Detective Sherlock Holmes: The Fictional Character Without a Rival

Master detective Sherlock Holmes remains as famous today as when he first appeared more than 125 years ago, during the late reign of Queen Victoria (1837-1901).

A new exhibition, Sherlock Holmes: The Man Who Never Lived and Will Never Die, is on view at the Museum of London.

The exhibition will show how Sherlock Holmes emerged from the pages of Arthur Conan Doyle's novels and became a real-life character. It will also highlight Sherlock Holmes's relationship with London, the city that served as the setting for many of his famous adventures.

Sidney Paget's drawing from The Adventure Of Silver Blaze, on display in a new exhibition

Fame overshadows "father"

The centerpiece of the exhibition is a large oil painting hanging on the wall, depicting Arthur Conan Doyle, the “father” of the detective character Sherlock Holmes. Rarely shown to the public, this painting was painted by artist Sidney Paget in 1897, when Doyle was not yet 40 years old. A decade earlier, he had created the world’s most famous detective character. But by 1897, Sherlock Holmes’s reputation had eclipsed that of his “father.”

The exhibition also traces how the residents of 221B Baker Street in London – the fictional upper-class residential area in the Sherlock Holmes books – became a real-life legend. It also highlights Holmes’ influence on real life through his many stage, television and film adaptations, including the BBC series Sherlock, starring Benedict Cumberbatch.

“Benedict Cumberbatch wore this coat in the film,” says exhibition curator Alex Werner, pointing to a Belstaff cloak borrowed from the artists who created the character of Sherlock Holmes. “For a new generation, it is as iconic as Sherlock Holmes’s hunting hat and pipe. In fact, it was the American actor William Gillette who made the pipe a trademark of Sherlock Holmes when he played the character in the first stage adaptations. It was the artist Sidney Paget who made Sherlock Holmes’s hunting hat famous, not Doyle’s depictions.”

Portrait of writer Doyle through the strokes of artist Paget

Leave a deep mark in real life

This is the largest Sherlock Holmes exhibition in decades. “We have tried to show artifacts related to the formation of Sherlock Holmes, such as the first lines in which Doyle mentions a character named Sherrinford Holmes. This is to bring a clearer cultural approach to the Sherlock Holmes phenomenon,” said curator Werner.

Interestingly, the exhibition also features videos of the actors who have portrayed Sherlock Holmes on screen over the years. These include British actor Basil Rathbone, who played Holmes in the 1940s; Douglas Wilmer in the BBC film of the 1960s; and Jeremy Brett in the Holmes television series of the 1980s.

For later generations, the detective Sherlock Holmes has had such a strong presence in real life that they often think he is a real person rather than a fictional character. “The character of Sherlock Holmes has been constantly reinvented since his first appearance. The BBC series Sherlock is the most obvious recent example. No fictional character can compete with Sherlock Holmes,” says Werner.

He also said that when Holmes appeared, the publishing industry took off, targeting an increasingly literate public. Therefore, the characters of Holmes and Dr. Watson quickly became ingrained in the minds of readers. Later, the adventures of Sherlock Holmes became a fascinating subject for pioneering filmmakers.

“Technological and scientific change has contributed a lot to the creation of the Sherlock Holmes legend. He has always been a modern detective and he adapts easily to later times,” Werner said.

According to TT&VH