 Hello and welcome to our video summarizing all you need to know about The Hound of Baskervilles, a novel by Arthur Colon Doyle. My name is Zara and in this video we'll look at the novel specifically beginning with a plot summary. We will then examine the necessary information you need to know before looking at each character in depth, key themes as well as important symbols. This video is very useful especially if you are studying this novel as part of your English coursework or exam. As I'll get into the details you need to know to get top marks. So let's get started. First an overview. So The Hound of Baskervilles is the third of the four crime novels written by Sir Arthur Colon Doyle, featuring the detective Sherlock Holmes, originally serialized in the strained magazine from August 1901 to April 1902. It is set largely on Dartmoor in Devon in England's West Country. And tells the story of an attempted murder inspired by the legend of a fearsome, diabolical Hound of supernatural origin. Sherlock Holmes and his companion Dr. Watson investigate the case. This was the first appearance of Holmes since his apparent death in the final problem and the success of The Hound of the Baskervilles led to the character's eventual revival. One of the most famous stories ever written in 2003. The book was listed as number 128th of 200 on the BBC's The Big Read poll of the UK's best loved novel. In 1999 it was listed at the top Holmes novel with the perfect rating from Sherlock Holmes's book, The Hound of the Baskervilles opens with a mini-mystery. Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson speculate on the identity of the owner of a cane that has been left in their office by an unknown visitor. Wowing Watson with his fabulous powers of observation, Holmes predicts the appearance of James Mortimer, owner of the Hound of the Baskervilles. Entering the office and unveiling an 18th century minuscript, Mortimer recounts the myth of the literate Hugo Baskervilles. Hugo captured and imprisoned a young country lass at his estate in Devonshire only to fall victim to a marauding Hound of a Hale. The Hound of the Baskervilles is known as the Hound of the Baskervilles. He has been called victim to a marauding Hound of a Hale as he pursued her along the Lonesome Moors late one night. Ever since Mortimer reports the Baskervilles line has been plagued by a mysterious and supernatural black Hound. The recent death of Sir Charles Baskervilles has rekindled suspicions and fears. Next of Ken, the duo finds out, has arrived in London to take up his post at Baskervilles Home. But he has already been intimidated by an anonymous note of warning and strangely enough, the theft of a shoe. Agreeing to take the case, Holmes and Watson quickly discover that Sir Henry Baskervilles is being trailed in London by a mysterious bearded stranger and they speculate as to whether the ghost befriend or foe. Holmes however announces that he is too busy in London to accompany Mortimer and Sir Henry to Devonshire to get to the bottom of the case as he sends Dr. Watson to be his eyes and ears insisting that he report back regularly. Once in Devonshire, Watson discovers a state of emergency with armed guards on the watch for an escaped convict roaming the Moors. He finds potential suspects with Mr. Barrymore and Mrs. Barrymore, the domestic health, and Mr. Jack Stapleton and his sister Beryl, Baskervilles neighbors. A series of mysteries arrive in rapid succession. Barrymore is called Skull King around the mansion at night. Watson spies a lonely figure keeping watch over the Moors and the doctor hears what sounds like a dog's howling. Beryl Stapleton provides an enigmatic warning and Watson learns of a secret encounter between Sir Charles and a local woman named Laura Lyons on the night of his death. During his best to unravel these threads of the mystery, Watson discovers that Barrymore's nightly jones are just his attempt to aid the escaped conv who turns out to be Mrs. Barrymore's brother. The doctor interviews Laura Lyons to assess her involvement and discovers that the lonely figure surveying the Moors is none other than Charles Combs himself. It takes home he then so as not to tip off the villain as to his involvement to piece together the mystery. Mr. Stapleton, Holmes has discovered, is actually in line to inherit the Baskervilles mansion and as such is the prime suspect. Laura Lyons was only a pawn in Stapleton's game. A Baskerville beneficiary whom Stapleton convinced to request and then miss a late night appointment with Sir Charles. Having lured Charles onto the Moors, Stapleton released his ferocious pet pooch which frightened the superstitious nobleman and caused a hurt attack. In a dramatic final scene, Holmes and Watson used the younger Baskerville as bait to catch Stapleton red-handed. After a late supper at Stapleton's, Sir Henry heads home across the Moors only to be waylaid by the enormous Stapleton pets. Despite a dense fog, Holmes and Watson are able to subdue the beast and Stapleton, in his panicked flight from the scene, drowned in a marshland on the Moors. Beryl Stapleton, who turns out to be Jack's haired wife and not his sister, is discovered tied up in his house, having refused to participate in his dust ordly scheme. Back in London, Holmes ties up the loose ends, announcing that the stolen shoe was used to give the hand Henry's scent and that mysterious warning note came from Beryl Stapleton, whose flandering husband had denied their marriage so as to seduce and use Laura Lyons. Watson files the case closed. On to character analysis. Sherlock Holmes is the ever-observant, world-renowned detective of 221B Baker Street. For all he's assumed, genius and intuitive, he's virtually omniscient in these stories and Holmes becomes more accessible in the context of his constant posturing and pretension. He lets down his guard and admits of a fragile ego. When challenged at the beginning of the book, Mortimer calls him the second best crime solver in Europe and Holmes lets