Tension and Atmosphere in "The Hound of the Baskervilles"
Tension and Atmosphere in “The Hound of the Baskervilles” by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was born in 1859. His mother Mary Doyle regularly read to him which is where he began his own love of books. Some years after graduating from college in 1876 he began writing. His first Sherlock Holmes book was “A Study in Scarlet”, written in 1887. “The Hound of the Baskervilles” was written in 1902.
The plot of this story focuses on a hound, supposedly trying to kill off the Baskerville family. Holmes himself is a very clever and interesting character. He manages to identify the tiny details that most people would not be able to spot. Although in the rest of the series Sherlock Holmes is the main character, Dr. Watson, Holmes’s assistant, is the main focus in this book.
“The Hound of the Baskervilles” consists of a series of dramatic events. Each one of these events is exciting and some are quite scary. This leads you into the story, continuously making you want to know what is going to happen next.
Early in the book, it is possible to spot the ways in which Conan Doyle creates tension and atmosphere. The opening of the story presents Holmes and Watson, discussing a walking stick that has been left behind by a visitor. They have not met this visitor as he visited when they were out. We, as readers, do not know anything about him at this point. Conan Doyle is withholding information from us in order to create tension. This works because it makes us think that there is something mysterious going on, and we want to read on further, in order to find out what it is. The walking stick has a name engraved on it, but we do not know who “James Mortimer” is or why he was there in the first place.
Conan Doyle uses unanswered questions as a technique to make us want to read on to find out the answer. In chapter two, Holmes finds out about the legend of the hound from a manuscript that Dr. James Mortimer shows to him. This creates tension because we immediately think of
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was born in 1859. His mother Mary Doyle regularly read to him which is where he began his own love of books. Some years after graduating from college in 1876 he began writing. His first Sherlock Holmes book was “A Study in Scarlet”, written in 1887. “The Hound of the Baskervilles” was written in 1902.
The plot of this story focuses on a hound, supposedly trying to kill off the Baskerville family. Holmes himself is a very clever and interesting character. He manages to identify the tiny details that most people would not be able to spot. Although in the rest of the series Sherlock Holmes is the main character, Dr. Watson, Holmes’s assistant, is the main focus in this book.
“The Hound of the Baskervilles” consists of a series of dramatic events. Each one of these events is exciting and some are quite scary. This leads you into the story, continuously making you want to know what is going to happen next.
Early in the book, it is possible to spot the ways in which Conan Doyle creates tension and atmosphere. The opening of the story presents Holmes and Watson, discussing a walking stick that has been left behind by a visitor. They have not met this visitor as he visited when they were out. We, as readers, do not know anything about him at this point. Conan Doyle is withholding information from us in order to create tension. This works because it makes us think that there is something mysterious going on, and we want to read on further, in order to find out what it is. The walking stick has a name engraved on it, but we do not know who “James Mortimer” is or why he was there in the first place.
Conan Doyle uses unanswered questions as a technique to make us want to read on to find out the answer. In chapter two, Holmes finds out about the legend of the hound from a manuscript that Dr. James Mortimer shows to him. This creates tension because we immediately think of