Dr. Joe Bell: Model for Sherlock Holmes - Softcover

Liebow, Ely M.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0879721987 ISBN 13: 9780879721985

Publisher: Popular Press 3, 1982

Synopsis

     A distinguished physician and professor of medicine at Edinburgh University, and a forensic expert for the British Crown, Joseph Bell was well known for his remarkable powers of observation and deduction. In what would become true Sherlockian fashion, he had the ability to deduce facts about his patients from otherwise unremarkable details. In one instance recounted by Arthur Conan Doyle himself—and similar to Sherlock Holmes's own observations in "The Greek Interpreter"—Bell took little time to determine that one of his patients had recently served in the army, a non-commissioned officer discharged from his Highland regiment stationed in Barbados:

“The man was a respectful man, but did not remove his hat. They do not in the army, but he would have learned civilian ways had he been long discharged. He has an air of authority and he is obviously Scottish. As to Barbados, his complaint is elephantitis, which is West Indian and not British.”

     Based on extensive research into the life of Bell and including tantalizing accounts of the connections between Bell and Conan Doyle, this biography is required reading for anyone interested in Victorian medicine, in the history of detective fiction, and in Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson.

About this title

About the Author:

Ely M. Liebow is professor emeritus of English at Northeastern Illinois University.

From Booklist:

Liebow writes that it matters little whether Bell was the model or a model for Sherlock Holmes. What emerges from a journal kept by Bell is a picture of a respectable Victorian with a scalpel-sharp mind and amazing powers of observation and of a devoted husband and father. On the basis of research gathered from books, medical journals, and newspapers, Liebow traces Bell's family history, his time spent at Edinburgh University and the Royal Infirmary, his work training nurses, and his relationship with Arthur Conan Doyle, who took surgical classes taught by Bell. Liebow believes that Bell was a fitting model "for one of the must heroic of all literary creations." J. N. Stisted, who wrote the foreword, is the great-grandson of Bell and has one of the letters, written on May 4, 1892, from Doyle to Bell. Liebow has written a vivid portrait of Bell, giving readers a rich understanding of the man and his friendship with Sherlock Holmes' creator. George Cohen
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

About this edition

• Publisher: Popular Press 3
• Publication date: 1982
• ISBN 10: 0879721987
• ISBN 13: 9780879721985
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 286