Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was a classic Renaissance Man. He seemed to do most everything well.
Public domain.
Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle was born in 1859 in Edinburgh, Scotland. His father was an alcoholic with a history of psychiatric illness. Young Arthur’s family was subsequently all but destitute.
Despite his squalid upbringing, Arthur was a quick study. Supported by wealthy uncles, the boy was sent to boarding school, where he availed himself of a classical education. He eventually attended a Jesuit school in Austria before returning to Scotland to study at the University of Edinburgh Medical School. Along the way, he made time to master botany and begin writing short stories.
The young doctor was a gifted athlete. He was an amateur boxer, a compulsive cricketer, and a goalkeeper for the Portsmouth Association Football Club.
An avid marksman, he founded the Undershaw Rifle Club at his home, replete with a 100-yard known distance firing range. Doyle was also recognized for his skill at skiing, golf, and billiards. In 1901, Arthur Doyle served as one of three official judges for the world’s first male bodybuilding competition.
Doyle was a prolific scribe, ultimately producing more than 30 book-length pieces and at least 150 short stories. Sprinkled across all of that were hundreds of essays and magazine articles. What Arthur Conan Doyle is truly remembered for, however, is creating Sherlock Holmes.
Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes series captivated readers around the world. Public domain.
Doyle’s Super Sleuth
Sherlock Holmes’ capacity for observation and deduction was like a superpower. His first work was A Study in Scarlet. Doyle penned this piece over the span of three weeks when he was 27 years old and then, predictably, struggled to find a publisher. Ward Lock and Co eventually printed the piece in 1886. Doyle earned £25 for his efforts. That would be about $4,700 today.
Doyle patterned his gifted detective upon one of his university professors named Joseph Bell. In a 1892 letter to Bell, he wrote, “It is most certainly to you that I owe Sherlock Holmes … round the centre of deduction and inference and observation which I have heard you inculcate I have tried to build up a man.”
Once the reading public got a taste of Sherlock Holmes, they could not be satiated. Doyle grew weary of such pigeonholed writing in short order and considered killing the acerbic super sleuth off. In an effort to rid himself of the Holmes burden, the author began demanding exorbitant sums from his publishers. However, they willingly paid whatever he asked to get more Holmes material.
Modern depictions of Doyle’s classic characters are reliably compelling even today.
Promotional still from the TV series Sherlock.
Life Imitates Art
As an aspiring professional writer myself, I can tell you that we all write from life. My early efforts were utterly tripe until I had accumulated enough experience to depict things realistically.
It was only after engineering school, eight years as an Army officer, and a second career as a physician that I finally accumulated a portfolio of experience adequate to inform a decent literary career. In the case of Arthur Doyle, MD, some of Sherlock Holmes’ amazing capacity for deduction bled over into his day job.
Dr. Doyle worked in a hospital in Edinburgh and was once consulted to evaluate a particularly sick child. The youngster was pale and listless. Despite being obviously well-nourished, the boy had little to no strength in his wrists. Doyle pondered the case briefly and directed the patient’s mother to stop painting the child’s crib.
When she inquired what the connection might be between the color of his crib and her child’s sickness, Doyle observed that the woman had flecks of white paint on her hands.
White paint in the 19th century invariably contained large amounts of elemental lead. Little children chew on anything they can fit into their mouths. Dr. Doyle rightly deduced that the kid had been gnawing on his freshly-painted crib and had developed plumbism.
Plumbism is the doctor word for lead poisoning. Back then, lead was found in lots of household stuff. This made lead intoxication a serious concern, particularly for inquisitive children. Chronic lead exposure can lead to belly pain, cognitive defects, and irreversible brain damage. Arthur Conan Doyle’s deductive skills uncovered the source of the kid’s problem so that it might be rectified.
Arthur Conan Doyle’s last words were directed at his wife
when he said, “You are wonderful.”
Ruminations
Doyle personally investigated two real-world closed cases in a relentless pursuit of justice. Both men were eventually exonerated as a result of his efforts. Doyle covered the second man’s legal expenses out of his own pocket.
In 1903, Doyle founded what he called The Crimes Club. This was an exclusive social club limited to 100 members that met four times a year at the Imperial Hotel on Russell Square in London. Their objective was to foment discussion on crime and criminal detection. The club has been perpetuated in its original form to the present day. Their logo is a silhouette of Doyle.
In July of 1930, Doyle suffered a catastrophic heart attack. He left behind five children, none of whom had kids of their own. As a result, Arthur Conan Doyle produced no direct descendants. His last words were directed at his wife when he said, “You are wonderful.” It was a fitting end for a truly exceptional scribe.