Dangerous work

Description

Conan Doyle's diary and log of his time served as a surgeon on a whaling ship in 1880. Annotated, and includes several incidental pieces derived from his experience, including the Sherlock Holmes story *The Adventure of the Black Peter*.

Description

"In 1880 a young medical student named Arthur Conan Doyle embarked upon the “first real outstanding adventure” of his life, taking a berth as ship’s surgeon on an Arctic whaler, the Hope. The voyage took him to unknown regions, showered him with dramatic and unexpected experiences, and plunged him into dangerous work on the ice floes of the Arctic seas. He tested himself, overcame the hardships, and, as he wrote later, “came of age at 80 degrees north latitude.” Conan Doyle’s time in the Arctic provided powerful fuel for his growing ambitions as a writer. With a ghost story set in the Arctic wastes that he wrote shortly after his return, he established himself as a promising young writer. A subsequent magazine article laying out possible routes to the North Pole won him the respect of Arctic explorers. And he would call upon his shipboard experiences many times in the adventures of Sherlock Holmes, who was introduced in 1887’s A Study in Scarlet. Out of sight for more than a century was a diary that Conan Doyle kept while aboard the whaler. Dangerous Work: Diary of an Arctic Adventure makes this account available for the first time in a beautiful facsimile edition that reproduces Conan Doyle’s notebook pages in his own elegant hand, accompanied by his copious illustrations. With humor and grace, Conan Doyle provides a vivid account of a long-vanished way of life at sea..."--Publisher description.

Subjects

Other Editions

• Dangerous work: the diary of an Arctic adventureUniversity of Chicago Press2012-01-01
• Dangerous workUniversity of Chicago Press2012-01-01
• Dangerous WorkhardcoverBritish Library2012-09-01
• Heute dreimal ins Polarmeer gefallenPaperbackbtb Verlag2016-12-12