A Study in Scarlet
Dr. Watson, back from the war, needs cheap rooms and is introduced to a strange young man called Sherlock Holmes. Soon a body is found in an empty house in Brixton, and the word RACHE written on the wall in blood. The very first Sherlock Holmes story. By Arthur Conan Doyle (1887). A public-domain classic.
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How it begins In the year 1878 I took my degree of Doctor of Medicine of the University of London, and proceeded to Netley to go through the course prescribed for surgeons in the army. Having completed my studies there, I was duly attached to the Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers as Assistant Surgeon. The regiment was stationed in India at the time, and before I could join it, the second Afghan war had broken out. On landing at Bombay, I learned that my corps had advanced through the passes, and was already deep in the enemy’s country. I followed, however, with many other officers who were in the same situation as myself, and succeeded in reaching Candahar in safety, where I found my regiment, and at once entered upon my new duties.The campaign brought honours and promotion to many, but for me it had nothing but misfortune and disaster. I was removed from my brigade and attached to the Berkshires, with whom I served at the fatal battle of Maiwand. There I was struck on the shoulder by a Jezail bullet, which shattered the bone and grazed the subclavian artery. I should have fallen into the hands of the murderous Ghazis had it not been for the devotion and courage shown by Murray, my orderly, who threw me across a pack-horse, and succeeded in bringing me safely to the British lines. Keep reading →About this story
This is where it all began. Dr John Watson, back in London after the war in Afghanistan, needs somewhere cheap to live and is introduced to a man who is looking for a flatmate. The man is Sherlock Holmes, and within days the two of them are looking at a body in an empty house with a word written on the wall.
Arthur Conan Doyle wrote it in 1887, and it was the first of four Holmes novels and fifty-six short stories. Doyle was a doctor, and he built Holmes’s methods partly on the sharp observation of one of his own teachers. The book is in two parts, and the second takes you somewhere you will not expect.
- Themes
- Detection, justice, revenge, partnership
- Good for
- Starting the Sherlock Holmes stories at the beginning; anyone who likes a puzzle
- Worth noticing
- How Watson describes Holmes at first meeting, including what he thinks Holmes does not know.
Chapters
- 1Mr. Sherlock Holmes12 min · 16 Oct
- 2The Science of Deduction16 min · 16 Oct
- 3The Lauriston Gardens Mystery17 min · 16 Oct
- 4What John Rance Had to Tell12 min · 16 Oct
- 5Our Advertisement Brings a Visitor11 min · 16 Oct
- 6Tobias Gregson Shows What He Can Do14 min · 16 Oct
- 7Light in the Darkness15 min · 16 Oct
- 8On the Great Alkali Plain16 min · 16 Oct
- 9The Flower of Utah12 min · 16 Oct
- 10John Ferrier Talks with the Prophet8 min · 16 Oct
- 11A Flight for Life15 min · 16 Oct
- 12The Avenging Angels16 min · 16 Oct
- 13A Continuation of the Reminiscences of John Watson, M.D20 min · 16 Oct
- 14The Conclusion10 min · 16 Oct
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