The Hound of the Baskervilles

Examine close reading of The Hound of the Baskervilles: Another Adventure of Sherlock Holmes with textual references and critical perspectives.

Arthur Conan Doyle’s crime novella is a canonical work of speculative fiction and detective literature that explores the hellhound of the Baskerville legends as a diabolical agency, huge creature, luminous, ghastly, spectral devil phosphorus painted baying werewolf spirited beast haunting the legacy of Baskerville estate and suburbians of Dartmoor Grimpen mire. In reality the mystery behind this superstitious supernatural phenomenon is a death entrapment laid down by Rodger Baskerville II in the disguise of Jack Stapleton. However the antithesis of superstitious mythicism is shrewdly contested by the skeptical detective Sherlock Holmes, and thus supernatural gothicism is challenged to the core of realistic cosmos. Selden, the absconded convict, kinsman to the Barrymores, is suspiciously implicated for his fiendish notoriety of Notting Hill case “ferocity of the crime” and “wanton brutality of the assassin”; but lately acquitted from allegation through befallen excruciating death perpetrated by the baying hound. “Barren waste moors, chilling winds and darkling skies” foreshadows saturnine funebrial macabre as envisioning of the literature of gothicism and foretelling chronicles of sublime detective fiction. 

The popularity of the impeccable detective hero Sherlock Holmes foregrounds intuitive logic, astute observations, perspicuous inferences to reveal the murder mystery of the heir to the Baskerville fortune in The Hound of the Baskervilles. Diabolical supernatural agency of the hellhound is a core paradox fabricated within the threads of this occultist murder mystery. Sherlock Holmes cast as the voice of reason and rationality to challenge the swashbuckling psychorama. In this detective fiction, archetypal plot twists occur along with the progression of the storyline, in anticipation of a reverse chronology, in which the murder mystery of Charles Baskerville is committed surrounding a close circle of suspects before a gradual reconstruction of the past. Contemporaneous detective novels of Arthur Conan Doyle is diversified canon of hybridized and fluid genres involving stereotyped characters within middle class family settings, duelling and feuding in all likelihood for identity and individuality, vindictive salvation and retributive justice, freedom and equality, importance of knowledge and the discovery of buried family ties. Central characters and formal elements of the Hound of Baskervilles is a conglomeration of thrill, mystery, suspense, horror, terror, spookiness, creepiness, grisliness and wonder. However, unlike Gothic literature, wonder and terror of the supernatural, fantastic and romantic worldview: suspension of disbelief is silhouetted into obscurity; ie, the murder mystery spectacle of Gothic tradition. Afterall, the real monsters weren’t the supernatural beasts of legends but the darkness hiding within human hearts. 

Howcatchem and whodunit of the Devonshire is interwoven by scientific empiricism and human psychology, bringing to the fore: epistolary chronicles between duo Holmes and Watson; weathering the taste of time; entrenched within themes, motifs, settings and psyches of Victorian England. Sherlock and Watson formulated after all, Rodger staged as Stapeton in order to get rid of the competitor rivals to the family estate and legacy of Baskerville fortunes. However, the fin-de-siecle of the prophetic rhetoric implied in the diction of Dr. James Mortimer is lucid and succinct, “there is a realm in which the most acute and most experienced of detectives is helpless.” The shoplifting of money in South America by Rodger as the imposter Vandeleur of preparatory educator of East Yorkshire and entomology research fellow of the Museum is the retrospective foreshadowing of the modern detective fiction. Jack Stapleton is the aftermath of his wedding with Beryl Garcia in Costa Rica and simultaneous settlement in England upon the voyage home. Vandeleurs occupied the Fraser’s fortune and eventually sank from disrepute to infamy. Fallaciousness of the specious identity of Vandeleur and/or Jack Stapleton alongwith the baronet’s ‘mastiff hellhound’s flaming jaws and blazing eyes’ limelights fin-de-siecle detective  masterpiece.  

