When Sir Arthur Conan Doyle died in 1930, the literary canon of Sherlock Holmes was  complete and closed. There would be no more of stories written up by Doctor Watson such as "The Hound of the Baskervilles."  Yet modern detective fiction was both older than Sherlock Holmes and was to prove a hearty perennial genre. The 1930s would explode as a golden age of detective fiction. Sleuthing away in pursuit of Holmes's mantle were such as "Hercule Poirot, Lord Peter
                           (Wimsey), the hardboiled Sam Spade  ....  and G.K. Chesterton's mild-mannered little Catholic priest, Father
                           Brown."(Steven Doyle, p. 1)And the genre lives and prospers to this day. 

                           This afternoon let me say a few words arranged under four headings: 

                             I. The Pre-History of the Modern Detective Story 

                           II.  Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930) compared with 

                           III   Sherlock Holmes in "The League of Red-headed Men" 
                                   and Father Brown in "The Invisible Man" 

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                            I. The Pre-History of the Modern Detective Story 
 

                           Edgar Alan Poe (1809-1849) invented the modern detective tale. He wrote four short detective stories of which two define the genre. They are "The Mystery of the Rue Morgue" and "The Purloined Letter." 

                           For much of the 19th centuries mysteries abounded, but not detective stories. Thus the recently created London metropolitan police force influenced Charles Dickens in 1853 to create Inspector Bucket in BLEAK HOUSE. In 1886 Fergus Hulme's released THE MYSTERY OF A HANSOM CAB. This was modeled on Emile Gaoriau's
 Monsieur Lecoq and both characters seem to be drawn on for Sherlock Holmes. (Accardo, 34f) 

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                           --(1) Both having been born Victorians, Doyle was 15 years older than Chesterton. They might have met each other but we do not know. 

                           --(2) They were more unlike than alike. 

                           ----(a) Doyle was born Catholic, but lived and died deep into spiritualism and seances. GKC was born into a vaguely Unitarian family, flirted with nihilism, was made into a practicing high church Anglican by his believing fiancee/wife and was Roman Catholic for his last 14 years (1922-36). 

                           ----(b) Doyle, a physician, volunteered as a doctor during the Boer War (1899-1902). Chesterton, trained as an artist, campaigned for Boer rights. 

                           ----(c) Sherlock Holmes dwarfed Conan Doyle. Had he not written detective stories, Doyle would be an obscure footnote among writers of his age. Detective stories and mysteries made up only a half of Chesterton's fiction. Had he not written about Father Brown, he would still be read and studied for his poems, essays, biographies, works of literary criticism, economics, religion and politics. "Chestertonians ... rarely rank Father Brown--their hero's most memorable literary creation--very high in the list of their author's
 favorite books." (Accardo, p. 42) 

Doyle portrayed Sherlock Holmes in 56 short stories and four novels. In Chesterton's lifetime 48 Father Brown stories appeared in print. Since then three more have been offered posthumously, as recently as 1988. (Doyle, p.6) 

Chesterton began his dectective fiction in 1904 with the collection, THE CLUB OF QUEER TRADES and the novelette, THE MAN WHO WAS THURSDAY. He began writing about Father Brown (loosely based on his friend Monsignor John O'Connor) in 1909, serialized in 1910 in the SATURDAY EVENING POST. (Doyle, ibid.)

Chesterton's writings had wide direct impact on such people as Mohandas K. Gandhi and Michael Collins, the Irish revolutionary. "C.S. Lewis was an atheist until he read Chesterton's book The Everlasting Man and became a Christian. (Ahlquist, p. 28). Other admirers included Marshall McLuhan, Agatha Christie, E.F.Schumacher ("small is beautiful"), Dorothy L. Sayers, Dorothy Day, Hugh Kenner, Gary Wills, Graham Greene, J.R.R. Tolkien, John F. Kennedy, Ernest Hemingway, Nobel Prize winner from Argentina Luis Borges. and on and on (ibid.) 

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                           III.   Sherlock Holmes in "The League of Red-headed Men" 
                                   and Father Brown in "The Invisible Man 
 

                           Let me conclude with a few words showing difference of technique via one story each of Sherlock Holmes
                           and Father Brown, following Pasquale Accardo (pp. 35-41) 

                                                  A. Sherlock Holmes in "The League of Red-headed Men"

Sherlock Holmes meets his red-headed pawnbroker client, Jabez Wilson. By way of preliminaries, Holmes
                           deduces that Wilson takes snuff, is a Freemason who has been to China, etc. A newspaper ad has
                           announced formation of the League of Red-headed Men. The mysterious League contracts with Wilson for
                           his clerk to copy Encyclopedia Britannica every work day from 10  a.m. to 2 p.m. After only eight weeks,
                           another newspaper announcement said that the Red-headed League is dissolved October 9, 1890. The
                           copying was done by Wilson's assistant, John Spaulding. Wilson commissions Holmes to solve what
                           Wilson regards as a kind of practical joke. Holmes discovers that Spaulding is a notorious criminal of royal
                           blood (Holmes does not share the information with the reader--from various physical marks of the criminal)
                           who has used the time supposedly spent in copying (with an accomplice) to dig a tunnel from the pawn shop
                           to the vault of a nearby bank. Holmes, Watson (with a weapon) and a policeman then apprehend the criminal
                           as they emerge with their spoils. 

