Tribulations of Baskerville - Thesis Example

Farahat engi Eng 3950 March 12, 2010 Tribulations of Baskerville The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle is a fiction story that revolves around the mysteries of an evil spell that befalls one of the eminent families in Britain, the Baskervilles. In the story, the Baskerville family fights against the perceived supernatural powers that haunt them. However, these supernatural powers are a creation of Sir Charles who makes his family belief that the Baskerville is under a spell. In narrating this story, the author highlights some major themes to deliver his plot such as conflict, superstition, crime, mistrust and dishonesty. Through these themes, the author warns his audience against excessive trust on one family member to the extent of defying logic and common sense. The story is retold through the narrator, Dr. Watson, from whose eyes and perspective the story is narrated. The author has used this technique to highlight his character and prominent role within the whole story setting. The first person technique allows the author to develop some consistency in the plot and also create a perspective through which the reader can identify with. Again, this style allows the reader to form some form of relationship and identify with the narrator throughout the story. Ironically, the author warns his author against trusting one family member’s views on certain issues such as superstition and yet narrates the story from the perspective of Dr. Watson alone. The author would have been better off using a neutral perspective. The author has used direct speech in the novel in certain circumstances to allow the audience to develop an opinion on the reasoning of the narrator and some of the characters. Direct speech in the conversational form in the story allows the audience to actually see the personality of the involved character free from the narrator’s opinion. For instance, the narrator viewed some Britons as just being poor due to laziness. On the other hand, Sir Charles, on his return from South Africa viewed the same people as in need of help to enable them lead a better life. Therefore, through this theme of philanthropy in the works of Sir Charles, the author makes the audience aware that the narrator and other characters such as Sir Hugo had differing opinion on the neediness of other Britons in relation to the Baskerville family. Conflict as a theme thus arises as these men are not willing to trust Sir Charles’ perception of philanthropy and poverty. Leadership is another theme that the author has highlighted in the novel in capturing the idea of trust. The author depicts Sir Charles as a kind and understanding man who on his return from South Africa engages in improving the lives of the impoverished people by donating some of his resources. His actions however, do not impress all of his family. Therefore, one person perception of wealth doe not fit all. While Sir Charles viewed wealth as an opportunity to help others in need, Stapleton viewed it as an opportunity to enrich himself by holding on to such. This is also evident from the fact that he was responsible for the collapse of a school he was managing though an outbreak was blamed for the same. However, under conventional wisdom and from history, the audience is likely to perceive embezzlement of funds by Stapleton as the most likely cause of the school’s collapse. Again, it comes out clear that one man cannot be trusted to run a school without overview. Superstition is another theme in the novel that appears constantly where the Baskerville family blames every misfortune that affects them on the curse. Family believes that the curse is meant to bring down the whole family through death and other misfortunes in the family. Sir Charles is depicted as the most superstitious character who passes on the superstitious nature to the rest of the family. He convinces the family that the Baskerville is under spell and even after his death writes a letter indicating such. Though there is no outright evidence of the evil spirits that haunt the Baskerville, the family still believed in him. The belief in the spell led to unwarranted wayward behavior. Again the family attributed anything bad or unfortunate to the evil spell. While the evil spell did not actually exists, the excessive trust that the family placed on Sir Charles convinced them that indeed there was an evil spell on the Baskervilles. It is also paramount to note the theme of relationship particularly family relationship through the inheritance of the hall down the generations of Baskerville family. The author here seeks to argue form two points of views; one of the issue of family unity and strong family relation against weak and poor family relations. For instance, there are family wrangles also where Stapleton decides to take away the life of his relations. Although Sir Charles cannot be trusted on his views of the supernatural and superstitions, his belief in family unity held. It is imperative also to mention the theme of evil power; this is evident since the society believed that the hound that was frustrating the Baskerville family was believed to be a spell that had been cast on them. While the Baskervilles are portrayed as an upright family which through Sir Charles demonstrates sympathy and philanthropy is targeted through an evil spell as interpreted by the family. Despite the wide use of this mechanism, passing of information was also done using written articles such as the letter that Sir Charles Baskerville, left for the upcoming generation comprehensibly warning them of the evil power that was condemning the family and therefore take precaution not to fall victims of the wrath. Written articles within the story allow the reader to have a peek at the mind of the authors of such material. This also creates