Further Reading, References, Endnotes and Podcasts

The Hound of the Baskervilles pp. 75

Chapter Title: In the Closet of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle: The Private Life of Sherlock

Holmes (1970), Book Title: A Foreign Affair, Book Subtitle: Billy Wilder’s American Films, Book Author(s): Gerd Gemünden, Published by: Berghahn Books. (2008)

Studies in the Literature of Sherlock Holmes, Robert Knox, Bluebook, Oxford lectures, (1910)

Introduction: What is Crime Fiction? Charles J. Rzepka

Chapter Defining Detective Fiction © The Author(s) 2023, S. J. Link, A Narratological Approach to Lists in Detective Fiction, Crime Files, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-33227-2_2

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Degeneration, Fin-de-Siecle Gothic, and the Science of Detection: Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Hound of the Baskervilles and the Emergence of the Modern Detective Story, Nils Clausson, University of Regina, December 2005, Journal of Narrative Theory 35(1):60-87, Eastern Michigan University, pp. 1-25

Sherlock Holmes Codes the Social Body, Rosemary Jann [George Mason University], ELH, Vol. 57, No. 3,  Autumn 1990, Johns Hopkins University Press. 

wind borne poems

the wind was something. I could hear it rattling outside and at least little parts of the sky blue showed themselves. I had a problem with the boot laces and changed them, using a lighter lace, a running shoe lace as I forgot to purchase proper laces. but I remembered going to Seneca College summer hockey camp and they showed us a video of Gordie Howe giving a few suggestions on equipment. he tied the lace before you do the loops, not once around, but twice, saying that if you do that it won’t come loose. I picked up on that then and always did that and felt I knew some secret about laces. Think about it and you will probably remember seeing someone in life holding down their laces with a finger or fingers in the middle of tying them. That’s because they can become loose before you are done. better to do Gordie Howe’s trick. I wonder how he learned it or discovered it himself. the old time people and figures sometimes know much. 

I ventured out and made my way to some

fields. I saw some leaves on trees and they seemed lonesome and strange, burdened by life. I imagined, a pure shameless projection, that they would rather be in Florida on a beach. I myself would have been. I imagined verdant palm fronds in a warm wind, talking slightly in their own way. How would it be? I would walk down some place and easy landscape and read campy pulp novels for fun, enough big thinking about literature and philosophy, spirituality and ideas. but sometimes I’d read a bit of Alexandr Solzhenitsyn and things to remain soulful and as sharp as possible. I’d head back to a patio and order a turkey club sandwich and a diet soda if I was getting hungry. maybe the next day I’d choose to eat at home and fix a sandwich myself. Outside I might hear the sea, and then take a break from eating that lunch, and go glance at the wondrous and whimsical ocean and coastline. 

but I had to concentrate on the present and brought myself out of my daydream about the southern shores. I kept on and went over a small bridge. one could hardly discern this bridge from the ground as the snows that had come over the weeks of the middle winter were that high. but some planks wooden were still there, confident and reliable. I stood there for a bit and the wind got stronger, almost vexatious, and I took a few big gulps of it. I had read that Knut Hamsun had gone on top of a train when he was sick and was gulping all the air and helped cure himself. whatever the case, fresh air couldn’t hurt and could only help. then I composed a more ‘verse’ poem in my head:

those leaves/

crinkled and old, staying/

nobody notices such/ and beyond the

winter wind makes the evergreens move/

the working boots talk their talk I see/

and the white collars too/

a bird appears/ somehow displaced from home/ looking/ not at ease like the birds of the summer poet/ no/ looking for something lost

