Lucy Worsley's Holmes vs Doyle

World famous detective Sherlock Holmes brought Arthur Conan Doyle fame and fortune. So why did he choose to kill the character off, only 6 years after he first appeared in print? Historian Lucy Worsley investigates this curious love/hate relationship between Holmes and Doyle; detective and author.

Join Arthur Conan Doyle after he has sent Sherlock Holmes over the Reichenbach Falls. While the world was reeling from a Holmes hangover, Doyle was having fun. He was learning to ski, writing ‘serious’ novels, and even running for parliament. Lucy Worsley explores who Arthur Conan Doyle was without Sherlock, and whether he was able to become the hero of his own story.

After Sherlock Holmes’s return from the dead, his creator Conan Doyle became an evangelist for spiritualism. Lucy Worsley investigates the resurrection of Sherlock and finds that the darkness of the later stories mirrored the reality of Doyle’s life. His star declined after a spat with the magician Houdini. Sherlock Holmes, in contrast, found a life beyond his author on stage and screen.