The Hound of the Baskervilles

My first foray into Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes. He is famous, so famous. And now I can see why. This is a cracking read. Somehow, thankfully, I remain ignorant of the plots of most classic books. So they are always a pleasant surprise to me. The Hound of the Baskervilles was no different. I had a vague notion that it was about a big, nasty dog. And it is, but it is also about much more.

Sherlock Holmes is engaged to look into the mysterious death of Sir Charles Baskerville, by Baskerville's friend Dr Mortimer, and he is quickly informed of the curse of the Baskerville family from an old manuscript depicting the grisly death of Hugo Baskerville in 1742. There is a bit of preliminary detective work in London before the action moves down to the lonely Devonshire moors.

The Hound of the Baskervilles has an interesting structure. Narrated by Dr Watson, there are several changes in style and format. It starts with a typical narrative structure, later we have two chapters that are letters written by Watson to Holmes, and then Watson's diary entries. It is full of a wonderful and rich vocabulary which will give me ample fodder for several Wondrous Word posts I'm sure.

It's a great gothic story with some nice twists, and a wonderful menacing air. I was really quite surprised at how graphically poor Hugo's death is described. We get a wonderful peek into turn of the (20th) century life for the moderately well to do single man. That you can write notes on your shirtcuff as we would write them on our hand. That if you're stuck in a tricky place you can get a boy to bring you your simple wants such as bread and new collars for your shirts. That nouveau riches wasn't a term dreamed up for Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous in the 80s. And I've never come across a better description of my day job:

"We are coming now rather into the region of guesswork," said Dr Mortimer.

"Say, rather, into the region where we balance probabilities and choose the most likely. It is the scientific use of the imagination...."

Indeed Conan Doyle's inpsiration for Sherlock Holmes was to be found in Joseph Bell, Scottish surgeon, one of Doyle's lecturers at the University of Edinburgh, and personal surgeon to Queen Victoria when she was in Scotland (a fact apparently plundered in a recent Doctor Who episode- is there no snippet of history unplundered by that show? Or are there researchers out there trawling wikipedia day and night like the rest of us?). I was hoping that he would be the Bell of Bell's palsy, but that appears to be another Scottish surgeon from Edinburgh, Charles Bell. I suspect that they are likely to be related.

Conan Doyle appears to have been a fascinating man. Scottish doctor, author, activist, husband and father. He actually wrote in many other genres including poetry and historical fiction, which Ruth Rendell in her introduction to the Penguin says were never very readable, and now largely forgotten. He thought that Sherlock Holmes diverted his attention from his more serious works, so much so that he killed off Holmes in one story, but the public outcry was so large that he was brought back in for The Hound of the Baskervilles in 1901.

It never occured to me that a video would exist of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle!

Or that he would be such a passionate advocate of both scientific observation and psychic experiences! I love that he says that he never risks hallucinations. Now that's sound advice.

Conan Doyle wrote four novels and 56 short stories featuring Sherlock Holmes. I have a lovely Penguin Complete Edition and a few of the short stories loaded onto my phone, and now I can look forward to spending some more time with Sherlock Holmes. If it is all too much for you to read this rather short book in our hectic, modern world, then you could listen to this wonderful, funny, irreverent Digested Read summary by John Crace instead. Or do both, it's worth it.

Classic Bribe

Old Yeller

It may be hard to believe but I'd never seen the movie Old Yeller til last year. I knew it was about a dog, and that it was sad, but that was it. I watched the movie last year, and it was sad. Very sad. So sad that I was a bit anxious about reading the book. 

And it is a sad book, but young Travis has such a great voice. Immediately distinctive. And totally engaging. Fourteen year old Travis Coates has to be the man about his family's farm in the Texas Hill Country in the frontier years of the mid 19th century, when his father leaves to take cattle to Abilene, Kansas. Travis is left on the farm with his mother, and younger brother Little Arliss. Old Yeller moves onto the farm soon after and wins a place in the family's hearts despite his thieving ways. 

Little Arliss is annoying like all little brothers. He keeps playing in the dam used by the family for drinking water. He continually collects all sorts of critters, and he generally gets in the way. Travis has a lot of work to do. He has to ensure that the family's corn crop isn't robbed by the many varmints that want to eat it- raccons, skunks and bears. I don't think enough books these days use the word varmints. I think we should bring it back. He has to brand their pigs, even though they are essentially living wild in the surrounding land. 

There's plenty to educate and amuse a modern Australian, or probably an urban dweller from anywhere about the habits of various varmints. The racoons come to raid the corn field at night. They "strip the shucks back with their little hands, and gnaw the milky kernels off the cob." Skunks like watermelons, they "open up little round holes in the rinds and reach in with their forefeet and drag out the juicy insides". Coyotes like watermelon too. Deer aren't as fussy and like corn, melons and peas. Wild hogs pop their teeth. 

Travis has a fantastic turn of phrase:

I was weak as a rain-chilled chicken, but most of the hurting had stopped.

She (a doe he is trying to shoot) kept doing me that way til finally my heart was flopping around inside my chest like a catfish in a wet sack.

The references to both animals and people afflicted by rabies, or hydrophobia as it is most commonly refered to in the text is rather fascinating medically. I remember them calling it hydrophobe in the movie version. Australia is a rabies free continent, so we have no cultural memory of such sickness. We don't have to vaccinate our pets against rabies even. Travis's Mama cleans his leg wounds from the wild pigs with hot water then pours turpentine into the wound. We can only wonder at how much that would hurt.

And Travis was quite the ethicist for his time:

I never minded killing for meat. Like Papa had told me, every creature has to kill to live. But to wound an animal was something else. 

This is something I've been thinking about for some time. Not that I'm forced to hunt for my meat. A simple trip to the supermarket, or the butcher is all it takes. But more generally our use of meat and the ethical and environmental impacts of our diet. It has all become quite contentious and topical in Australia in the past few weeks, after revelations (and rather graphic footage) of the treatment of Australian cattle shipped to Indonesia as part of our live export trade. 

But ultimately, Old Yeller is a book about a boy and his dog. Travis and Old Yeller forge a strong bond in the few short months that they live and work together. Old Yeller is a bit of a loveable rascal. But he is a faithful, wise and brave dog who protects his new family from multiple threats. And he pays for his devotion in the famous climax of the book. 

Old Yeller is a fantastic book, that deserves to be more widely read. 

I'm offering up Old yeller as my first post to both The Classic Bribe and Kid Konnection at Booking Mama