I didn’t have a title for the words then. but I would end up calling it simply, Leaves 

there was a series of hills and I went up and then down them, bumps in an otherwise pretty vast and plain area. there were some spots near the far purlieu where some wild sumac lived, retaining that deep inspiring colour in all months. the snow had stayed on some of it, and the white/red made an interesting picture for its juxtapositions. when I had begun nature walking everything looked the same. as time went along I learned that there were hundreds, probably thousands of pictures and poems and stories to be had from woodlands and fields, even the sky and water. we had become friends, and my friends seemed to teach me through time not only photography and writing, but mysticism and maybe…do you know what is beyond mysticism itself, all forms of mysticism, and is the true and most noble and important goal? it is Enlightenment

, Moksha, Freedom, Awakening. Pick your word. I walked and walked. I had to take my time as the snow was deep. The main paths were too busy though. I’d take the snow. Like in life, the main path is easier but paved with mediocrity and predictability. I would make it my own way, somehow, in the snow, in the arts w/my work, and in spiritually and life itself. but, though on the monomyth journey, and the fool’s journey of the tarot, that entire seeker’s trip, i was also no fool, and so would remember to tie my laces like the great Gordie Howe did. 

—-

Jacques Fleury is a Boston Globe featured Haitian American Poet, Educator, Author of four books and a literary arts student at Harvard University online. His latest publication “You Are Enough: The Journey to Accepting Your Authentic Self”  & other titles are available at all Boston Public Libraries, the University of Massachusetts Healey Library, University of  Wyoming, Askews and Holts Library Services in the United Kingdom, The Harvard Book Store, The Grolier Poetry Bookshop, Amazon etc…  He has been published in prestigious publications such as Wilderness House Literary Review, Muddy River Poetry Review, Litterateur Redefining World anthologies out of India, Poets Reading the News, the Cornell University Press anthology Class Lives: Stories from Our Economic Divide, Boston Area Small Press and Poetry Scene among others…Visit him at:  http://www.authorsden.com/jacquesfleury.–

Three

I’m three three three one-two-three and nobody knows I’m up up up – Mommy sleeping sleeping sad in her big bed. Daddy at work – work work work in town at the dry cleaners after bacon and eggs and coffee at Ohio Restaurant. Love Daddy – I’m Daddy’s little girl.

Climb one-two-three shelves for cereal in the cupboard – bowl spoon milk from the frigerator sometimes smells bad. Then turn the knob all-by-myself open the big heavy door open the screen door out the door. No shoes no socks my feet my toes wiggle in the grass wet wet wet. Run run run to the barn pee in my big girl training pants take em off and toss em in the weeds every-Mommy’s-bad-word-morning-when-will-she-learn. Bare bottom who cares I don’t care no one cares maybe grandma cares.

Horses are waiting for me me me at the gate one big one nice one mean one brown one white and a pony-just-my-size. And I pet their noses oh my gosh soft so soft and I feed them green grass even the white mean-to-grown-ups one who could eat my tiny fingers anytime it wants to snap-just-like-that but it doesn’t never never never did never never never will. My big brodder’s watching me from his window thinks he’s the boss of me but isn’t the boss of me. Face scrunched and big frown always worry worry worry.

Then my dog friends are waiting every-morning-same-place-same-time for me me me. Black white and brown but mostly black Smokey knows only one trick shake shake shake the neighbor boys taught him a long time ago when he was my brodder’s dog not anymore. And Sammy also black with curly part-poodle hair. And the next-door-neighbor’s big big big red Ireesh Sitter with eyes that say something to me every day. Just us we all go running in the tall green grass field – green grass taller than me and when I fall down my dog friends wait for me to get up and catch up. I know lunch time just-know-it lunch time and cartoons and fight-every-Mommy’s-bad-word-day-driving-me-crazy-brodder time – who’s not the boss of me.

