Sherlock Holmes is a detective hero of all times, a fictional character who is more famous than his creator Arthur Conan Doyle. The Scottish author Doyle wrote one of his well-known novel “The Sing of Four starring” the unique and detailed character Sherlock Holmes. Although Doyle has never been a colonist nor his character Holmes, the novel presents the idea of the British empire and its power along with the danger of colonized India and its people through Victorian perspective. I shall start first with the writer’s notion presented in the novel, which is most obvious, weather the novel is a warning alarm of the threat outside British domestic sphere caused by the outsiders or not. I will be analyzing the depiction of both nations in the
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Though Doyle was never an ex-colonist, his depiction is built on a second-hand experience just like his creation Holmes, they gain their knowledge about India, Indians and the famous mutiny mentioned in the novel through magazines, newspapers and books “of course you know all about it, gentlemen- a deal more than I do, very like, since reading is not in my line”. Both Doyle and Holmes are not considered as eye-witnesses, they have never experienced any of the novel’s events and the Indian mutiny is no exception, he represents the Indian mutiny after almost three decades of the actual event timing. Yet he described the mutiny with specific details. Doyle also uses a remarkable tool in his writing to make his creation believable by adding minor flaws to Holmes, so he would be more realistic and closer to the Victorians. Doyle choose cocaine to accomplish this purpose as Doyle was also alcoholic and his father was a drug addict. The novel opens with a surprising scene to some readers. Holmes is injecting himself with cocaine, Dr. Watson is a little concerned about Holmes health. Holmes takes cocaine occasionally only to stimulate his brain when he has no case to solve in his hand so we cannot consider him a drug addict. Accurate dosage of drugs showed that Victorians were familiar with drugs because Opium, cocaine and morphine was legal back then. Another idea that Doyle was trying to state that even the imaginary “22113 Barker” street hold …show more content…
In that period of time, the empire was its highest levels. However, “many Victorians were uncomfortable with the increasingly interact relationship between home and abroad (J. Watson, Towheed, 2012). I assume that Indian people will not agree on such attack represented in the novel regarding their culture, personalities, physical appearance, social behavior and their religion, who would? Novels like “The Sign of Four” contribute in cracking the relationship between the two nations not bring them closer to each other. Both nations are simply too different essentially. This image is fixed in Victorians imagination for so long that they cannot let go, there will always be problematic between them even if on the surface is not
Though Doyle was never an ex-colonist, his depiction is built on a second-hand experience just like his creation Holmes, they gain their knowledge about India, Indians and the famous mutiny mentioned in the novel through magazines, newspapers and books “of course you know all about it, gentlemen- a deal more than I do, very like, since reading is not in my line”. Both Doyle and Holmes are not considered as eye-witnesses, they have never experienced any of the novel’s events and the Indian mutiny is no exception, he represents the Indian mutiny after almost three decades of the actual event timing. Yet he described the mutiny with specific details. Doyle also uses a remarkable tool in his writing to make his creation believable by adding minor flaws to Holmes, so he would be more realistic and closer to the Victorians. Doyle choose cocaine to accomplish this purpose as Doyle was also alcoholic and his father was a drug addict. The novel opens with a surprising scene to some readers. Holmes is injecting himself with cocaine, Dr. Watson is a little concerned about Holmes health. Holmes takes cocaine occasionally only to stimulate his brain when he has no case to solve in his hand so we cannot consider him a drug addict. Accurate dosage of drugs showed that Victorians were familiar with drugs because Opium, cocaine and morphine was legal back then. Another idea that Doyle was trying to state that even the imaginary “22113 Barker” street hold …show more content…
In that period of time, the empire was its highest levels. However, “many Victorians were uncomfortable with the increasingly interact relationship between home and abroad (J. Watson, Towheed, 2012). I assume that Indian people will not agree on such attack represented in the novel regarding their culture, personalities, physical appearance, social behavior and their religion, who would? Novels like “The Sign of Four” contribute in cracking the relationship between the two nations not bring them closer to each other. Both nations are simply too different essentially. This image is fixed in Victorians imagination for so long that they cannot let go, there will always be problematic between them even if on the surface is not