'A STUDY IN SCARLET', SHERLOCK HOLMES PREMIERE

On a day like today in 1930, Arthur Conan Doyle, the Scottish creator of Sherlock Holmes died in Crowborough, England. He left a legacy of great novels and great characters, and The Grandma wants to remember him talking about his first published novel with Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, A Study in Scarlet.

A Study in Scarlet is an 1887 detective novel written by Arthur Conan Doyle.

The story marks the first appearance of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, who would become the most famous detective duo in popular fiction.

The book's title derives from a speech given by Holmes, a consulting detective, to his friend and chronicler Watson on the nature of his work, in which he describes the story's murder investigation as his study in scarlet: There's the scarlet thread of murder running through the colourless skein of life, and our duty is to unravel it, and isolate it, and expose every inch of it.

The story, and its main characters, attracted little public interest when it first appeared. Only 11 complete copies of the magazine in which the story first appeared, Beeton's Christmas Annual for 1887, are known to exist now, and they have considerable value.

Although Conan Doyle wrote 56 short stories featuring Holmes, A Study in Scarlet is one of only four full-length novels in the original canon. The novel was followed by The Sign of the Four, published in 1890.  

A Study in Scarlet was the first work of detective fiction to incorporate the magnifying glass as an investigative tool.

Conan Doyle wrote the novel at the age of 27 in less than three weeks. As a general practice doctor in Southsea, Hampshire, he had already published short stories in several magazines of the day, such as the periodical London Society. 

The story was originally titled A Tangled Skein, and was eventually published by Ward Lock & Co. in Beeton's Christmas Annual 1887, after many rejections. The author received £25 in return for the full rights, although Conan Doyle had pressed for a royalty instead. It was illustrated by David Henry Friston.

The novel was first published as a book in July 1888 by Ward, Lock & Co., and featured drawings by the author's father, Charles Doyle.

More information: Grade Saver

In 1890, J. B. Lippincott & Co. released the first American version. Another edition published in 1891 by Ward, Lock & Bowden Limited (formerly Ward, Lock & Co.) was illustrated by George Hutchinson. A German edition of the novel published in 1902 was illustrated by Richard Gutschmidt. Numerous further editions, translations and dramatizations have appeared since. 

According to a Salt Lake City newspaper article, when Conan Doyle was asked about his depiction of the Latter-day Saints' organization as being steeped in kidnapping, murder and enslavement, he said: all I said about the Danite Band and the murders is historical, so I cannot withdraw that, though it is likely that in a work of fiction it is stated more luridly than in a work of history. It's best to let the matter rest.

Conan Doyle's daughter has stated: You know, father would be the first to admit that his first Sherlock Holmes novel was full of errors about the Mormons. 

More information: BBC

Historians speculate that Conan Doyle, a voracious reader, would have access to books by Fannie Stenhouse, William A. Hickman, William Jarman, John Hyde and Ann Eliza Young, among others, in explaining the author's early perspective on Mormonism.

Years after Conan Doyle's death, Levi Edgar Young, a descendant of Brigham Young and a Mormon general authority, claimed that Conan Doyle had privately apologized, saying that He [Conan Doyle] said he had been misled by writings of the time about the Church and had written a scurrilous book about the Mormons.

In August 2011, the Albemarle County, Virginia, School Board removed A Study in Scarlet from the district's sixth-grade required reading list following complaints from students and parents that the book was derogatory toward Mormons. It was moved to the reading lists for the tenth-graders, and remains in use in the school media centres for all grades.

Download A Study in Scarlet by Arthur Conan Doyle

 It has long been an axiom of mine that
the little things are infinitely the most important.

Arthur Conan Doyle

DR JOHN H. WATSON, SHERLOCK HOLMES'S BEST FRIEND

Having tea with Sherlock Holmes & Dr. Watson

Today, The Grandma has received the amazing exciting wonderful visit of John H. Watson, aka Dr Watson and Sherlock Holmes, the famous detective. They have been talking about The Watsons, The Grandma's new family in Sant Boi de Llobregat, and Dr Watson has explained her some secrets to help her family members to improve their English.

John H. Watson, known as Dr Watson, is a fictional character in the Sherlock Holmes stories created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Watson is Sherlock Holmes' friend, assistant and sometime flatmate, and the first person narrator of all but four of these stories.

He is described as a typical Victorian-era gentleman, unlike the more eccentric Holmes. He is astute, although he fails to match his friend's deductive skills. Whilst retaining his role as Holmes's friend and confidant, Watson has been adapted in various films, television series, video games, comics and radio programmes.

