur Conan Doyle
Illustrator Sidney Paget
Cover artist Alfred Garth Jones
Country United Kingdom
Language English
Series Sherlock Holmes
Genre Detective fiction
Published 1902
Publisher George Newnes
Publication date
 1902[1]
Preceded by The Final Problem (last story of The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes)
Followed by The Return of Sherlock Holmes

The Hound of the Baskervilles is the third of the crime novels written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle featuring the detective Sherlock Holmes. Originally serialised in The Strand Magazine from August 1901 to April 1902, it is set largely on Dartmoor in Devon in England's West Country and tells the story of an attempted murder inspired by the legend of a fearsome, diabolical hound of supernatural origin. Sherlock Holmes and his companion Dr. Watson investigate the case. This was the first appearance of Holmes since his apparent death in "The Final Problem", and the success of The Hound of the Baskervilles led to the character's eventual revival.

In 2003, the book was listed as number 128 of 200 on the BBC's The Big Read poll of the UK's "best-loved novel."[2] In 1999, it was listed as the top Holmes novel, with a perfect rating from Sherlockian scholars of 100.[3]

Plot

Dr. James Mortimer asks Sherlock Holmes to investigate the death of his friend, Sir Charles Baskerville. Sir Charles died at his Devonshire estate, Baskerville Hall, and Mortimer now fears for Sir Charles's nephew and sole heir, Sir Henry Baskerville. The death was attributed to a heart attack, but Mortimer is suspicious, because Sir Charles died with an expression of horror on his face, and Mortimer noticed "the footprints of a gigantic hound" nearby. The Baskerville family has supposedly been under a curse since the era of the English Civil War, when Hugo Baskerville offered his soul to the devil for help in abducting a woman and was reportedly killed by a giant spectral hound. Sir Charles believed in the curse and was apparently running away from something when he died.

Intrigued, Holmes meets with Sir Henry, newly arrived from Canada. Sir Henry has received an anonymous note, cut and pasted from newsprint, warning him away from the moors, and one of his new boots is inexplicably missing from his London hotel room. The Baskerville family is discussed: Sir Charles was the eldest of three brothers; the youngest, black sheep Rodger, is believed to have died childless in South America, while Sir Henry is the only child of the middle brother. Sir Henry plans to go to Baskerville Hall, despite the ominous warning message. Holmes and Dr. Watson follow him from Holmes's Baker Street apartment back to his hotel and notice a bearded man following him in a cab; they pursue the man, but he escapes. Mortimer tells them that Mr. Barrymore, the servant at Baskerville Hall, has a beard. Sir Henry's boot reappears, but an older one vanishes.

Sherlock Holmes examining Dr. Mortimer's walking stick

Holmes dispatches Watson to accompany Sir Henry to Baskerville Hall. They learn that an escaped murderer named Selden is believed to be in the area.

Barrymore and his wife wish to leave the estate soon. Watson hears a woman crying in the night; it is obvious to him that it was Mrs. Barrymore, but her husband denies it. Watson has no proof that Barrymore was in Devon on the day of the chase in London. He meets a brother and sister who live nearby: Mr. Stapleton, a naturalist, and the beautiful Mrs Stapleton. When an animalistic sound is heard, Stapleton is quick to dismiss it as unrelated to the legendary hound. When her brother is out of earshot, Mrs Stapleton mistakes Watson for Sir Henry and warns him to leave. Sir Henry and she later meet and quickly fall in love, arousing Stapleton's anger; he later apologizes and invites Sir Henry to dine with him a few days later.

Sir Henry Baskerville

Barrymore arouses further suspicion when Watson and Sir Henry catch him at night with a candle in an empty room. Barrymore refuses to answer their questions, but Mrs. Barrymore confesses that Selden is her brother, and her husband is signalling that they have left supplies for him. Watson and Sir Henry pursue Selden on the moor, but he eludes them, while Watson notices another man on a nearby tor. After an agreement is reached to allow Selden to flee the country, Barrymore reveals the contents of an incompletely burnt letter asking Sir Charles to be at the gate at the time of his death. It was signed with the initials L.L.; on Mortimer's advice, Watson questions a Laura Lyons, who admits to writing the letter in hopes that Sir Charles would help finance her divorce, but says she did not keep the appointment. Watson tracks the second man he saw in the area and discovers it to be Holmes, investigating independently in hopes of a faster resolution. Holmes reveals further information: Stapleton is actually married to the supposed Miss Stapleton, and he promised marriage to Laura Lyons to get her cooperation.

