In Part 1, Chapter 1, Doyle uses visual imagery to describe the place where Dr. John Watson first encounters Sherlock Holmes: a chemical laboratory in a hospital he has visited many times before, where he finds Holmes busily experimenting with a chemical test he has invented for the police to identify blood at crime scenes. The imagery used to describe their first encounter foreshadows the profound effect that his friendship with Holmes will come to have on his life:
As [Stamford] spoke, we [entered] a wing of the great hospital. It was familiar ground to me, and I needed no guiding as we ascended the bleak stone staircase and made out way down the long corridor with its vista of whitewashed walls and dun-coloured doors. Near the further end a low arched passage branched away from it and led to the chemical laboratory.
This was a lofty chamber, lined and littered with countless bottles. Broad, low tables were scattered about, which bristled with retorts, test-tubes, and little Bunsen lamps, with their blue flickering flames.
In this passage’s first paragraph, Doyle uses imagery to convey the monotony, boredom, and aimlessness that has characterized Watson’s life since moving to London after serving as an army doctor in Afghanistan. The colors of the hospital hallway are described as dull and muted (“bleak,” “whitewashed,” and “dun-colored”) reflecting the bleak colorlessness of Watson’s life since his arrival in London. He appears to be somewhat depressed as a result of the physical and emotional trauma he experienced in the Afghanistan war, describing his life as a “comfortless, meaningless existence” and London as “that great cesspool into which all the loungers and idlers of the Empire are irresistibly drained,” revealing his dreary outlook on life. The dull color palette of the hospital corridor could be read as representing Watson’s despondent mood at the beginning of the novel, as well as his aimlessness following the removal of his purpose—helping wounded soldiers in the war—after being injured and dispatched from service.
Further, the image of endless “dun-coloured” doors stretching down the hall into infinity and Watson’s description of the corridor as “familiar ground” gives this paragraph a sense of repetition, suggesting that Watson has been stuck in a monotonous cycle. Despite his depressed mood, Watson’s sarcastic use of the word “vista” to describe such a boring hallway reveals his wry sense of humor, which colors his narration throughout the novel.
When Watson enters the chemical laboratory, the passage’s mood shifts. First, he describes the “low arched passage” leading into the lab as “branching away” from the main hallway. This image of a smaller passage branching away from the main route represents Sherlock Holmes’s eccentricity and unconventional ways of thinking (his tendency to take the road less traveled, so to speak), which lie at the root of his genius. Second, Watson describes the lab as a “lofty chamber,” opening up from the lower-ceilinged hallway, which represents the exciting and unfamiliar world that his friendship with Holmes will open up for him. The “lofty chamber” could also be read as representing Holmes’s mind; “lofty” can mean either intellectual or arrogant, and Holmes is certainly both. Finally, the imagery of blue flames beneath the Bunsen lamps are the first splash of color in an otherwise dull description, suggesting that Holmes will lend some color to Watson’s colorless life.
In Part 1, Chapter 2, when first describing what Sherlock Holmes looks like, Doyle uses visual imagery to emphasize Holmes’s striking and intelligent appearance:
His very person and appearance were such as to strike the attention of the most casual observer. In height he was rather over six feet, and so excessively lean he seemed to be considerably taller. His eyes were sharp and piercing [...] and his thin, hawk-like nose gave his whole expression an air of alertness and decision. His chin, too, had a prominence and squareness which mark the man of determination. His hands were invariably blotted with ink and stained with chemicals, yet he was possessed of extraordinary delicacy of touch[.]
By highlighting such visual details as Holmes’s “sharp and piercing eyes” and his “thin, hawk-like nose [which] gave his whole expression an air of alertness and decision,” Doyle implicitly compares Holmes to a hawk or other bird of prey. Birds of prey are notorious for having extraordinarily keen eyesight—much keener than humans, hence the idiom, “to watch someone like a hawk.” This association between Holmes and a bird of prey highlights his exceptional observational skills, which are part of what makes him such a talented detective.
The imagery of Holmes’s ink-blotted and chemical-stained hands suggest that he is a man who often engages in intellectual pursuits such as writing and scientific experimentation, as well as indicates that he is so obsessive about these pursuits that he is prone to neglecting his appearance. By describing Holmes as being “excessively lean,” Doyle also reveals that he is a man who lives primarily in the realm of the mind. Because he is so focused on his intellectual pursuits, the description suggests, he often forgets to take care of bodily needs, like eating.