In Conan Doyle's early rough plot outlines, Sherlock Holmes's associate was named Ormond Sacker before Conan Doyle finally settled on John Watson. He was probably inspired by one of Doyle's colleagues, Dr James Watson. 

More information: Arthur Conan Doyle

William L. DeAndrea wrote that Watson also serves the important function of catalyst for Holmes's mental processes... From the writer's point of view, Doyle knew the importance of having someone to whom the detective can make enigmatic remarks, a consciousness that's privy to facts in the case without being in on the conclusions drawn from them until the proper time. Any character who performs these functions in a mystery story has come to be known as a 'Watson'.

Dr Watson's first name is mentioned on only four occasions. Part one of the very first Sherlock Holmes story, A Study in Scarlet, is subtitled Being a reprint from the Reminiscences of John H. Watson, M.D., Late of the Army Medical Department.

Sherlock Holmes & Dr. John H. Watson

The preface of the collection His Last Bow is signed John H. Watson, M.D., and in The Problem of Thor Bridge, Watson says that his dispatch box is labelled John H. Watson, M.D.

His wife Mary Watson appears to refer to him as James in The Man with the Twisted Lip; Dorothy L. Sayers speculates that Mary may be using his middle name Hamish (an Anglicisation of Sheumais, the vocative form of Seumas, the Scottish Gaelic for James), though Doyle himself never addresses this beyond including the initial. David W. Merrell, on the other hand, concludes that Mary is not referring to her husband at all but rather to (the surname of) their servant.

In 1881, Watson is introduced by his friend Stamford to Sherlock Holmes, who is looking for someone to share rent at a flat in 221B Baker Street. Concluding that they are compatible, they subsequently move into the flat. When Watson notices multiple eccentric guests frequenting the flat, Holmes reveals that he is a consulting detective and that the guests are his clients.

Throughout Doyle's novels, Watson is presented as Holmes's biographer. At the end of the first published Holmes story, A Study in Scarlet, Watson is so incensed by Scotland Yard's claiming full credit for its solution that he exclaims: Your merits should be publicly recognised. You should publish an account of the case. If you won't, I will for you. Holmes suavely responds: You may do what you like, Doctor. Therefore, the story is presented as a reprint from the reminiscences of John H. Watson, and most other stories of the series share this by implication.

More information: Sherlockian

A Study in Scarlet, having just returned from Afghanistan, John Watson is described as thin as a lath and as brown as a nut. In subsequent texts, he is variously described as strongly built, of a stature either average or slightly above average, with a thick, strong neck and a small moustache.

Watson used to be an athlete: it is mentioned in The Adventure of the Sussex Vampire (1924) that he used to play rugby union for Blackheath, but he fears his physical condition has declined since that point. In The Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton (1899), Watson is described as a middle-sized, strongly built man—square jaw, thick neck, moustache... In His Last Bow, set in August 1914, Watson is described as ...a heavily built, elderly man with a grey moustache....

John Watson is intelligent, if lacking in Holmes's insight, and serves as a perfect foil for Holmes: the archetypal late Victorian/Edwardian gentleman against the brilliant, emotionally detached analytical machine. Furthermore, he is considered an excellent doctor and surgeon, especially by Holmes.

For instance, in The Adventure of the Dying Detective, Holmes creates a ruse that he is deathly ill to lure a suspect to his presence, which must fool Watson as well during its enactment. To that effect in addition to elaborate makeup and starving himself for a few days for the necessary appearance, Holmes firmly claims to Watson that he is highly contagious to the touch, knowing full well that the doctor would immediately deduce his true medical condition upon examination.

Download A Study in Scarlet by Arthur Conan Doyle

My dear Watson, you were born to be a man of action.

Your instinct is always to do something energetic.

Sherlock Holmes

GIGLIO, UNDER THE SHADOW OF THE 'COSTA CONCORDIA'

Tina Picotes visits Isola del Giglio

Today, Tina Picotes and her friends have visited Giglio, one of the islands of the Tuscan Archipelago well-known in 2012, when the cruise ship Costa Concordia foundered off the coast of the island.

During the trip from Montecristo to Giglio, The Grandma has started to read a new novel titled The Hound of the Baskervilles written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. She likes Sherlock Holmes and it is always a good moment to read about him and his cases.