They hear a scream and discover the body of Selden, dead from a fall. They initially mistake him for Sir Henry, whose old clothes he was wearing.

At Baskerville Hall, Holmes notices a resemblance between Stapleton and a portrait of Hugo Baskerville. He realises that Stapleton could be an unknown Baskerville family member, seeking to claim the Baskerville wealth by eliminating his relatives. Accompanied by Inspector Lestrade, whom Holmes has summoned, Holmes and Watson travel to the Stapleton home, where Sir Henry is dining. They rescue him from a hound that Stapleton releases while Sir Henry is walking home across the moor. Shooting the animal dead in the struggle, Sherlock reveals that it was a perfectly mortal dog - a mix of bloodhound and mastiff, painted with phosphorus to give it a hellish appearance. They find Mrs. Stapleton bound and gagged inside the house, while Stapleton apparently dies in an attempt to reach his hideout in a nearby mire. They also find Sir Henry's boot, which was used to give the hound Sir Henry's scent.

Weeks later, Holmes provides Watson with additional details about the case. Stapleton was in fact Rodger Baskerville's son, also named Rodger. His now-widow is a South American woman, the former Beryl Garcia. He supported himself through crime for many years, before learning that he could inherit a fortune by murdering his uncle and cousin. Stapleton had taken Sir Henry's old boot because the new, unworn boot lacked his scent. The hound had pursued Selden to his death because of the scent on Sir Henry's old clothes. Mrs. Stapleton had disavowed her husband's plot, so he had imprisoned her to prevent her from interfering.

The story ends with Holmes and Watson leaving to see the opera Les Huguenots starring Jean de Reszke.[4]

Origins and background

Baskerville Hall, formally Clyro Court. It is thought this house may have provided Conan Doyle with the inspiration for The Hound of the Baskervilles

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote this story shortly after returning to his home Undershaw from South Africa, where he had worked as a volunteer physician at the Langman Field Hospital in Bloemfontein at the time of the Second Boer War.

Conan Doyle had not written about Sherlock Holmes in eight years, having killed off the character in the 1893 story "The Final Problem". Although The Hound of the Baskervilles is set before the latter events, two years later Conan Doyle would bring Holmes back for good, explaining in "The Adventure of the Empty House" that Holmes had faked his own death.

He was assisted with the plot by a 30-year-old Daily Express journalist named Bertram Fletcher Robinson (1870–1907). His ideas came from the legend of Richard Cabell, which was the fundamental inspiration for the Baskerville tale of a hellish hound and a cursed country squire. Cabell's tomb can be seen in the Devon town of Buckfastleigh.[5][6]

Squire Richard Cabell lived for hunting and was what in those days was described as a 'monstrously evil man'. He gained this reputation for, amongst other things, immorality and having sold his soul to the Devil. There was also a rumour that he had murdered his wife. On 5 July 1677, he died and was laid to rest in the sepulchre. The night of his interment saw a phantom pack of hounds come baying across the moor to howl at his tomb. From that night on, he could be found leading the phantom pack across the moor, usually on the anniversary of his death. If the pack were not out hunting, they could be found ranging around his grave howling and shrieking. In an attempt to lay the soul to rest, the villagers built a large building around the tomb, and to be doubly sure a huge slab was placed .[7]

Moreover, Devon's folklore includes tales of a fearsome supernatural dog known as the Yeth hound that Conan Doyle may have heard.

It has been claimed that Baskerville Hall is based on a property in Mid Wales, built in 1839 by one Thomas Mynors Baskerville. The house was formerly named Clyro Court and was renamed Baskerville Hall towards the end of the last century. Arthur Conan Doyle was apparently a family friend who often stayed there and may have been aware of a local legend of the hound of the Baskervilles.[8]

Original manuscript

In 1902, Doyle's original manuscript of the book was broken up into individual leaves as part of a promotional campaign by Doyle's American publisher - they were used as part of window displays by individual booksellers. Out of an estimated 185-190 leaves, only 36 are known to still exist, including all the leaves from Chapter 11, held by the New York Public Library. Other leaves are owned by university libraries and private collectors.[9] A newly rediscovered example was sold at auction in 2012 for US$158,500.[10]

Technique

The novel uses many traditional novelistic techniques which had been largely abandoned by the time of writing, such as letters, diary extracts, interpolated manuscripts, and the like, as seen in the works of Henry Fielding and, later, Wilkie Collins. It incorporates five plots: the ostensible 'curse' story, the two red-herring subplots concerning Selden and the other stranger living on the moor, the actual events occurring to Baskerville as narrated by Watson, and the hidden plot to be discovered by Holmes. Doyle wrote that the novel was originally conceived as a straight 'Victorian creeper' (as seen in the works of J. Sheridan Le Fanu), with the idea of introducing Holmes as the deus ex machina only arising later.

