back     more news

Celebrating the first novel of Conan Doyle

10/10/2011

The Undershaw Preservation Trust (UPT) was invited to the British Library in late September to celebrate the publication of The Narrative of John Smith, the first unpublished novel of Conan Doyle (later Sir Arthur ). The CD of The Narrative of John Smith is read by leading actor Robert Lindsay and the original manuscript is on display at The British Library.

Undershaw is Sir Arthur’s former home in Hindhead which is under threat from development into residential units. The Trust is contesting a planning decision by Waverley Borough Council and has been given permission for a Judicial Review of the case.

Pictured at the British Library Shop (left to right): John

Gibson (UPT Chairman and founder); Robert Lindsay;

and Sue Meadows and Lynn Gale (Co-Founders of UPT).

"This was a great honour for us to be involved in something so significant to what we are trying to achieve with Undershaw,” said Lynn Gale. "It only proves how much Conan Doyle is still very much in the public eye.”
 
The manuscript of The Narrative of John Smith was lost in the post on the way to the publishers and then rewritten by Conan Doyle from memory. Although he continued to revise the text and drew on various passages from it in subsequent writings, Conan Doyle never re-submitted the novel for publication, later claiming in jest: "My shock at its disappearance would be as nothing to my horror if it were suddenly to appear again – in print."

Therefore, the text has been known only to a handful of scholars up to this point. Now it is published for the first time serving as a rare insight into the author’s creative development and apprenticeship as a writer.

The Narrative of John Smith was written in 1883 when Conan Doyle was 23 and living in Portsmouth, struggling to establish himself as both a doctor and a writer. John Smith,  the opinionated Everyman, came before the astute detective Sherlock Holmes and his capable colleague Dr Watson. 

Conan Doyle had already had a number of short stories published in leading magazines of the day, such as Blackwood’s, All the Year Round, London Society, and the Boy’s Own Paper. But, as was the accepted practice of literary journals of the time, his stories were published anonymously. He knew that, to establish his name as a writer, he had to write a novel.

Many of the themes and stylistic tropes of his later writing, including his first Sherlock Holmes story, A Study in Scarlet (published in 1887), can be clearly seen. More a series of ruminations than a traditional novel, The Narrative of John Smith is of considerable biographical importance and provides an exceptional window into the mind of the creator of Sherlock Holmes. Through John Smith, a 50 year-old man confined to his room by an attack of gout, Conan Doyle sets down his thoughts and opinions on a range of subjects – including  literature, science, religion, war, and education – with no detectable insecurity or diffidence.
 
Though unfinished, The Narrative of John Smith stands as a fascinating record of the early work of a man on his way to becoming one of the best-known authors in the world. This book will be welcomed with enthusiasm by the numerous Conan Doyle devotees. Stephen Fry said of the publication: "His boundless energy, enthusiasm and wide-ranging mind, not to mention the pitch-perfect, muscular and memorable prose is all on display here in a work whose publication is very very welcome indeed."

Undershaw Preservation Trust, www.saveundershaw.com