Bucknell University Bucknell Digital Commons Honors Theses Student Theses 2016 "Romantic Realities": Sherlock Holmes and Urban Imagination Samantha Vaughn Gates Bucknell University,
[email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.bucknell.edu/honors_theses Recommended Citation Gates, Samantha Vaughn, ""Romantic Realities": Sherlock Holmes and Urban Imagination" (2016). Honors Theses. 354. https://digitalcommons.bucknell.edu/honors_theses/354 This Honors Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Theses at Bucknell Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Honors Theses by an authorized administrator of Bucknell Digital Commons. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. “ROMANTIC REALITIES”: SHERLOCK HOLMES AND URBAN IMAGINATION by Samantha V. Gates A Thesis Submitted to the Honors Council For Honors in English May 2, 2016 Approved by: Digitally Signed Adviser: Virginia Zimmerman Second Reader: John Hunter Digitally Signed Department Chairperson: Alf Siewers TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT v CHAPTER ONE 1 CHAPTER TWO 27 CHAPTER THREE 49 BIBLIOGRAPHY 77 iv Gates, Sherlock Holmes and Urban Imagination ABSTRACT My thesis explores excerpts of the Sherlock Holmes canon through literary and historical lenses, and relies on close readings to investigate the representation of urbanity in the stories. For my work, I rely on the term “urban imagination” as I discuss the way that Arthur Conan Doyle places representations of real London places adjacent to fantasy urban locations of his own creation, and the effect that this has on the narratives and on Sherlock himself. Doyle uses urban imagination in his romanticization of city life, and his manifestation of a London particularly suited to Sherlock’s needs.