Publication

The Hound of the Baskervilles was first serialized in The Strand Magazine in 1901. It was well-suited for this type of publication, as individual chapters end in cliffhangers. It was printed in the form of a novel the following year.[11]

Adaptations

The Hound of the Baskervilles has been adapted for many media.

Film and television adaptations

Over 20 film and television versions of The Hound of the Baskervilles have been made.

Year Title Country Director Holmes Watson
1914 Der Hund von Baskerville, 1. Teil German Empire Rudolf Meinert Alwin Neuß None
1914 Der Hund von Baskerville, 2. Teil — Das einsame Haus
1914 Der Hund von Baskerville, 3. Teil — Das unheimliche Zimmer Richard Oswald
1915 Der Hund von Baskerville, 4. Teil
1920 Das dunkle Schloß Weimar Republic Willy Zeyn Eugen Burg None
1920 Das Haus ohne Fenster Erich Kaiser-Titz
1920 Dr. MacDonalds Sanatorium
1921 The Hound of the Baskervilles United Kingdom Maurice Elvey Eille Norwood Hubert Willis
1929 Der Hund von Baskerville Weimar Republic Richard Oswald Carlyle Blackwell George Seroff
1932 The Hound of the Baskervilles United Kingdom Gareth Gundrey Robert Rendel Frederick Lloyd
1937 The Hound of the Baskervilles Nazi Germany Carl Lamac Bruno Güttner Fritz Odemar
1939 The Hound of the Baskervilles United States Sidney Lanfield Basil Rathbone Nigel Bruce
1955 Der Hund von Baskerville West Germany Fritz Umgelter Wolf Ackva Arnulf Schröder
1959 The Hound of the Baskervilles United Kingdom Terence Fisher Peter Cushing André Morell
1962 Bees Saal Baad[12][13](based on H. K. Roy[14]'s Nishachari Bibhishika,[15] the Bengali adaptation of The Hound of the Baskervilles.[16]) India Biren Nag Asit Sen
(as Detective Gopichand) 		?
1968 The Hound of the Baskervilles
Part 1 + 2 (from the Sherlock Holmes 1965 TV Series)		 United Kingdom Graham Evans Peter Cushing Nigel Stock
1968 L'ultimo dei Baskerville (episode of the TV series Sherlock Holmes) Italy Guglielmo Morandi Nando Gazzolo Gianni Bonagura
1971 The Hound of the Baskervilles (Собака Баскервилей) USSR A. F. Zinovieva Nikolay Volkov Lev Krugliy
1972 The Hound of the Baskervilles United States Barry Crane Stewart Granger Bernard Fox
1978 The Hound of the Baskervilles United Kingdom Paul Morrissey Peter Cook Dudley Moore
1981 The Hound of the Baskervilles (Собака Баскервилей) USSR Igor Maslennikov Vasilij Livanov Vitali Solomin
1982 The Hound of the Baskervilles United Kingdom Peter Duguid Tom Baker Terence Rigby
1983 The Hound of the Baskervilles United Kingdom Douglas Hickox Ian Richardson Donald Churchill
1983 Sherlock Holmes and the Baskerville Curse Australia Ian McKenzie & Alex Nicholas Peter O'Toole (voice) Earle Cross (voice)
1988 The Hound of the Baskervilles United Kingdom Brian Mills Jeremy Brett Edward Hardwicke
1995 The Slobbery Hound United States Fred Holmes "Wishbone"
(Soccer the Dog, voice of Larry Brantley) 		Ric Speigel
1999 The Hounds of the Baskervilles (episode of the animated TV series Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd Century) United States, United Kingdom Robert Brousseau, Scott Heming Jason Gray-Stanford John Payne
2000 The Hound of the Baskervilles Canada Rodney Gibbons Matt Frewer Kenneth Welsh
2002 The Hound of the Baskervilles United Kingdom David Attwood Richard Roxburgh Ian Hart
2012 BBC Sherlock The Hounds of Baskerville United Kingdom Paul McGuigan Benedict Cumberbatch Martin Freeman
2015 The Adventure of Henry Baskerville and a Dog
(Basukaviru kun to inu no bōken,
"バスカーヴィル君と犬の冒険")[17] 		Japan Michiyo Morita Kōichi Yamadera (voice) Wataru Takagi (voice)
2016 Elementary: "Hounded" United States Robert Hewitt Wolfe Jonny Lee Miller Lucy Liu

