The Life of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Place_Pub: New York: Barnes & Noble Books, 1994. very good, very good. 320, illus., biograhical archives, index, DJ slightly worn and soiled. A great modern master of detective fiction writes the life of the man who created the most famous literary detective of them all. This singularly vivid biography, written by John Dickson Carr, a giant in the field of mystery fiction, benefits from his full access to the archives of the eminent Sir Arthur Conan Doyle--to his notebooks, diaries, press clippings, and voluminous correspondence. This is a lively, emotionally immediate portrayal of Doyle's forays into politics, his infatuation with spiritualism, his literary ambitions, and dinner-table conversations with friends like H. G. Wells and King Edward VII. This colorful narrative takesDoyle from his school days at Stonyhurst to Edinburgh University and a medical practice at Southsea, where he conceived the idea of wedding scientific study to criminal investigation in the fictive person of Sherlock Holmes. It also explores the private tragedy of Doyle's first marriage and long-delayed second as it follows him into the arena of public activity, propaganda, and literary output that would win him not only celebrity but also (under protest) knighthood.