RIP Sidney Paget - The man who brought Sherlock Holmes to vivid life

Sidney Edward Paget passed away on this day in 1908.

Arthur Conan Doyle was an expert wordsmith and a master storyteller. His timeless stories featuring the Great Detective were further embellished with Paget’s superb drawings.

Paget created the iconic image of Sherlock Holmes wearing the deerstalker cap and the Inverness Cape. Conan Doyle did describe Holmes’ physicality in A Study in Scarlet but never mentioned these specifics.

As the famous proverb goes: “A picture is worth a thousand words”.

In addition to Sherlock Holmes, Paget also brought two other major characters memorably to life: Professor Moriarty and Mycroft Holmes.

RIP Sidney.

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Image Source: Artintheblood.com

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Happy Birthday Sherlock Holmes!

According to Christopher Morley, today marks the 159^th birth anniversary of Sherlock Holmes.

Sherlock Holmes is an immortal character in every sense of the word. He is the most portrayed fictional character ever and continues to be as popular today as he was in the late 19^th century.

Here’s wishing the very best of fame and popularity to the world’s greatest fictional detective.

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Complete Sherlock Holmes Collection - Free Download

Click here to download the complete collection of Sherlock Holmes stories and novels.

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Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas!

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Arthur Wontner as Sherlock Holmes

Arthur Wontner as Sherlock Holmes

Arthur Wontner (1875 – 1960) starred as Sherlock Holmes in a total of 5 productions from 1931 to 1937: The Sleeping Cardinal, The Missing Rembrandt, The Sign of Four: Sherlock Holmes’ Greatest Case, The Triumph of Sherlock Holmes, and Silver Blaze. One of them The Missing Rembrandt is officially a lost film.

Wontner made a very stately Holmes and has a striking resemblance to Sidney Paget’s portraits. Wontner was 56 when he starred in his first Holmes adaptation and despite his advanced age, Wontner’s Holmes has a great sense of humor. Even while reading the Canon, I was always enamored by Holmes’s levity that came to the fore time and again in so many of Arthur Conan Doyle’s works.

A discussion of Holmes is never complete without Watson. Ian Fleming (not the author) played Dr Watson in all the productions excepting The Sign of Four, where Ian Hunter replaced Ian Fleming. Fleming plays Watson as nice but little bit dense. Thankfully he stops short of making his Watson a laughing stock a la Nigel Bruce.

Ian Fleming as Dr Watson

I have seen couple of Wontner’s movies: The Triumph of Sherlock Holmes and Silver Blaze. A noticeable feature is that Holmes’ archenemy Moriarty is the recurring villain in almost all of these movies.

In Silver Blaze, he engineers the disappearance of Silver Blaze in order to ensure the success of his client in winning the lottery. This adaptation takes a liberty, by setting the story 20 years after The Hounds of Baskerville. Henry Baskerville still resides at the Baskerville hall and has a young daughter, about to be betrothed. Tragedy strikes as the famed horse, Silver Blaze is missing and his trainer is found murdered. Inspector Lestrade suspects the prospective son-in-law of Baskerville. As luck would have it, Holmes and Watson are visiting Baskerville and Holmes solves the case. The rest of the plot is pretty faithful to the canon.

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Silver Blaze is my all-time favorite among the 56 short stories. The story contains 2 of my favorite lines of all time, regarding “The Curious incident of the dog at night” and “The sudden epidemic among the sheep”. Both of these lines appear verbatim in this adaptation much to the joy of the Holmes fan inside me!

Holmes and Watson decipher the message in 'The Triumph of Sherlock Holmes'

The “Triumph of Sherlock Holmes” is based on The Valley of Fear. Next to The Hound of Baskervilles, The Valley of Fear is my favorite novel. Holmes’s deduction of the identity of the victim and the murderer is in my humble opinion, one of the best works by Sir Doyle.

I have seen many different adaptations of Sherlock Holmes and unfortunately, there are very few adaptations of The Valley of Fear so far. Other than this one, the only others I have seen are the one with Ronald Howard in the 1954-55 series (titled “The Case of the Pennsylvania Gun”) and an animated adaptation in 1984 with Peter O’Toole voicing Holmes. Sherlock Holmes and the Deadly Necklace (Christopher Lee and Thorley Walters) as Holmes is also very loosely based on The Valley of Fear.

The adaptation with Wontner is probably the best of the lot and Professor Moriarty makes a direct appearance at the end. In the Canon, he sends a letter to Holmes instead.

This series is highly recommended for fans of Sherlock Holmes. Wontner is an excellent Holmes on-screen!

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Image Sources: The Baker Street Blog, Aveleyman, Mystery Movies Online

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