On Conan Doyle by Michael Dirda

By Kate Phillips 
 

 

          On Conan Doyle by Michael Dirda is a two-fer as both Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Michael Dirda provide Masterclasses. Dirda’s memoir, from his first reading of a Sherlock Holmes mystery as a fifth grader through to his present day membership in The Baker Street Irregulars, is full of the passion all avid readers feel about literary characters they love.

          Dirda recounts how he waited for a stormy day when he was alone in the house to read The Hound of the Baskervilles he bought through a book club at school. First he rode his bike to the store to buy provisions—candy bars, a box of Cracker Jack, and a cold soda—then climbed into a reclining chair under a blanket.

          “In the louring darkness I turned page after page, more than a little scared, gradually learning the origin of the dreaded curse…I shivered with fearful pleasure, scrunched further down under my thick blanket, and took another bite of my Baby Ruth candy bar, as happy as I will ever be.” (page 6)

          Can’t we all relate to that moment?

          This memoir is filled with the joy of reading, of discovering literary greatness, and of learning about other authors with the same feelings paying homage to Conan Doyle with their books like The Incredible Schlock Homes and its sequels by Robert L. Fish, full of puns and deliberately bad jokes, or The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes by Vincent Starrett, a most important study of the canon. A great number of these books are discussed in the text and a list is included in the back on pp. 203-206.

          Dirda also quotes Conan Doyle’s advice for novice writers:

          “…he reminds the novice to build up his vocabulary, to adopt a style that doesn’t draw undue attention to itself, to be natural. Above all, he argues that good writing should follow three rules: ‘The first requisite is to be intelligible. The second is to be interesting. The third is to be clever.’” (page 98)

          This is a fabulous book for anyone who loves Sherlock Holmes, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, or great writing.

          As Dirda states, “Whether you’re looking for mystery or horror, science fiction or romance, social realism or historical fiction, memoir or essay, Arthur Conan Doyle is the writer for you.” (page 199)

Is there a better recommendation than that?

 

 

Books in My Reading Pile

From Kate’s Writing Crate…

          It seems like I have a never-ending reading pile. No matter how fast I read, the pile keeps growing. Where are these books coming from?

          Like most avid readers, I have favorite authors that are must reads. So in my reading pile are Devoted in Death by JD Robb (which I’m just finishing but wouldn’t recommend); Why I Came West by Rick Bass (I love reading memoirs about the Great Outdoors in autumn); and Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader by Anne Fadiman (which I am rereading).

          Many of my friends and co-workers are avid readers, too, so I have books recommended by them including I Shall Not Want by Julia Spencer-Fleming (murder mystery series); Live By Night by Dennis Lehane; All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr (the next book I will start); and South Toward Home: Travels in Southern Literature by Margaret Eby. (I love reading about authors’ lives—and there is something special about southern writers.)

          I watched Michael Dirda on Book TV on C-SPAN2 recently. I’ve read him before so I decided to try On Conan Doyle (a memoir which I’m enjoying immensely) and Bound to Please: An Extraordinary One-Volume Literary Education (which I think I will love).

          Due to good reviews, I picked up Among the Ten Thousand Things by Julia Pierpont (barely started) and My Struggle Book 1 by Karl Ove Knausgaard which is hard to categorize, but is a uniquely fascinating book. (I’m halfway through and plan on reading the other two books in this series. Includes many Insightful Asides.)

          Some of the books in my reading pile I discovered while simply browsing. These include A Field Guide to Getting Lost by Rebecca Solnit (full of Insightful Asides); The Bard on the Brain: Understanding the Mind Through the Art of Shakespeare and the Science of Brain Imaging by Paul M. Matthews, MD, and Jeffrey McQuain, PhD, with a Foreword by Diane Ackerman (she is one of my must read authors); and The Art of Crash Landing by Melissa DeCarlo. (The first paragraph made me laugh and the book contains Insightful Asides).

I also read books recommended by authors I like. The Essay: Old & New, by Edward P. J. Corbett and Sheryl L. Finkle, was a recommendation from William Cane in his book Fiction Writing Master Class (post dated 9/7/15).

What are you reading?