A Scandal in Bohemia
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| "A Scandal in Bohemia" | |
|---|---|
| by Arthur Conan Doyle | |
| Released | 1891 |
| Series | The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes |
| Client(s) | The King of Bohemia |
| Set in | March 1888 |
| Villain(s) | Debatably Irene Adler |
"A Scandal in Bohemia" was the first of Arthur Conan Doyle's 56 Sherlock Holmes short stories to be published in The Strand Magazine and the first Sherlock Holmes story illustrated by Sidney Paget. (Two of the four Sherlock Holmes novels—A Study in Scarlet and The Sign of the Four—preceded the short story cycle.)
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[edit] Plot summary
Holmes is called upon by a masked gentleman introducing himself as Count Von Kramm, an agent for a wealthy client, but Holmes quickly deduces that he is in fact Wilhelm Gottsreich Sigismond von Ormstein, Grand Duke of Cassel-Felstein, the hereditary King of Bohemia. The King admits this, tearing off his mask.
It transpires that the King is engaged to Clotilde Lothman von Saxe-Meningen, a young Scandinavian princess, but the King's in-laws-to-be would have a very low opinion of him if any evidence of his former liaison with an opera singer named Irene Adler, originally from New Jersey, were ever revealed to them. Unfortunately, that is what the lady herself is threatening to do, apparently not, though, for monetary gain, for the King's agents have already tried to buy the evidence. They have also broken into Miss Adler's house to try to find it.
It is a photograph described to Holmes as a cabinet (5 1/2 by 4 inches), and therefore too bulky for a lady to carry upon her person, showing both the King (then the Crown Prince), and Irene Adler. The King gives Holmes £1,000 to cover any expenses. Holmes asks Dr. Watson to join him at 221B Baker Street at 3 o'clock the following afternoon.
The next morning, Holmes goes out to Miss Adler's house dressed as an out-of-work groom and manages to elicit useful information from the other stable workers. Irene Adler has a gentleman friend Godfrey Norton, a lawyer, who calls at least once a day. On this particular day, Norton comes to visit Miss Adler, and soon afterwards, takes a cab to the Church of St. Monica in Edgware Road. Minutes later, the lady herself gets in her landau bound for the same place. Holmes follows in a cab and, arriving, finds himself dragged into the church to be a witness to Godfrey Norton's and Irene Adler's wedding. Curiously, they go their separate ways after the ceremony.
Holmes decides to make his move that evening, with Watson's help. Disguising himself as a simple-minded clergyman, he arrives at Irene Adler's house and, with his agents' help, causes a commotion in which he falls down with his face bloodied, just as Miss Adler, or Mrs. Norton, arrives home. She has the clergyman conveyed into the house where she tends to him. Watson, having been instructed to keep near the sitting room window, waits for Holmes to raise his hand. At this signal, Watson throws a plumber's rocket through the window and yells "Fire!", as do the assorted other characters in the street, hired by Holmes with the money from the King. Holmes observes Mrs. Norton rushing to a panel in the sitting room, opening it, and beginning to take something out. Having thus discovered where the photograph is, Holmes calls out that it is a false alarm, and contrives to leave the house and meet Watson at the corner as prearranged.
Upon arriving back at Baker Street, however, something odd happens: they hear a voice say "Good-night, Mister Sherlock Holmes". Holmes recognizes the voice but cannot place it. If he could, he would deduce what the episode meant.
Holmes, Watson, and the King go to Irene Adler's house early the next morning to see about achieving what Holmes did not have the opportunity to do the night before, namely stealing the photograph. However, they find that she and her husband have left England, never to return. The picture is gone, and in its stead another has been left, showing only her.
She has also left a letter for Holmes, making it plain that she knew who he was – her suspicions were aroused by the "fire" – and that he was likely to have been hired by the King. She declares that she loves and is loved by Godfrey Norton and no longer feels the need to mire her former lover in scandal, and also that the King need never worry now about the photograph – unless he is foolish enough to take any threatening action against her. She has, of course, kept it. She also reveals that she followed him home after the fire and she was the one that said "goodnight" to him.
The king is satisfied with this outcome, and offers a valuable ring to Holmes as his reward. Holmes, however, is impressed by the intelligence of Irene, and asks instead to keep her portrait. Later Holmes receives a gold snuff box from the King.
[edit] Commentary
- At the start of the story Watson says he has seldom heard Holmes call Irene Adler anything but 'The Woman'. However in every other story in which she is mentioned he calls her 'Irene Adler'.[citation needed]
Holmes received a gold snuff box from the King of Bohemia in "A Case of Identity" as a reward for the case that he had previously solved, involving Irene Adler, called "A Scandal in Bohemia".
[edit] Adaptations
The Granada TV version with Jeremy Brett was faithful to the original story.
The 1965 Broadway musical flop Baker Street was loosely based on the story, making Irene Adler into the heroine and adding Professor Moriarty as the villain. [1]
The PBS Kids show Wishbone adapts the story in the episode entitled "A Dogged Exposé".
[edit] References in popular culture
The second-season episode of Star Trek: the Next Generation "Elementary, Dear Data" featured a holodeck program combining elements of several Holmes adventures, including A Scandal in Bohemia.
The 1998 film Zero Effect provided a modern update to Sherlock Holmes, with a plot loosely based upon "A Scandal in Bohemia".
Philadelphia's Orchestra 2001 produced the world premiere of an operatic adaptation of A Scandal in Bohemia at the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts in February 2009. The opera was composed by Thomas Whitman of Swarthmore College with libretto by Nathalie Anderson.[2]
The pilot episode of House features a patient named Rebecca Adler, a reference to the character in "A Scandal in Bohemia."
The 2009 film Sherlock Holmes, starring Robert Downey, Jr. and Jude Law has a character Irene Adler, based very loosely on the character from this story. She is portrayed by Rachel McAdams. Her cabinet portrait is seen displayed in Holmes' rooms in the film.
[edit] Fictional Monarchies
Rather than create a fictional country for the King in his story, as in the Ruritanian tales, Conan Doyle chose to place a fictional dynasty in a real country. Bohemia was at the time of writing - and for centuries before - a possession of the Habsburg Emperors and had no independent monarchs of its own (the last attempt to set up such a monarchy, back in 1618, was the direct cause of the Thirty Years' War). Similarly, there had never been a King of Scandinavia, and efforts earlier in the 19th Century to unify Scandinavia had come to naught.
[edit] References
[edit] External links
[edit] Wikimedia links
Works related to A Scandal in Bohemia at Wikisource
Media related to A Scandal in Bohemia at Wikimedia Commons
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