In his description of Holmes’s appearance, Doyle reveals an attitude very popular in the 19th century, when A Study in Scarlet was written: that one’s character can be “read” by closely examining their physical appearance. This popular pseudoscience was called physiognomy. Essentially, it proposed that specific physical characteristics correlated with specific personality traits. So when Doyle discusses Holmes’s chin as having “a prominence and squareness which mark the man of determination,” he is invoking this idea of physiognomy. Physiognomy is closely linked with scientific racism in the 19th century, since people who believed in it would often associate typically non-white features with negative qualities and typically white features with positive ones. It was, however, very common for authors of the time to use physiognomic descriptions in their fiction: Charlotte Brontë and Charles Dickens are two examples of this.
In Part 1, Chapter 3, Doyle gives another physiognomic description, this time of the murdered man Enoch Drebber:
On his rigid face there stood an expression of horror, and as it seemed to me, of hatred […] This malignant and terrible contortion, combined with the low forehead, blunt nose, and prognathous jaw gave the dead man a singularly ape-like appearance.
This physiognomic description of Drebber’s face gives an insight into the link between physiognomy and the development of criminology as a discipline in the 19th century. Many criminologists at the time believed that you could predict someone’s propensity for crime through their facial features. The imagery of a “low forehead, blunt nose,” jutting jaw, and “ape-like appearance” are all characteristics that these criminologists commonly listed as indicating criminal behavior. This view of criminology has been discredited in the present day, since it suggests that the factors that go into crime are purely biological and fails to take into account the many social factors that can influence criminal behavior.
In Part 1, Chapter 2, when first describing what Sherlock Holmes looks like, Doyle uses visual imagery to emphasize Holmes’s striking and intelligent appearance:
His very person and appearance were such as to strike the attention of the most casual observer. In height he was rather over six feet, and so excessively lean he seemed to be considerably taller. His eyes were sharp and piercing [...] and his thin, hawk-like nose gave his whole expression an air of alertness and decision. His chin, too, had a prominence and squareness which mark the man of determination. His hands were invariably blotted with ink and stained with chemicals, yet he was possessed of extraordinary delicacy of touch[.]
By highlighting such visual details as Holmes’s “sharp and piercing eyes” and his “thin, hawk-like nose [which] gave his whole expression an air of alertness and decision,” Doyle implicitly compares Holmes to a hawk or other bird of prey. Birds of prey are notorious for having extraordinarily keen eyesight—much keener than humans, hence the idiom, “to watch someone like a hawk.” This association between Holmes and a bird of prey highlights his exceptional observational skills, which are part of what makes him such a talented detective.
The imagery of Holmes’s ink-blotted and chemical-stained hands suggest that he is a man who often engages in intellectual pursuits such as writing and scientific experimentation, as well as indicates that he is so obsessive about these pursuits that he is prone to neglecting his appearance. By describing Holmes as being “excessively lean,” Doyle also reveals that he is a man who lives primarily in the realm of the mind. Because he is so focused on his intellectual pursuits, the description suggests, he often forgets to take care of bodily needs, like eating.
In his description of Holmes’s appearance, Doyle reveals an attitude very popular in the 19th century, when A Study in Scarlet was written: that one’s character can be “read” by closely examining their physical appearance. This popular pseudoscience was called physiognomy. Essentially, it proposed that specific physical characteristics correlated with specific personality traits. So when Doyle discusses Holmes’s chin as having “a prominence and squareness which mark the man of determination,” he is invoking this idea of physiognomy. Physiognomy is closely linked with scientific racism in the 19th century, since people who believed in it would often associate typically non-white features with negative qualities and typically white features with positive ones. It was, however, very common for authors of the time to use physiognomic descriptions in their fiction: Charlotte Brontë and Charles Dickens are two examples of this.
In Part 1, Chapter 3, Doyle gives another physiognomic description, this time of the murdered man Enoch Drebber:
On his rigid face there stood an expression of horror, and as it seemed to me, of hatred […] This malignant and terrible contortion, combined with the low forehead, blunt nose, and prognathous jaw gave the dead man a singularly ape-like appearance.
This physiognomic description of Drebber’s face gives an insight into the link between physiognomy and the development of criminology as a discipline in the 19th century. Many criminologists at the time believed that you could predict someone’s propensity for crime through their facial features. The imagery of a “low forehead, blunt nose,” jutting jaw, and “ape-like appearance” are all characteristics that these criminologists commonly listed as indicating criminal behavior. This view of criminology has been discredited in the present day, since it suggests that the factors that go into crime are purely biological and fails to take into account the many social factors that can influence criminal behavior.