Isola del Giglio is a Tuscan island and comune situated in the Tyrrhenian Sea, off the coast of Tuscany, and is part of the Province of Grosseto. The island is one of seven that form the Tuscan Archipelago, lying within the Arcipelago Toscano National Park.

Giglio means lily in Italian, and though the name would appear consistent with the insignia of Medici Florence, it derives from Aegilium, Goat Island, a Latin transliteration of the Greek word for little goat, in Ancient Greek Aigýllion, Αιγύλλιον.

The island is separated by a 16-kilometre stretch of sea from the nearest point of the mainland, the promontory of Monte Argentario. Mainly mountainous, it consists almost entirely of granite, culminating in the Poggio della Pagana, which rises to 496 metres.

The Grandma and Claire visit Giglio, Tuscany

Ninety percent of its surface is covered by Mediterranean vegetation, alternating with large pine forests and numerous vineyards which allow the production of the local Ansonaco wine.

The coast is 27 kilometres long, made up of rocks, smooth cliffs and several bays: Arenella, Cannelle, Caldane and Campese.

The municipality is composed of the islands of Giglio and Giannutri. Three principal settlements are located on the main island:

Giglio Porto located on the eastern coastal side and hosts the port. It is divided into the quarters of Chiesa, Moletto and Saraceno.

Giglio Castello, located upon a hill between the two other localities and characterized by the majestic walls of a fortress. It is divided into the quarters of Casamatta, Centro, Cisterna and Rocca.

Giglio Campese, it is located on the north-western coastal side and is a modern sea resort.

More information: Visit Tuscany

The modern island was formed probably 4.5 to 5 million years ago, and has been inhabited since the Stone Age. Later, it was probably an Etruscan military stronghold.

Under the Roman dominion, Aegilium Insula or Igillia Insula it was an important base in the Tyrrhenian Sea, and was cited briefly by Julius Caesar in his De Bello Civili, by Pliny, by Pomponius Mela, and by the fifth-century AD poet Rutilius Claudius Namatianus, who celebrated Igilium's successful repulse of the Getae and safe harbor for Romans, in a time when Igilium's slopes were still wooded.

Sinking of Costa Concordia, 2012

In 805, the island was donated by Charlemagne to the abbey of the Tre Fontane in Rome, and was later successively a possession of the Aldobrandeschi, Pannocchieschi, Caetani, and Orsini families, and of the municipality of Perugia.

In 1241, the Sicilian and Pisan fleet of Emperor Frederick II destroyed a Genoese fleet in the Battle of Giglio. From 1264, Isola del Giglio was a Pisan dominion, from which it passed to the Medici family. It suffered several Saracen attacks, which ended only in 1799.

On 14 June 1646, Grand Admiral Jean Armand de Maillé-Brézé was killed at the Battle of Orbetello, at sunset on his flagship the Grand Saint Louis.

More information: Independent

Alongside its history, the island was always renowned for its mineral ore: many columns and buildings in Rome were built with the Gigliese granite.

The island houses the remains of a Roman villa of Domitius Ahenobarbus (1st-2nd century AD), in the area of Giglio Porto. No traces of the once existing Temple of Diana can be seen now. The church of San Pietro Apostolo in Giglio Castello has an ivory crucifix attributed to the sculptor Giambologna.

The island is also the site of an Etruscan shipwreck dating back to the early Iron age, c. 600 BC. The cargo of the ship included copper and lead ingots, iron spits, amphorae and a Corinthian helmet. Even a wooden writing tablet with stylus was preserved. The finds are almost completely lost now.

In 2012, the island received prolonged international media attention, following the 13 January 2012 running aground of the cruise liner Costa Concordia, just off the island's shore.

The people of the island rushed to help, providing hot drinks and blankets, and many opened their homes to the victims. The ship removal work was started in 2013 and was completed towards the end of July 2014. Flotation devices were attached to right the ship and then raise it. It was subsequently towed to its final destination port of Genoa to be scrapped.

More information: BBC

In the ocean of baseness,

the deeper we get, the easier the sinking.

James Russell Lowell

THE GRANDMA REMEMBERS THE HOLMES: 221B BAKER ST

Sherlock Holmes

Today, The Grandma has started to read a new story about Sherlock Holmes, written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The Grandma has chosen this book because she loves Sherlock and his stories and because she wants to remember one of her beautiful families, The Holmes.

Sherlock Holmes has his headquarters in 221B Baker Street and The Grandma wants to talk about this amazing place. Before starting the new book, The Grandma has studied a new lesson of her Elementary Language Practice manual (Grammar 50).