(But he makes me laugh laugh laugh so much I pee my pants accidental not on purpose. When I dunk Oreo cookies in my milk and my mouth is full – makes me laugh so I spray it all over the table. Laugh when he makes the squeaky mouse voice when I try to bite a pickle I can never eat my pickles. “No! No! No! Don’t eat me! Please please please don’t eat me!” And he pushes me around the driveway in my old junky I’m-too-big-for-it-stroller again again again! And of course he showed me how to swing a swing and slide a slide. Keeps my bare feet away from rusty nails and sometime makes me Froot Loops even if I think I-did-it-all-by-myself. And he said he would look after me when I ride the school bus for the very first time. And he looks for me when no one is looking for me and he makes sure I get home for supper. Okay my brodder loves loves loves me even if he isn’t the boss boss boss of me.)

And at nighty-night time Mommy awake – not a morning mommy. And Daddy’s home – I’m Daddy’s little girl Daddy’s home! Brodder shuts up but sometimes a story. Mommy finds at bath and toys in the tub and towel time tics in my ears burrs in my hair from the tall green grass time. Daddy mad Mommy says nothin’ Brodder told-you-so. Tics and burrs just like Smokey Sammy and the big big big red Ireesh Sitter who don’t get baths or towels or cartoons so what’s the big deal?

David Sapp, writer and artist, lives along the southern shore of Lake Erie in North America. A Pushcart nominee, he was awarded Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Grants for poetry and the visual arts. His poetry and prose appear widely in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. His publications include articles in the Journal of Creative Behavior, chapbooks Close to Home and Two Buddha, a novel Flying Over Erie, and a book of poems and drawings titled Drawing Nirvana.

The Myth of the Last Shelter

AI GENERATION

The world was a graveyard of metal and dust. Once, it had been a thriving ecosystem—a place of green forests, blue skies, and quiet lakes. Now, all that remained were ruins. The air was thick with the acrid scent of burning plastic and oil, and the ground was cracked, barren, like a wound that refused to heal.

Three piglets—small and fragile in the face of this post-apocalyptic landscape—struggled to survive. Each had their vision of how life could continue in the ruins, each had their own idea of shelter, safety, and salvation. But the truth was simple: none of them were truly safe.

The first piglet, named Ironhoof, built his fortress of steel. Tall spires of metal rose like the bones of a giant, sharp and cold, stretching toward the gray sky. He filled his walls with machines—giant gears that turned without purpose, engines that roared in the silence, weapons that gleamed with dangerous promise. To Ironhoof, survival was about control, about the power of human-made structures, about making a world where nothing could touch him. But the walls of his fortress did not protect him from the constant hum of emptiness. As the wind howled outside, he sat alone in his sterile tower, staring at the screen that flickered in the dark. He wanted power, but it was the lack of meaning that gnawed at him.

The second piglet, Greenwhisk, crafted a dwelling of glass and plants. Her structure was a delicate blend of bio-tech and nature—vines curled around the frames, and bio-luminescent moss lit the pathways at night. She dreamt of a world where harmony with nature could return, where the earth could heal itself. The winds whispered through the leaves of trees that grew in the heart of her shelter, their roots entwined with the very wires that powered her home. Yet, Greenwhisk found no peace in the rustling of leaves. The gentle hum of life outside her walls was tainted by the constant reminder of the world’s decay. She wondered if she was merely hiding in a fragile illusion—a fragile dream that would wither when the last resource ran dry.

The third piglet, named Wildtail, had built his home in the ruins of nature itself. His shelter was less a building than an extension of the land—a cavernous space woven into the roots of an ancient tree, where branches reached down like veins connecting the past to the future. His philosophy was that true survival lay in returning to the land, in living as one with the forgotten world, in surrendering to the rhythms of the earth. Yet, as he lay in his shelter, he could hear the groans of the land itself, the cracking of the trees, the faint whispers of extinction in every gust of wind. How long could the earth withstand the weight of their need?

The world outside was constantly shifting—storms brewed and passed, but each one left its mark. The threats were always there—bandits who roamed the broken roads, scavengers who preyed on the weak, and the unrelenting erosion of the planet’s resources. But as each attack came, each threat loomed larger, the piglets began to see a different truth.

