In today's New York Times there is an interesting article about the upcoming sale of some of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's personal effects. Apparently, the sale has been met with great controversy, because a number of Conan Doyle researchers will never access a complete collection of his papers, which contains such riches as an unpublished novel and letters sent to such literary luminaries as Oscar Wilde and P.G. Wodehouse. The article notes:
The Conan Doyle archive...is expected to bring in about £1 million to £1.5 million ($1.8 million to $2.7 million), according to Christie's, which is handling the sale. But even as that auction house has attracted a stream of Conan Doyle enthusiasts thrilled at the newly released material, it has also been sharply criticized by some scholars and members of Parliament for allowing the sale because they say crucial legal questions remain unresolved....
Adding to the sense of unease is the mysterious death of Richard Lancelyn Green, a leading Conan Doyle scholar and private collector, and a vociferous opponent of the sale. On March 27 Mr. Lancelyn Green, 50, a former chairman of the Sherlock Holmes Society of London and the author of several well-received books on Conan Doyle, was found garroted to death, strangled by a shoelace wrapped around a wooden kitchen spoon used to tighten its grip.
Mr. Lancelyn Green had become increasingly agitated and worried for his safety in the days before he died, several friends and family members told the inquest into his death. The coroner in the case said that he could not rule out murder and recorded an open verdict, meaning that he did not conclude what led to Mr. Lancelyn Green's death, although he said that he "would not wish to stress the importance of any conspiracy theories."
This mystery is rather befitting
the creator of Sherlock Holmes. As the famous dectective says in
A Study in Scarlet, "There's the scarlet thread of murder running through the colorless skein of life, and our duty is to unravel it, and isolate it, and expose every inch of it."
