THE SELF-ISOLATION RESIDENCY 1st august 2020: DAY 125

'The Constant Library',  Volume II:
"The Original Illustrated 'Strand' Sherlock Holmes", Conan Doyle.'

'The Constant Library', Volume II: 'The Original Illustrated 'Strand' Sherlock Holmes' by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

"The idea for 'The Constant Library' follows on from a recent conversation considering which books had, and continue to have, the greatest affect my life in a variety of different ways. These are the books I can't live without and whenever possible I have a copy of with me wherever I travel in the world.; my 'Constant Library."

When I was very young I wasn't a great reader and struggled to find books that made the effort of reading worthwhile.  With this in mind it comes as no surprise that I was probably first drawn to the idea of Sherlock Holmes not initially through the printed editions but through the black and white movies, starring Basil Rathbone in the titular role, which were often show on TV during wet Saturday afternoons when I was a child. The whole package of the character's life and times; the mystery, intelligence and romance of the stories set against the backdrop of 'smoggy' of London fired my imagination. So much so that when the time came the first book which I actually chose and purchased for myself was a slim anthology of some of the better known SH short stories. It was that edition changed my relationship with books forever.

As you can probably tell from the picture above this particular edition of SH is my own, well thumbed copy, which has indeed traveled the world with me. I love this volume because as a facsimile of how all 60 stories, 56 short stories and 4 long, were presented to the public for the first time in the Strand magazine, with all of the original illustrations in place; makes this probably as accurate interpretation of the stories as Conan Doyle created them as you will find. Free from the effect that any self-important editors may have had in other publications.