Stage

In 2007, Peepolykus Theatre Company premiered a new adaptation of The Hound of the Baskervilles at West Yorkshire Playhouse in Leeds. Adapted by John Nicholson and Steve Canny, the production involves only three actors and was praised by critics for its physical comedy. Following a UK tour, it transferred to the Duchess Theatre in London’s West End. The Daily Telegraph described it as a 'wonderfully delightful spoof', whilst The Sunday Times praised its 'mad hilarity that will make you feel quite sane'. This adaptation continues to be presented by both amateur and professional companies around the world.[18]

Ken Ludwig is the author of "Baskerville: A Sherlock Holmes Mystery", that premiered as a co-production at Arena Stage (Washington, D.C.) in January 2015 and McCarter Theatre Center in March 2015. [19]

Video games

The Hound of Baskervilles serves as the primary inspiration for the final case in Dai Gyakuten Saiban: Naruhodō Ryūnosuke no Bōken (大逆転裁判 ‐成歩堂龍ノ介の冒険‐, "the Ace Attorney series in which the protagonist's (Phoenix Wright) great-great-grandfather teams up with Sherlock Holmes to investigate mysteries based on various entries in the Holmes chronology.

Sherlock Holmes and the Hound of the Baskervilles is a casual game by Frogwares. It departs from the original plot by introducing clear supernatural elements. Despite its non-canonical plot, it received good reviews.[20]

(Chronological)

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Facsimile of the 1st edition (1902)". S4ulanguages.com. Retrieved 20 April 2010.
  2. ↑ "BBC - The Big Read". BBC. April 2003, Retrieved 31 October 2012
  3. ↑ "The Best Sherlock Holmes Stories". Bestofsherlock.com. Retrieved 2014-06-23.
  4. ↑ Text of the story at project gutenburg
  5. ↑ Spiring, Paul (2007). "Hugo Baskerville & Squire Richard Cabell III". BFROnline. Retrieved 29 March 2009.
  6. ↑ "Cabell Tomb — Buckfastleigh". Devon Guide. 2007. Retrieved 29 March 2009.
  7. ↑ "Buckfastleigh Church". Legendary Dartmoor. 22 November 2007. Retrieved 29 March 2009.
  8. ↑ "Mansion said to have inspired The Hound of the Baskervilles on sale for £3m". Wales Online.
  9. ↑ Stock, Randall (June 10, 2013). "The Hound of the Baskervilles: A Manuscript Census". bestofsherlock.com. Retrieved 9 October 2013.
  10. ↑ "DOYLE, Sir Arthur Conan (1859-1930). Autograph manuscript leaf from The Hound of the Baskervilles, first serialized in The Strand Magazine, August 1901-April 1902, published in book form by George Newnes, on 25 March 1902.". Christies. Retrieved 9 October 2013.
  11. ↑ "Publication of the Hound of the Baskervilles". History Today.
  12. ↑ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055783/
  13. ↑ Bees Saal Baad (1962 film)
  14. ↑ Hemendra Kumar Roy#Creative years
  15. ↑ http://maamatimanush.tv/articlesTest.php?aid=408
  16. ↑ Chatterjee, ed. board Gulzar, Govind Nihalani, Saibal (2003). Encyclopaedia of Hindi cinema. New Delhi: Encyclopaedia Britannica. p. 659. ISBN 978-81-7991-066-5.
  17. ↑ The episode is based on "The Adventure of the Dancing Men" also.
  18. ↑ "Licencing, The Hound of the Baskervilles, Peepolykus Theatre Company". Peepolykus.com. Retrieved 2014-10-28.
  19. ↑ Purcell, Carey."Ken Ludwig's Baskerville: A Sherlock Holmes Mystery Makes World Premiere Tonight" playbill.com, January 15, 2015
  20. ↑ "Sherlock Holmes and the Hound of the Baskervilles". bigfishgames.com. Retrieved 2 June 2016.
  21. ↑ Uncle Scrooge #29, Dell, 1960.
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