More information: Prepositions and Adverbials of Place and Position

221B Baker Street is the London address of the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes, created by author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. In the United Kingdom, postal addresses with a number followed by a letter may indicate a separate address within a larger, often residential building. Baker Street in the late 19th century was a high-class residential district, and Holmes' flat would probably have been part of a Georgian terrace.

At the time the Holmes stories were published, addresses in Baker Street did not go as high as 221. Baker Street was later extended, and in 1932 the Abbey National Building Society moved into premises at 219–229 Baker Street. For many years, Abbey National employed a full-time secretary to answer mail addressed to Sherlock Holmes.

In 1990, a blue plaque signifying 221B Baker Street was installed at the Sherlock Holmes Museum, situated elsewhere on the same block, and there followed a 15-year dispute between Abbey National and the Holmes Museum for the right to receive mail addressed to 221B Baker Street. Since the closure of Abbey House in 2005, ownership of the address by the Holmes Museum has not been challenged, despite its location between 237 and 241 Baker Street.

Sherlock Holmes

When the Sherlock Holmes stories were first published, street numbers in Baker Street did not go as high as 221. The section north of Marylebone Road near Regent's Park -now including 221 Baker Street -was known in Conan Doyle's lifetime as Upper Baker Street. In his first manuscript, Conan Doyle put Holmes' house in Upper Baker Street.

However, a British crime novelist named Nigel Morland claimed that, late in Conan Doyle's life, he identified the junction of Baker Street and George Street, about 500 metres south of the Marylebone Road, as the location of 221B. Sherlockian experts have also held to alternative theories as to where the original 221B was located and have maintained that it was further down Baker Street.

When street numbers were reallocated in the 1930s, the block of odd numbers from 215 to 229 was assigned to an Art Deco building known as Abbey House, constructed in 1932 for the Abbey Road Building Society, which the society and its successor, which subsequently became Abbey National plc, occupied until 2002.

More information: Sherlock Holmes Museum

Almost immediately, the building society started receiving correspondence from Sherlock Holmes fans all over the world, in such volumes that it appointed a permanent secretary to Sherlock Holmes to deal with it. A bronze plaque on the front of Abbey House carried a picture of Holmes and a quotation, but was removed from the building several years ago. Its present whereabouts are unknown. In 1999, Abbey National sponsored the creation of a bronze statue of Sherlock Holmes that now stands at the entrance to Baker Street Underground station.

The Sherlock Holmes Museum is situated within an 1815 townhouse very similar to the 221B described in the stories and is located between 237 and 241 Baker Street. It displays exhibits in period rooms, wax figures and Holmes memorabilia, with the famous study overlooking Baker Street the highlight of the museum. The description of the house can be found throughout the stories, including the 17 steps leading from the ground-floor hallway to the first-floor study.

Sherlock Holmes & Dr Watson

According to the published stories, 221B Baker Street was a suite of rooms on the first floor of a lodging house above a flight of 17 steps. The main study overlooked Baker Street, and Holmes' bedroom was adjacent to this room at the rear of the house, with Dr. Watson's bedroom being on the floor above, overlooking a rear yard that had a plane tree in it.

The street number 221B was assigned to the Sherlock Holmes Museum on 27 March 1990, replacing the logical address 239 Baker Street, when the Leader of Westminster City Council, Lady Shirley Porter, unveiled a blue plaque signifying the address of 221B Baker Street. She was invited to renumber the museum's building to coincide with its official opening and because the number 221B had not been included in the original planning consent for the museum granted in October 1989.

More information: Smithsonian

A long-running dispute over the number arose between the Sherlock Holmes Museum, the building society Abbey National, which had previously answered the mail addressed to Sherlock Holmes, and subsequently the local Westminster City Council. The main objection to the Museum's role in answering the letters was that the number 221B bestowed on the Museum by the Council was out of sequence with the other numbers in the street: an issue that has since vexed local bureaucrats, who have striven for years to keep street numbers in sequence.

In 2005, Abbey National vacated their headquarters in Baker Street, which left the museum to battle with Westminster City Council to end the dispute over the number, which had created negative publicity. Eventually the museum was granted special permission by the City of Westminster to bear the address of 221B Baker Street.

More information: Atlas Obscura

My name is Sherlock Holmes.

It is my business to know what other people don’t know.