One evening, as the sun fell beneath a sky the color of ash, a violent storm raged over the land. Ironhoof’s fortress shook as the winds slammed against its steel walls. His machines buzzed erratically, flickering in and out of power. Greenwhisk’s plants withered under the pressure, their bioluminescent glow dimming, leaves curling in defeat. Wildtail’s tree was bent, its branches snapped like bones under the force of the storm.

The piglets emerged from their shelters and met in the middle of the ruined land. They had survived the storm, but the cost was clear. Ironhoof’s walls were battered and rusting. Greenwhisk’s glass cracked under the pressure. Wildtail’s roots had begun to decay.

“We are losing,” Ironhoof said, his voice hollow. “None of our shelters stand up to this world. We build, and it is destroyed. Over and over again.”

Greenwhisk, staring at the shattered remnants of her plants, spoke softly, “Perhaps we were never meant to fight against the world. Maybe we were meant to live with it. But even that… it’s slipping away.”

Wildtail, his eyes reflecting the dying light of the storm, whispered, “Maybe we’re not meant to survive at all. Maybe we’ve already lost.”

The three piglets stood in silence, facing the crumbling ruins of their shelters, and in that silence, they realized the true destruction was not in the storm, not in the broken world—but in themselves. They had built their shelters to protect against the world, but they had never stopped to question their own hearts, their own contradictions.

Ironhoof had sought power, but in the end, he was trapped within his own fortress of isolation. Greenwhisk had sought harmony with nature, but had she been blinded by her idealism, too fragile to withstand the world’s cruelty? Wildtail had sought surrender to the earth, but the earth was already dying, and with it, so was he.

They stood there, each lost in the ruins of their beliefs. The world was no longer something they could fight against—it was something that had already claimed them. The storm had passed, but the true storm—the one within them—raged on.

In the end, there was no answer. There was only the wind, the empty sky, and the sound of their hearts slowly breaking, one beat at a time.

Heralding God’s Magnificence

Lord, thank you for grace
For you are with me always as I run my race
Inspite of my nakedness, you shield me with your lace
By faith, I can move mountains
For you’ve made me an ace
Christ is my base
I can’t be shaken by life’s rays
For in God’s presence, I’m more than all mays
And in Christ, I put my enemies at infinite bays
The Lord God is in charge of my case
For His word is greater than what anybody says
His death on the cross is greater than all my big pays
So, I’ve chosen to serve Him, Grace!

(D)

We Are Children!

We make the world go round

but we are taken to the ground

We make ourselves ready to be used

but we are abused!

We make the world a proud place

but we are pushed aside in many ways!

We make up the figure

but we  are not shown the gesture!

We make forgiveness our priority

but we are faced with cruelty!

We make the truth our watch-word

but we are influenced by the Liar’s Rod!

We make the world one

but we are treated as none!

We make freedom play out itself

but we are stuck in the growing years of  self!

We make ourselves happy at school

but we are not just cool!

We make our elders better brethren

but we are children!

O THAT MACBETH HAD READ A POEM!

In fact, while doing some evil deed, a man does not need to think. But if he is doing some good deed, he has to stop and consider what consequences he may have to face.

****

When stones start sparkling with emotions, literature can be said to have performed its part to perfection.

-Anand

It is no exaggeration to say that evil dominates the human psyche more than any other emotion, like love or compassion. Macbeth and Dr. Faustus appear as objective correlatives of evil. But this article questions were they entirely evil? Is goodness an outer growth over evil, or is evil an outer growth over good? My thesis is that all men invariably are made of the shining stuff, and evil is a super imposition, and can be erased with sharp tools of wit, wisdom and satire.

