Dec 5, 2012
When Conan Doyle embarked on his whaling adventure at the age of
20, little could he have guessed what awaited him.
And little did the world know how profoundly his experiences would
influence his later life, including the creation for which we know
him most intimately - that of Sherlock Holmes.
We're joined in this episode by the editors of
Dangerous Work: Diary of an Arctic Adventure, Jon
Lellenberg, BSI and Daniel Stashower, BSI. Jon and Dan have been
with us on previous episodes of I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere: when
we discussed
Arthur Conan Doyle: A Life in Letters on
Episode 13, and again onEpisode
37 when we covered
The Narrative of John Smith, a lost Conan Doyle
manuscript.
What we learn about Conan Doyle's six and a half month voyage on
the Hope is absolutely fascinating - from the
provenance of the manuscript itself and how Dame Jean Conan Doyle
worked tirelessly to ensure this publication could be seen, to the
harrowing adventures that Arthur himself saw as part of this arctic
voyage and more - and what we consider the world would have been
like had this journey not taken place, or worse: if events had
taken a more grisly turn.
From the raw and harsh realities that required the ministrations of
a third year medical student, to the unexpected swims and from the
daily thoughts to the watercolor illustrations, we gain a view of
Conan Doyle that truly helps the reader understand the seeds that
were planted for a later career. What would his mother, (the
"Ma'am") have thought of his accepting the adventure? What would
his work been like absent such adventures? We speculate with the
two men who have come to know Conan Doyle intimately through their
previous work.
One item of note that the editors shared with us is that Dr.
William Henry Neale, the surgeon on board theEira (a
ship that the Hope encountered), posed in a photograph with Conan
Doyle at the time. A later photo (in 1892 and pictured below) shows
Dr. Neale, who could very easily pass for Dr. Watson.
There is another item of note related to Dr. Watson that was
mentioned by Conan Doyle at the conclusion of his voyage, but
rather than spoil it here, we'll let you discover it yourself in
the audio.
Finally, rather than the traditional Editor’s Gas-Lamp, we thought
that while we had the editors with us, they could read to us from
Doyle's diary. We asked Dan to read a poem that Doyle wrote in the
July 26 entry, titled "Meerschaum Pipe."
We then turn to your comments on previous episodes and review your
response to some of our questions/surveys on Facebook. Of course we
do our housekeeping and mention all of our social network presence:
on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and Instagram -
including the
Top 10 Suggestive Lines from the Sherlock Holmes
Canon.