Conan Doyle said it himself: “The essay is not the most attractive literary form, unless it is done in the most delicate way. It is too reminiscent of the school essays of our childhood – a statement then the necessary development.” A great specialist in English literature (we owe him books on JM Barrie, GK Chesterton and Agatha Christie), François Rivière has the finesse necessary to pull it off with elegance.
It would be a bit long to go into detail here about the troubled youth of Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle, born in Scotland in 1859. Let’s just say that he grew up in poverty with a loving mother and a depressed father. and alcoholic. Taking the opposite view, the robust Conan Doyle will always be attracted to sport – especially cricket and boxing. A doctor and already an apprentice writer, he joined a whaling ship in 1880, like Herman Melville. He then boards a cargo ship, leaves for Africa, but catches malaria. Establishing yourself as a doctor seems more reasonable. Already initiated into spiritualism (which would occupy a major part of his life), he began at the same time to publish in magazines, with the ambition of becoming Walter Scott or nothing, while thinking for entertainment of detective fiction inspired by Edgar Allan Poe. In 1887, Sherlock Holmes appeared in A study in red. It’s a fail. But in 1889, Mike Clarke, a broad novel set in the 17th century, doesn’t work either. What to do ?
A decisive dinner took place on August 30, 1889 at the Langham Hotel, in London: the American agent JM Stoddart brought together Oscar Wilde and Conan Doyle. The dandy playwright and the boxing doctor hit it off and make a bet to each write a book in a few weeks. This will give The Picture of Dorian Gray And The Sign of Fourwhich marks the true starting point of the adventures of Sherlock Holmes: between 1891 and 1893, Conan Doyle published no less than 24 Holmes stories in The Strand Magazine ! This time, public success was achieved. Unfortunately for him, The White Companymedieval pavement that he designed as his Ivanhoe and to which he values more, is neglected by critics. He does not digest it and foments his revenge against his own character…
On April 6, 1893, in a letter to his mother, his confidante, Conan Doyle announced: “I am in the middle of Holmes’s last affair, after which this gentleman disappears, never to return. His name alone reminds me unbearable!” The tweed-clad detective breaks his pipe in December 1893 in The Last Problem. For almost ten years, turning his back on “the weakest part of [s]we work”, Conan Doyle devoted himself to the stories of Brigadier Gérard and to other projects. It was the sirens of money that finally made him give in. In 1901, he released The Hound of the Baskervilles. In 1902, King Edward VII, a fan of Holmes, knighted the writer. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle finally understood that this was his destiny: between 1903 and 1904, he again signed 13 Holmes adventures in The Strand Magazine. There will then be other literary attempts, sometimes very successful, such as The lost World in 1912, where he invented Professor Challenger.
Despite this, Conan Doyle will never stop carrying the cross that Holmes represents for him. In 1917, he once again thought about putting an end to this damn detective in His last bow. No luck: this earned him praise from the press across the Atlantic, where Conan Doyle has been a hit for a long time. The author addresses this response to a Chicago journalist: “It was very kind of you to have spoken so heartily about Holmes. My feelings towards him are mixed because he has obscured so much of my more serious writings, but the thing will come to light one day – and too bad if it doesn’t.”
Conan Doyle died resignedly in 1930. Nearly a century later, his unloved hero is still running. It remains very popular in bookstores and continues to inspire directors (in recent years, include the two Sherlock Holmes by Guy Ritchie and the series Sherlock with Benedict Cumberbatch). François Rivière pays an erudite and moving tribute to the dissatisfied writer. And ends by quoting Jorge Luis Borges, in The Conjurers : “Thinking one evening or another about Sherlock Holmes is one of those good habits that remains with us…”.
Arthur Conan Doyle. The extraordinary story of the creator of Sherlock Holmes, by François Rivière. Tallandier, 236 p., €19.90.