As far as human society is concerned, goodness has already been pushed to the margins. The animals and birds also indulge in killings but this violence cannot be classified as Evil. People do show sparks of goodness, but very occasionally, while evil is on the elephant ride in the streets of this kingdom, which belongs to God, but is run by monsters. The good remain huddled in corners of existence, whereas the centre stage is grabbed by evil mongers. When evil multiplies and threatens the very fabric of the society, God sends apocalyptic beings like Lord Krishna and Jesus Christ. But it is also a fact that as soon as they disappear from the world, people come back to their original setting, of vileness, suppression and exploitation of the good. The pages of human history depict either wars or men who created havoc with the masses in the name of religion.  It appears either there were no good periods in history, or they are intentionally ignored because they do not offer thrills which a reader expects from the reading of history.

Footfall at the Gate of Hell

The  Reception at the Gate of Heaven remains closed most of the time. Once or twice during a month, the office opens to admit one or two persons at the most. In fact,  it is the Reception at the Gate of Hell where you find most festive conditions. People come in hordes singing folk songs, carrying drinks and beauties in their laps. It is another thing, the monsters welcome them, and after a thorough investigation, they are directed to the Purgatory.

The scene inspires horror when we try to guess how rampant is evil in our society. Some scientists from Lustus University lost their lives when a speeding bus tumbled into an abyss while negotiating a sharp turn high on a mountain. On reaching the Gate of Hell, they were engaged in a verbal duel with the Reception staff.

‘There is no goodness in this world. It is not possible to find one person who believes in good. Close down the  Reception Centre for Heaven,’  they argued so vehemently that  senior functionaries of Hell and Heaven had to intervene.

Course Correction

Brahma detailed Indra to bring them to the Emergency. All of them were laid on different tables, and given injections of inertia. When the operation was over, and the Professors of Lustus University were back in their senses, a video was played which showed how each man’s consciousness was turned naked, and then, with sharp-edged appliances, the dirt frozen on their consciousness was layered off. After several days of deep digging, a shining layer of light was visible.

The merchants of darkness were stunned to realize that they were essentially made up of the shining stuff. However, man becomes oblivious of this sublimity of his being when layers of dust fall and freeze on the shiny surface.  What really transforms the evil souls is the power of goodness, exampled by its practitioners [like the Bishop in Victor Hugo’s novel Les Miserables] Man not only learns but he even unlearns by example.

The Flop Triumvirate

With evil so rampant, if we are getting oblivious of the dividing line between good and evil, it is because our elders have not learnt their ropes well. The teachers, the parents, the religious leaders – are responsible if the moral fabric of the society has deteriorated. The reality is that Evil comes to man far more naturally than good. In fact, while doing some evil deed, a man does not need to think. But if he is doing some good deed, he has to stop and consider what consequences he may have to face. It is the fear of consequences of being good, straight, honest and kind that most of the people have said good bye to this domain.

The emotional demography of good and evil can be understood with the help of the following graph. Thirty percent people can go to any extent in the domain of evil. Five percent people practice goodness and cannot be deflected from their path. However, the remaining sixty five percent keep shifting from good to evil and evil to good depending on their necessities.

Re-forming the Social Fabric

If we want to re-form and re-organize our society, we have to contend with the truth  that religion and fears of hell do not horrorize any Faustus now. Millions of people will be ready to sign in blood a contract with the Devil which ensures them twenty four years of thrills. The horror of Faustus’ destiny is no longer a deterrent for evil-mongering which has now become a  romantic fantasy.

Art and Literature

Society lacks the tools with which it should be able to touch the souls of the people. The best way is Art and Literature.  A poem is truly magnificent if it can tear off the layers of unreality, faithlessness, despair and doubt, from the consciousness of a person who has no direct or indirect connect with art or literature. When stones start sparkling with emotions, literature can be said to have performed its part to perfection.

Dr. Jernail Singh Anand, [the Seneca, Charter of Morava, Franz Kafka and Maxim Gorky awards Laureate, with an opus of 180 books, whose name adorns the Poets’ Rock in Serbia]]  is a towering literary figure whose work embodies a rare fusion of creativity, intellect, and moral vision.