Notable is the fact that Conan Doyle/narrator Dr Watson do not share with the reader enough information to
                           solve the crime. Doyle does not sprinkle enough clues for the purpose. We have here a mystery within a
                           mystery and the reader is diverted to solve the wrong one. 

                                                           B. Father Brown in "The Invisible Man"

 Neither Sherlock Holmes nor Father Brown is a professional detective. Both are in that sense "eccentric," off
                           to the side of society and so are their methods. 

In "The Invisible Man" Laura Hope, a sometime waitress in a confectionary shop, is proposed to by two different customers, both of whom she finds physically distasteful but is too polite to say so. She puts them
                           off by saying that the man she marries must earn his own living and not live on inheritances as do the
                           suitors. Time passes. She receives a letter fom the short Isadore Smythe saying that he is making his
                           fortune selling his invention, robotic household services. She never sees nor hears from the tall rival James
                           Welkin. But she thinks she hears his laugh a few seconds before receiving Smythe's letter. Just after reading
                           the letter, she even hears Welkin threaten Smythe. But she sees/notices no one on the street. Smythe hires
                           Flambeau, a detective friend of Father Brown, to keep an eye on his flat after receiving threats from Welkin.
                           But blood is found in Smythe's flat and Smythe's corpse is found in a canal. An invisible man must have done
                           the deed! 

Witnesses: the chestnut vendor saw no one suspicious at Smythe's flat. The policeman on the beat saw no
                           one. The commissionaire saw no one. Yet there are fresh footprints in the snow leading into the apartment
                           building. Father Brown explains that the invisible man was the postman (Welkin), so taken for granted as not
                           to be noticed. Brown had asked if a heavy mail bag was discovered near the corpse--a clue shared with
                           readers before the denouement. Brown then spends hours walking and speaking with (counseling?) Welkin.

COMMENT: Chesterton gives enough clues to solve the problem. He also solves crimes by looking at evil within
                           himself and asking, how would I have drawn on my inherent evil to commit this crime? Father Brown maintains the
                           same logical rigor and reader friendliness in every single mystery. 
 

I find a kind of lesser Father Brown in the character Flambeau. He was the greatest thief of his age but under
                           influence of Father Brown reformed and became a great detective. Both aproached crimes as persons very familiar
                           with crime and criminals.
 

                                                                         -OOO- 

                                                           SOURCES CITED OR DRAWN UPON
 
 

--ACCARDO, Pasquale. "G.K. Chesterton and Detective Fiction," 31 - 43 in Steven Doyle, editor, G.K. CHESTERTON'S SHERLOCK HOLMES, New York, The Baker Street Irregulars, 2003. 

--AHLQUIST, Dale. "The Importance of G.K. Chesterton, " 19 - 29 in Steven Doyle, editor, G.K. CHESTERTON'S SHERLOCK HOLMES, New York, The Baker Street Irregulars, 2003. 

--CHESTERTON, Gilbert Keith. AUTOBIOGRAPHY. First published 1935. Poughkeepsie, NY. House of Stratus, Inc. 2001 

--CHESTERTON, GIlbert Keith. THE COMPLETE FATHER BROWN. New York. Penguin Putnam, Inc. 1981. 

-CHESTERTON, Gilbert Keith (all included in Steven Doyle's G.K. (CHESTERTON'S SHERLOCK HOLMES) 

                           ----"Errors About Detective Stories," DOYLE 67-69, Aug. 1920. 

                           ----"How To Write Dective Stories," DOYLE 70-74, Nov. 1921. 

                           ----"A Defense of Detective Stories," DOYLE 75-77, undated. 

                           ----"Sherlock the God," DOYLE 78-79, Feb. 1935. 

--COREN, Michael. GILBERT: THE MAN WHO WAS G.K. CHESTERTON. 1989 (UK). New York. Paragon House
                           Publishers. 1990. 

 --DOYLE, Steven,  Editor/Introducer. G.K. CHESTERTON'S SHERLOCK HOLMES, New York, The Baker Street Irregulars, 2003. 

--WILLS, Gary. CHESTERTON. Originally published by Sheed & Ward,1961. New York, Doubleday. 2001. 

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                           Swannanoa, NC 
                           August 24,  2003