The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes: Gilded Pocket Edition

by Arthur Conan Doyle, Sidney Paget (Illustrator)

Overview

This handsome hardback edition presents the first collection in Arthur Conan Doyle's classic Sherlock Holmes stories, featuring gold cover embossing, gilded page-edges, and original illustrations by Sidney Paget.

Sherlock Holmes and the faithful Dr Watson are featured here in a series of twelve of their earliest cases. They include A Scandal in Bohemia where Holmes comes up against and unexpected advesary; The Red-Headed League, which begins with a bizarre newspaper advertisement for red-haired men; and The Adventure of the Speckled Band, in which the great detective traces a sinister whistling sound to its lethal source. First published month by month in The Strand magazine (1891-1892), the stories are illustrated by Sidney Paget, who created the image of Holmes in his signature deerstalker hat and Inverness cape.

This beautiful pocket-sized gift edition contains the classic, unabridged text, presented with a gold embossed cover design, ivory pages, classic illustrations, beautifully designed endpapers and gold gilded page edges. Part of the Arcturus Ornate Classics series, this book makes wonderful gift for any lover of classic literature.

ABOUT THE SERIES: Arcturus Ornate Classics are beautifully bound editions of iconic literary works across history. These compact, foil-embossed hardbacks are printed using deluxe ivory paper and make the perfect gift.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781398851436
Publisher:	Arcturus Publishing Limited
Publication date:	09/30/2025
Series:	Arcturus Ornate Classics , #61
Pages:	288
Product dimensions:	4.13(w) x 6.50(h) x (d)

About the Author

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930) was a writer and physician. Born in Edinburgh in Scotland, he beganwriting short stories while studying medicine. His first work featuring Sherlock Holmes, A Study in Scarlet, was published in 1886. Relentlessly curious about a vast range of subjects, his interests were reflected in the vast array of knowledge that Sherlock Holmes exhibited in his stories. Conan Doyle died at the age of 71 and is buried in Hampshire.

Sidney Paget (1860-1908) was a popular British illustrator, best known for his illustrations that accompanied Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories in The Strand magazine.

Date of Birth:

May 22, 1859

Date of Death:

July 7, 1930

Place of Birth:

Edinburgh, Scotland

Place of Death:

Crowborough, Sussex, England

Education:

Edinburgh University, B.M., 1881; M.D., 1885

Read an Excerpt

A Scandal in Bohemia

Chapter 1

To Sherlock Holmes she is always the woman. I have seldom heard him mention her under any other name. In his eyes she eclipses and predominates the whole of her sex. It was not that he felt any emotion akin to love for Irene Adler. All emotions, and that one particularly, were abhorrent to his cold, precise but admirably balanced mind. He was, I take it, the most perfect reasoning and observing machine that the world has seen, but as a lover he would have placed himself in a false position. He never spoke of the softer passions, save with a gibe and a sneer. They were admirable things for the observer excellent for drawing the veil from men's motives and actions. But for the trained reasoner to admit such intrusions into his own delicate and finely adjusted temperament was to introduce a distracting factor which might throw a doubt upon all his mental results. Grit in a sensitive instrument, or a crack in one of his own high-power lenses, would not be more disturbing than a strong emotion in a nature such as his. And yet there was but one woman to him, and that woman was the late Irene Adler, of dubious and questionable memory.

I had seen little of Holmes lately. My marriage had drifted us away from each other. My own complete happiness, and the home centred interests which rise up around the man who first finds himself master of his own establishment, were sufficient to absorb all my attention, while Holmes, who loathed every form of society with his whole Bohemian soul, remained in our lodgings in Baker Street, buried among his old books, and alternating from week to week betweencocaine and ambition, the drowsiness of the drug and the fierce energy of his own keen nature. He was still, as ever, deeply attracted by the study of crime, and occupied his immense faculties and extraordinary powers of observation in following out those clues, and clearing up those mysteries which had been abandoned as hopeless by the official police. From time to time I heard some vague account of his doings: of his summons to Odessa in the case of the Trepoff murder, of his clearing up of the singular tragedy of the Atkinson brothers at Trincomalee, and finally of the mission which he had accomplished so delicately and successfully for the reigning family of Holland. Beyond these signs of his activity, however, which I merely shared with all the readers of the daily press, I knew little of my former friend and companion.

One night—it was on the twentieth of March, 1888—I was returning from a journey to a patient (for I had now returned to civil practice), when my way led me through Baker Street. As I passed the well remembered door, which must always be associated in my mind with my wooing, and with the dark incidents of the Study in Scarlet, I was seized with a keen desire to see Holmes again, and to know how he was employing his extraordinary powers. His rooms were brilliantly lit, and, even as I looked up, I saw his tall, spare figure pass twice in a dark silhouette against the blind. He was pacing the room swiftly, eagerly, with his head sunk upon his chest and his hands clasped behind him. To me, who knew his every mood and habit, his attitude and manner told their own story. He was at work again. He had risen out of his drug-created dreams and was hot upon the scent of some new problem. I rang the bell and was shown up to the chamber which had formerly been in part my own.

