Biography of Arthur Conan Doyle

The subtle science of deduction

22 May 1859
July 7, 1930
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was born in Edinburgh, Scotland on day 22 May 1859. Of English origin on his father's side, he is descended on his mother's side from an Irish family of ancient nobility. The young Arthur before he began his studies at a school in his hometown, then at Hodder Preparatory School, Lancashire. His most important studies continue in Austria at the Jesuit Stonyhurst College, a Catholic school run by the Jesuits in and around Clitheroe, and then at the University of Edinburgh in 1876, where in 1885 consgue a degree in medicine. From this period is his first opera "the mystery of Sasassa Valley Valley" (1879), tale of terror sold to Chambers Journal; in the scientific and professional, in the same period, he published his first medical article concerning a sedative that experiments on himself.
In 1880 Sir Arthur Conan Doyle sells to The London Society the story "the tale of the American" on a monstrous plant native to Madagascar that feeds on human flesh. A year later gets first her BA in medicine, then the masters in surgery: thus began working at the hospital in Edinburgh, where he met Dr. Joseph Bell, which for a brief period, before graduating, becomes Assistant. The brilliant and cold Dr. Bell, with his scientific method and its deductive skills, inspire Doyle the lucky character of Sherlock Holmes, who, at least in the beginning, a link with the medical thriller.
After studying Conan Doyle embarks on a whaling ship as a ship's doctor, spending many months in the Atlantic Ocean and Africa. Back in England and open with little success a medical practice in Southsea, Portsmouth suburb. It was in this period that Doyle began writing the adventures of Holmes in short stories of this character are beginning to experience some success at the British public. The first novel of the famous detective is "a study in scarlet", 1887, published in the Strand Magazine: in the novel the Narrator is the good Dr. Watson-in a sense represents the author himself-has Holmes and the subtle science of deduction. In this first work followed by "the sign of four (1890), a work that applies to Arthur Conan Doyle and Holmes huge successes, so as not to have no equal in the history of crime fiction. Despite the huge success Doyle will not bond never enough with his most popular character, who hated because it became more famous than him.
It was in fact more attracted by other literary genres, such as adventure or great, or as works of historical research: in this field produces historical novels as "the white company" (1891), "the adventures of Brigadier Gérard" (collection of sixteen stories of 1896) and "The Great Boer War (1900, written while he was correspondent of the Boer War in South Africa); the latter work won him the title of Sirin 1902. Even during the great war he repeats the experience as a war correspondent, but without neglecting his work as a novelist, essayist and journalist. As a journalist, during the London Olympics of 1908, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle writes in an article for the Daily Mail-cha will prominently-in which enhances the Italian Dorando Pietri athlete (winner of the Olympic Marathon, but disqualified) comparing him to an ancient Roman. Conan Doyle is also a promoter of a fundraiser for the unlucky Italian. Other works that deal with the kinds of adventure, fantasy, supernatural and horror are "The Last Of The Legions and other tales of long ago", "Tales of Pirates", "My Friend The Murderer and other mysteries", "Lot 249" (the Mummy), "the lost world".
Although the fantastic element is never completely absent even from his realistic production-such as in the novel "the Hound of the Baskervilles" (1902) or in the short story "The Sussex vampire" (1927), both of the cycle of Sherlock Holmes novels, belongs in the fantasy genre that Doyle has written five, along with about forty short stories closely, most of them of the horror and the supernatural. With his vast literary output, Doyle, along with Edgar Allan Poe is regarded as the founder of two literary genres: yellow and brilliant. In particular, Doyle is the father and absolute master of that sub-genre called "whodunit", made famous by Sherlock Holmes, his most successful character, but constituted only a fraction of its huge production, which has ranged from adventure to science fiction by the supernatural to historical themes. Speaking of the myth of Sherlock Holmes, it is noteworthy that the famous phrase "elementary, Watson!" that Holmes would pronounce addressed to Assistant, is an invention of posterity. The genre is primarily addressed by the series of professor Challenger (1912-1929), a character that Doyle model on the figure of professor Ernest Rutherford, quirky and cantankerous father of atom and radioactivity.
Among them the most famous is "the lost world", a 1912 novel that tells of an expedition led by Challenger on a plateau in South America populated by prehistoric animals survived the extinction. The story will have great success in the world of cinema, starting from the silent era in 1925 with the first movie, followed by five other films (including two remakes). The argument that the Scottish writer dedicated the last years of his life is the Spiritism: in 1926 he published the essay "history of Spiritism (" The History of Spiritualism ")", creating articles and lectures through contacts with the Golden Dawn. Due to the controversial content that the study of theme brings with it, this activity will not give to Doyle acknowledgments that as a scholar was expected. Will, moreover, attacks by the Roman Catholic Church. His latest published work is "The Edge of Unknown", where the author explains his psychic experiences, now become his sole source of interest. While in his country house in Windlesham, Crowborough, Arthur Conan Doyle is seized with sudden heart attack: he died on July 7, 1930, at the age of 71 years. The Tomb, located at Minstead in the New Forest, Hampshire, the epitaph reads: "Steel True | Blade Straight | Arthur Conan Doyle | Knight | Patriot, Physician & Man of Letters".
Article contributed by the team of collaborators.