another platform through which the audience can judge whether the individual characters are trustworthy or untrustworthy. By allowing the audience to also connect with individual characters in form of written articles one can relate the story to one’s family. This is underscores the warning message of trusting one family member excessively such that it cloud reasoning. Written literature also forms the basis for historical data that can be referred to over a period of time. Unlike verbal communication that has no tangible evidence written communication gives principal details that can be used as evidence of how one person can influence the whole family. For instance Sir Charles wrote to his sons: “To my sons, Rodger and John Baskerville. It is time that I told you the legend of you home Baskerville Hall. It is a sad and evil story, but I must protect you. Baskerville has been the home of Hugo Baskerville ….” (Doyle 6). This letter alone gives more clear-cut evidence of Sir Charles superstitious nature through which the whole story is developed. Symbolism as a means of passing information has been greatly deployed. The stick that Dr, Mortimer forgot in Mr. Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson’s apartment at 221B Baker Street when he visited them brought a myriad of suggestions of the implications of such a stick by the middle aged doctor. ‘I have, at least, a well-polished, silver-plated coffee-pot in front of me,’ said he. ‘But, tell me, Watson, what do you make of our visitor’s stick?’ (Doyle 2). Holmes posed this question to Dr. Watson to seek a second opinion. Does this imply that Holmes could not trust his own opinion on the stick? No. The author’s intent here was to draw his audience to the need for consultation and communication in a family. Holmes needed to hear what his friend thought of the Dr. Mortimer’s stick and probably compare it to his own, discuss it and probably reach an agreement. Holmes’ exemplary intellectual capability enables him to bring out the hypocrite in him without detection by others. He asserts that Stapleton is actually one of the Baskerville family members who is not privileged to inherit Sir Henry’s wealth and therefore he chooses to wipe out all the possible heirs. After squandering all the wealth that he had and the downfall of his school due to an outbreak, he resulted to robbery where he gained experience to execute killings with less trouble. He chooses to use a trained Hound that has been dressed to appear supernatural to inflict fear and kill his contenders. All his actions and plans had a sinister motive of acquiring all the inheritance something that all other family member did not seem to realize. Being a family member, the other Baskervilles trusted him and exonerated him from any crime without knowing he was the culprit. The story depicts irony in various instances. For example, Holmes and Watson differ in thought and profession but ironically they form a perfect fit in their decision making and perception on certain issues. It is also ironical that Holmes does not consider Watson as an expert in using the current evidence to come up with the likely happenings in the past though he seems to agree with his arguments in the long run even after initial contrasting views. The stick left behind by the Mortimer caused some arguments between them however Holmes writes down most of the ingenious suggestions of what he makes out of the stick about Mortimer. Dr. Watson seems to be submissive to Holmes and praises his extraordinary judgments, which are portrayed to be authoritative on most of the issues to do with crime. It is astounding that despite his meager confidence in Dr Watson; Holmes goes ahead and sends him to the crime scene to find out on the actual facts that led to the killing of Sir Charles. This shows that trust has to be eared and not offered blindly. When gained, trust is beneficial but when offered blindly just because o family ties, results could be disastrous. Poor decision making and lack of clear thinking is another theme that the author brings out through a number of characters. As for Sir Henry, it is unclear why after acquiring enormous wealth and knowledge from South Africa, he would trouble himself inheriting the moor which put his life in jeopardy through the evil Baskerville curse. Just because the family believed in the Sir Henry’s decision to inherit the moor, the whole family suffered. Again, it is mind boggling why Mortimer should involve himself in the affairs of Sir Henry yet there was little in store for him considering all the dangers that he exposes himself According to the author, family ties are not as tight as we may like to believe. Contrary to the old adage that blood is thicker than water, Stapleton goes ahead and kills Sir Charles and is in the process of killing Sir Henry his nephew when his plans are exposed. Selden was being used by Stapleton to undermine the Baskerville family ties. This way the author warns his audience about placing excessive trust on family members to the point of being unreasonable and throwing all caution to the wind. This novel highlights a number of themes successful as shown by the discussed examples. However, the author has given weight to very many themes which the scope of the paper does not allow covering and as a result, some of the major themes that would be expected from such as mystery story do not surface strongly. For instance, robbery and violence are highlighted in a relatively mild manner whereas the same would be expected to surface strongly so as to capture the detective element of the story and the characters involved. Nevertheless, is successful in portraying numerous themes without losing context and without watering down the story. Work Cited Doyle, Sir Arthur. The Hound of the Baskervilles: 150th Anniversary. Signet Classics, 2001. Read More