His manner was not effusive. It seldom was; but he was glad, I think, to see me. With hardly a word spoken, but with a kindly eye, he waved me to an armchair, threw across his case of cigars, and indicated a spirit case and a gasogene in the corner. Then he stood before the fire and looked me over in his singular introspective fashion.

"Wedlock suits you," he remarked. "I think, Watson, that you have put on seven and a half pounds since I saw you."

"Seven!" I answered.

"Indeed, I should have thought a little more. Just a trifle more, I fancy, Watson. And in practice again, I observe. You did not tell me that you intended to go into harness."

"Then, how do you know?"

"I see it, I deduce it. How do I know that you have been getting yourself very wet lately, and that you have a most clumsy and careless servant girl?""My dear Holmes," said I, "this is too much. You would certainly have been burned, had you lived a few centuries ago. It is true that I had a country walk on Thursday and came home in a dreadful mess, but as I have changed my clothes I can't imagine how you deduce it. As to Mary Jane, she is incorrigible, and my wife has given her notice; but there, again, I fail to see how you work it out."

He chuckled to himself and rubbed his long, nervous hands together."It is simplicity itself," said he; "my eyes tell me that on the inside of your left shoe, just where the firelight strikes it, the leather is scored by six almost parallel cuts. Obviously they have been caused by someone who has very carelessly scraped round the edges of the sole in order to remove crusted mud from it. Hence, you see, my double deduction that you had been out in vile weather, and that you had a particularly malignant boot-slitting specimen of the London slavey. As to your practice, if a gentleman walks into my rooms smelling of iodoform, with a black mark of nitrate of silver upon his right forefinger, and a bulge on the right side of his top hat to show where he has secreted his stethoscope, I must be dull, indeed, if I do not pronounce him to be an active member of the medical profession."

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
Introduction
A Scandal in Bohemia
The Red-Headed League
A Case of Identity
The Boscombe Valley Mystery
The Five Orange Pips
The Man with the Twisted Lip
The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle
The Adventure of the Speckled Band
The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb
The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor
The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet
The Adventure of the Copper Beeches

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"Prebble's performance is spot on; he ably and admirably assumes the tales' many voices and dialects." —-Library Journal Audio Review

Editorial Reviews

Conan Doyle's collection of short stories, first published in 1892 and featuring the world's most famous fictional detective, translates successfully to audio as narrated by Simon Prebble (www.simonprebble.com), who has previously read several other of Conan Doyle's later works for Tantor. Prebble's performance is spot on; he ably and admirably assumes the tales' many voices and dialects. With the recent success of the Sherlock Holmes movie, these 12 stories—which include "A Case of Identity," "The Boscombe Valley Mystery," and "The Man with the Twisted Lip"—will certainly appeal to a new generation of Holmes fans. [Includes a full-text PDF ebook; see also the review of CSA Word's production of this title, read by actor Edward Hardwicke, LJ 9/1/09.—Ed.]—Theresa Connors, Arkansas Tech Univ. Lib., Russellville

Library Journal

Conan Doyle did not just create Sherlock Holmes. He reinvented and popularised the mini-series with self-contained episodes — think not just Inspector Morse or Dr Who but Friends and The Simpsons. Andrew Glazzard's expertly curated new edition of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, Conan Doyle's first foray into this endlessly generative form, is a timely invitation for us to binge-read these brilliant stories once again.

Peter D. McDonald

First Rate

The Times Educational Supplement

It is especially appropriate that the man who played Sherlock Holmes' chronicler in the popular series narrates these tales on audio. Hardwicke's reading is subdued, but clear and precise.

The Strand Magazine

You should listen to these wonderfully atmospheric pieces...Edward Hardwicke has the perfect voice for this: resonant, old-fashioned, precise - everyone's idea of a Victorian gent.

The Guardian

For the past decade, Penguin has been producing handsome hardcover versions of their classics (…) both elegant and quirky in shocks of bright color” 
–The New York Times

From the Publisher

In a gravelly voice, Ralph Cosham becomes the voice of Dr. Watson as he narrates 12 of his adventures with Sherlock Holmes. Dashing round London and the English countryside, Watson and Holmes search for villains, deceivers, and the perpetrators of crimes both physical and psychological. Cosham brings these immortal tales to life once again, replete with details both significant and trivial and the sights and sounds of late-nineteenth-century London. Cosham uses subtle accents to differentiate the characters. Watson is characterized with droll, smoky tones, and Holmes is portrayed with an even cadence and soft tones. The other characters have accents reminiscent of their stations, nationalities, and gender. Cosham captures the genius of Sherlock Holmes, the faithful friendship of Dr. Watson, the language of their time, and their zest for adventure. M.B.K. © AudioFile 2010, Portland, Maine

FEBRUARY 2010 - AudioFile