Sherlock Holmes

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Sherlock Holmes

Although he is partnered with Dr Watson, Sherlock Holmes is clearly the protagonist in the story. Holmes is a private detective, who is employed by people to solve problems without the police.

Through Watson's eyes

As Dr Watson narrates the story, Holmes is presented through his eyes.
Watson hugely admires Holmes, describing him as intelligent, methodical and, overall, a brilliant detective.
Watson is almost happy to be proven wrong or to not know how to solve the case because he learns from Holmes.
Watson also appears to relish watching the way in which Holmes’ mind works.

Mental stimulation

Right from the beginning of the novella, we learn that Holmes needs to feel mental stimulation or he feels that his brain cannot cope – at the start, this takes the form of injecting himself with powerful drugs; later on, the investigation provides him with enough challenge to make taking drugs unnecessary.

Holmes' intelligence

From the start, Holmes demonstrates his brilliantly-intelligent mind and his powerful skills of detection and deduction.
Holmes is very confident in his own intelligence – he even tells Watson to stop romanticising stories about his skills because the factual side of it is impressive on its own.
He seems to enjoy the fact that his brain works differently and that he is more intelligent than other people – even with Watson, he deliberately holds details of the case back until an appropriately-dramatic time.

Initially oblivious

Holmes is initially presented as being somewhat oblivious to people’s needs – in Chapter 3, he does not seem to care that Mary Morstan is getting upset.
When Holmes does not even realise that Mary is attractive, Watson calls him an ‘automaton’, implying that he is emotionless and unsociable (as well as highly-intelligent).

Good at talking to people

But in the rest of the novella, we are shown that he is actually very good at talking to people and getting what he wants.
Holmes does this especially well with Jonathan Small in Chapter 12.
Small is volatile towards Inspector Jones but confesses to Holmes because Holmes speaks to him politely.

Cyclical Nature of Sherlock Holmes' Life

Every main character in the story seems to change in some way, except for Holmes.

Starts and ends with drugs

Whilst Watson and Mary develop a romantic relationship, Holmes returns to normal.
- Sherlock Holmes’ character experiences a cyclical structure – at the end, as he did at the start, he sits down and injects himself with drugs.

Machine-like existence

We could link this to Watson calling Holmes a ‘machine’ and an ‘automaton’ – he lives for one purpose: to solve puzzles.
- When Holmes does not have these puzzles, his brain cannot function properly, and so he uses drugs to give himself a mental boost.
This is almost like Holmes, the machine, is just on stand-by between cases, waiting for the next one, which he will solve with ease before going back to stand-by.

Cycle of investigations

Holmes’ life, like the structure of the story itself, follows a set cycle of investigation after investigation – this is the only thing that brings meaning to his life.