An Entirely New Country - Arthur Conan Doyle, Undershaw and the Resurrection of Sherlock Holmes [Paperback]

I recently purchased this book because firstly I was curious about Sir Arthur Conan-Doyle's years in Undershaw and secondly this raises awareness of the Undershaw cause (see more at Undershaw Preservation Trust's website).

I must admit I have never been fond of biographies and other non fiction books. They just have always reminded me too much of the school textbooks which are (with rare exceptions) boring. But I wanted to get to know more about Undershaw and what it meant to Sir Arthur Conan-Doyle and the Sherlockian world. Alistair Duncan has a way with words that keeps a reader like me interested. Even hooked. I have never said that about a non fiction book and I mean it as a compliment. Very well researched, brilliantly written with subtle sparks of humor - I often found myself smiling or chuckling when reading it. Sir Arthur Conan-Doyle lived a very interesting, at times even a bit scandalous life and Alistair's commentary made it unfold before my eyes just like I would be reading a great imaginary story. It doesn't matter whether the story is fictional or tells the true facts, it really is important how it is told. That's a sign of a good story teller and Alistair Duncan is one.

A must have for every Sherlockian (or Holmesian).

"A snapshot is a very revealing thing" writes Mark Gatiss in the foreword to Alistair Duncan's new study of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the man who created Sherlock Holmes. The value of this 'snapshot' is to call attention to the sheer amount of work Doyle carried out during his residence at Hindhead, Surrey, from 1897 to 1907. His home for most of this time was Undershaw, a house he commissioned to be built in a location considered agreeable for his first wife who was suffering from tuberculosis. The house is now sadly neglected, a fact brought home to the reader by Alistair's use of contemporary photos showing dilapidated rooms, much changed since they were used to entertain fin-de-siècle literary society. Alistair navigates us through the diverse range of activities Doyle involved himself with - his volunteering during the Boer War, his literary and theatrical work, his political campaigns, his love of sport - and uses meticulous archive and newspaper research to present us with a decade in the life of a complex public figure who was much more than just a writer of wonderful detective stories. As well as his public life, Alistair considers closely Doyle's complicated private life and is justifiably critical of his treatment of the children from his first marriage on the death of their mother. It is a very readable biographical study which will leave the reader questioning why Undershaw has not been treated with the respect it deserves as an important reminder of our literary heritage.

An Entirely New Country
Type of material: Trade Paperback
Publisher: MX Publishing, London
Year: 2012
Author: Alistair Duncan

This book covers the 10 years (1897-1907) that Arthur Conan Doyle lived at Undershaw, the stately home he built at Hindhead in Surrey, and where he lived with his first wife Louis "Touie" Hawkins Doyle and their two children, Mary and Kingsley. This is Duncan's sequel to The Norwood Author, a 2011 Howlett Literary Award winning book that covers Doyle's life from 1891-94.

The important years covered by this book include the launching of actor William Gillette as the world's embodiment of Holmes due to his smash hit play "Sherlock Holmes." The play was written by Gillette, but began as a play written by Doyle himself.

These years also saw the writing of arguably the greatest Gothic mystery of all time - The Hound of the Baskervilles - and ultimately the resurrection of The Great Detective himself with the publishing of what would eventually become the collection of short stories known as "The Return of Sherlock Holmes." One gathers that, despite Doyle's proclaimed dislike of his famous hero, even he was not content to let sleeping detectives lie.

These pivotal subjects are handled fairly well, as is Doyle's extensive involvement in the Boer War. Other important topics, however, I felt were rather glossed over. For example, it was during this time Doyle campaigned to clear parcee solicitor George Edalji of a charge of maliciously wounding a pony; but the broader issues of racism that surrounded this volatile subject were rather downplayed, leaving Doyle's zeal somewhat without a platform.

We learn that during this period Doyle's wife Louise finally succumbs to her longstanding fight with tuberculosis, but apart from that, we learn very little about their home life together or about her as a person. And, other than learning that Doyle carried on a not-very-private courtship of his second wife Jean Leckie, all the while Louise was still alive, we learn few details about her, either. I was quite interested to learn that during this time Doyle toured the scene of the Jack the Ripper crimes yet, apart from one sentence mentioning that, I learn nothing more about it here.

Each chapter of this book represents one of the 10 years covered and events are recorded chronologically. Duncan makes meticulous use of newspaper clippings, Doyle's diary entries and personal memorabilia provided by the family and there is an ample supply of photographs. Occasionally the author indulges in speculation if the information available to him is ambiguous or if there is an obvious gap in the record; otherwise, the author's journalistic, "just-the-facts" approach to his subject is somewhat dry. I suppose Sherlock Holmes would applaud Duncan's not putting too much color and life into his narrative but I think I should have preferred a more Watsonian approach!

To his credit, his footnotes and bibliography are both excellent, so if one wanted to learn more about Doyle's life with his first family than is provided here, one could perhaps pick up a copy of Out of the Shadows by Georgina Doyle, widow of John Doyle, the son of Arthur's brother Innes. Or, if one wished to learn more about the Edalji case, one could pick up a copy of Julian Barnes's 2005 novel Arthur & George, Gordon Weaver's Conan Doyle and the Parson's Son: The George Edalji Case or Outrage: The Edalji Five and the Shadow of Sherlock Holmes by Roger Oldfield.

For these reasons, I would categorize this more as a useful reference book, although rather limited as an actual biography. Its chronological layout makes it perfectly useful in that respect. It is worth noting that Duncan is a fervent supporter of the Undershaw Preservation Trust, an organization that is in the process of restoring Doyle's home Undershaw to serve as a museum dedicated to Doyle and to Sherlock Holmes. It is a monumental undertaking, and Duncan has pledged a percentage of the royalties from this book to the project.

Mark Gatiss - actor, screenwriter, novelist, co-producer with Steven Moffat of the smash hit BBC series "Sherlock" and Patron of Undershaw since December 2010 provides a worthy foreward to this book.

Reviewed by: By Margaret Whitmer, February, 2013