down his guard and asks who could possibly be the first. By a large, however, Holmes' ego is kept in check by a constant dose of adulation from Watson. Holmes regularly announces some absurd and unsubstantiated conclusion only to mock Watson by revealing the most obvious of clues. In the end, Holmes toys with his associates, in particular Watson, at least as much as he flouts his enemies equivocating, misleading and making fools out of them only to up his own crime-solving cachet. Dr. Watson, the good doctor, plays the sidekick to Holmes' self-obsessed hero figure. Watson is a lowly apprentice and live-in friend who spends most of the book trying to solve a difficult case in his master's steed. Always on hand to stroke Holmes' ego, Watson is nonetheless intent on proving his own middle by applying Holmes' techniques. His never-ending adulation, which is presumably meant to mirror our own understanding of the legendary detective, comes through most forcefully at the end of the novel, when Holmes arrives at Devonshire. Holmes announces that he meant for Watson to think he was in London and a pouty Watson reacts, then you use me and yet you don't trust me. Co-dependent throughout Holmes and Watson feel each other's needs. Watson provides Holmes with an ego boost and Holmes needs Watson's eyes and ears to inconspicuously gather clues. Watson is awestruck by Holmes' power of observation and Watson feels more powerful by association. Mr. Jack Stapleton, intended to incarnate ill will and malice, Stapleton is conflated at various points with the licorice libertine Hugo, whom he resembles. Stapleton is a black-hearted, violent villain hidden beneath a benign, bookish surface. If Hugo operates as a kind of double-ganger for his entomologist air, then the convict offers an interesting parallel as well. Serving mainly as a red herring in the mystery's death of Sir Charles Baskerville, the convict also operates as a foil for the real culprit, Stapleton. Personifying peculiar ferocity, wanton brutality and even devious sanity, the convict is shown to be a pathetic, animalistic figure on whom the detectives ultimately take pity. Not so with Stapleton, a man with a murderous heart and a wolf in sheep's clothing. Stapleton is the worthy adversary because of his birthright. If the convict is a simple murderer, he is also simply born, related by blood to the Baskerville's domestic help. Thus, the convict is part of a lower class than Holmes and, therefore, is not a worthy adversary. Stapleton, however, is an intellectual and when his evil side comes out, his hidden nobility comes out as well. Once Holmes is handling an educated and noble rival, he begins to take things much more seriously. In this sense, Stapleton's character adds to the strong classicist themes embedded in the book. On to theme analysis. Natural and supernatural truth and fantasy. As soon as Dr. Mortimer arrives to unveil the mysterious curse of the Baskervilles, Hound wrestles with questions of natural and supernatural occurrences. The doctor himself decides that the marauding Hound in question is a supernatural beast and all he wants to ask Sherlock Holmes is what to do with the next of kin. For Holmes' point of view, every set of clues points toward a logical, real-world solution, considering the supernatural explanation. Holmes decides to consider all other options before falling back on that one. Sherlock Holmes personifies the intellectuals' faith in logic and on examining facts to find the answers. In this sense, the story takes on the Gothic tradition, a brand of storytelling that highlights the bizarre and unexplained. Doll's mysterious Hound, an ancient family curse, even the ominous Baskervilles Hall, all set up a Gothic style, mystery that, in the end, will fall victim to Holmes' powerful logic. Doll's own faith in spiritualism, a doctrine of life after death and psychic powers, might at first seem to contradict a Sherlockian belief in logical solutions and real-world answers. Holmes is probably based more on Doll's scientific training than his belief system, but the struggle for understanding the search for a coherent conception of the world will live in, links the spiritualist Doll with his fictional counterpart. Throughout the novel, Holmes is able to come up with far flung if ultimately true accounts of the world around him. Much as his authors trove for understanding in fiction and in fact. Holmes focused on the natural and supernatural spills over into other thematic territory. The rigid classism of Doll's milieu, while to do intellectual that he was. Doll translated many of the assumptions of turn of the century English society into his fiction. The natural and supernatural is one example. Throughout the story, the superstitions of the shapeless mass of common folk everyone attributes an unbending faith in the curse to their commoners or their ancestors. The superstitions of the shapeless mass of common folk everyone attributes an unbending faith in the curse to their commoners or den. To the commoners or denigrated and often dismissed. If Mortimer and Sir Henry have their doubts, it is the gullible common folk who take the curse seriously. In the end, when Watson's reportage and Holmes' insight have shed light on the situation, the curse of the commoners who believed it end up looking silly. At the same time, Sir Henry's servants vince a kind of docility and their brother the convict is reduced from dangerous murderer to pathetic rodent under Watson's gaze. Holmes' classism is also imaged in questions of entitlement. Who has the right to basketball hole? To Holmes' attention to our attention. So that's it for this video. If you found it useful, give it a thumbs up and do subscribe to our channel where we offer free materials that you can use as part of your studies. To really get a better grasp of specific areas you might find challenging. Make sure to visit our website where you'll find useful revision guides, model answers and tools to get top marks. Thank you for listening.