Case of Sherlock Holmes

Andrew Glazzard is a senior research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute. He is the author of Conrad’s Popular Fictions (Palgrave Macmillan, 2016) and of numerous journal articles on late-Victorian and Edwardian fiction. He is an occasional contributor to the New Statesman.

• List of illustrationsAcknowledgementsTexts and ReferencesIntroduction: The Art of DeductionPart One: Finance 1. Stone into Money2. The Roylotts of Stoke Moran3. The Guardians of SecuritiesPart Two: Class4. The Pick of a Bad Lot5. The Fall of the House of Musgrave6. A Scandal in East YorkshirePart Three: Family7. Singular Occurrence at a Wedding8. The Rock of Gibraltar9. The Discreetly Shadowed CornersPart Four: Sex10. The Worst Man in London11. The Whole Queer Business of Wisteria LodgePart Five: Race12. Nice, Amiable People!13. A Nobler Man Never Walked the Earth14. The Heat of the Amazon Was Always in her BloodPart Six: War15. This Circle of Misery and Violence and Fear16. Do We Progress?17. The East WindPart Seven: Secrecy18. That Secret History of a Nation19. Oaths and Secrets20. The Giant Rat of SumatraConclusion: The Problem of FinalityBibliographyIndex

Erudite and enjoyable, Andrew Glazzard’s book replaces the Sherlock Holmes stories in a contemporary context of small social details and large cultural and economic forces. If you thought you knew the Holmes stories, think again: this study detects a hoard of secret treasure in them, enriching our reading and leaving us with an even greater respect for their importance.