Book One: The Hound of Baskervilles

When I chose to read "The Hound of Baskervilles" I was hoping that the story would give me a bit more information about London the city, rather than just telling me about the people. While this book did have wonderful descriptions of the scenery, most of the descriptions were of places that either aren't real or only directly related to the places that Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson were visiting in order to find clues.

Despite this slight fallback, I did get a sense for what the people in London at the time might have really spoken and acted like. Considering that the author, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, wrote this story in the early 20th century, the language used felt very appropriate for lack of better words. The speech was somewhat formal compared to what I am used to, not Shakespearean by any means, but a little bit more "educated" sounding, (something I am not against seeing more of in the slightest). For example:

"Really, Watson, you excel yourself," said Holmes...

People today don't often use phrases such as, "You excel yourself". It's a relatively simple phrase, but it is one that isn't used much anymore. All of the writing in this book is this way, from Holmes's witty and somewhat egotistical banter, to Watson's, still highly educated, but more identifiable speech. What I mean by identifiable is that he seems a bit more like the average person. Homes often comes off almost like a super-human with his deductive and observational abilities. Watson is very clever in his own right and he tries very hard to solve the case before Holmes does, which is something that the reader attempts to do as well, (at least that was the case for me).

In conclusion, I feel that more than anything, I have a better understanding of the people from London in the early 20th century. There is a certain level of class that was upheld by almost all citizens, (at least that seemed the case in this story) and several of the people in the city appeared to have at least some type of education. I would like to now do some research about London in real life and see if there are any statistics about education at the time. Even literacy rates would be helpful, but I think I would like to find some articles and graphs about this.