Sherlock Holmes

THE JONES IN THE GAMES ROOM: PLAY & ENJOY

Shelock Holmes

Today, The Jones have spent an unusual day playing in the Games Room of Hogwarts. It has been a very beautiful day because lots of magic friends have come to visit them: From Mary Poppins to Cleopatra, from Johan Cruyff Sherloch Holmes. 

They have also participated in a Quidditch Championship. It has been a beautiful experience.

The family is going to spent this Easter in Hogwarts and they are going to meet every member of the Magic School deeply, apying a lot of attention to their biographies.

Quidditch is a wizarding sport played on broomsticks. It is the most popular game and most well-known game among wizards and witches, and, according to Rubeus Hagrid, the equivalent to Muggles' passion for football.

The object of the game is to score more points than your opponents. Each goal is worth ten points and catching the Snitch is worth one-hundred fifty points. The game ends when the Snitch is caught or an agreement is reached between the captains of both teams. Some games can go on for many days if the Snitch is not caught, the record, according to Quidditch Through the Ages, is three months. 

Happy Easter Jones and good reading!

Download Play Games with English 1 & 3

Talent wins games, but teamwork 

and intelligence wins championships. 

Michael Jordan

ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE & DETECTIVE SHERLOCK HOLMES

Arthur Conan Doyle

Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle (22 May 1859-7 July 1930) was a Scottish writer best known for his detective fiction featuring the character Sherlock Holmes. Originally a physician, in 1887 he published A Study in Scarlet, the first of four novels about Holmes and Dr. Watson. In addition, Doyle wrote over fifty short stories featuring the famous detective.

The Sherlock Holmes stories are generally considered milestones in the field of crime fiction. Doyle is also known for writing the fictional adventures of Professor Challenger and for propagating the mystery of the Mary Celeste. He was a prolific writer whose other works include fantasy and science fiction stories, plays, romances, poetry, non-fiction and historical novels.

More information: Arthur Conan Doyle

A sequel to A Study in Scarlet was commissioned, and The Sign of the Four appeared in Lippincott's Magazine in February 1890, under agreement with the Ward Lock company.

In December 1893, to dedicate more of his time to his historical novels, Doyle had Holmes and Professor Moriarty plunge to their deaths together down the Reichenbach Falls in the story The Final Problem. Public outcry, however, led him to feature Holmes in 1901 in the novel The Hound of the Baskervilles.

Arthur Conan Doyle in 1925

In 1903, Doyle published his first Holmes short story in ten years, The Adventure of the Empty House, in which it was explained that only Moriarty had fallen, but since Holmes had other dangerous enemies, especially Colonel Sebastian Moran, he had arranged to also be perceived as dead. 

Holmes was ultimately featured in a total of 56 short stories, the last published in 1927, and four novels by Doyle, and has since appeared in many novels and stories by other authors.

Doyle had a longstanding interest in mystical subjects. He was initiated as a Freemason on 26 January 1887 at the Phoenix Lodge No. 257 in Southsea. He resigned from the Lodge in 1889, but returned to it in 1902, only to resign again in 1911.

More information: Biography.com

Also in Southsea in 1887, influenced by a member of the Portsmouth Literary and Philosophical Society, Major-General Alfred Wilks Drayson, he began a series of psychic investigations. These included attending around 20 seances, experiments in telepathy and sittings with mediums. Writing to Spiritualist journal Light, that year, he declared himself to be a Spiritualist and spoke of one particular psychic event that had convinced him.

Arthur Conan Doyle at Windlesham

Though he later wavered, he remained fascinated by the paranormal. He was a founding member of the Hampshire Society for Psychical Research in 1889 and joined the London-based Society for Psychical Research in 1893. 

He joined Sir Sidney Scott and Frank Podmore on a poltergeist investigation in Devon in 1894. Nevertheless, during this period, he remained, in essence, a dilettante.

Doyle was found clutching his chest in the hall of Windlesham Manor, his house in Crowborough, East Sussex, on 7 July 1930. He died of a heart attack at the age of 71. At the time of his death, there was some controversy concerning his burial place, as he was avowedly not a Christian, considering himself a Spiritualist. He was first buried on 11 July 1930 in Windlesham rose garden.

Download The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle

When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, 

however improbable, must be the truth. 

Arthur Conan Doyle

ROGER MOORE & 007: THE SPY WHO LOVED ME

Roger Moore playing The Saint

Sir Roger George Moore (October 1927 – 23 May 2017) was an English actor. He played the British secret agent James Bond in seven feature films between 1973 and 1985. He is also known for playing Simon Templar in the television series The Saint between 1962 and 1969.

Moore took over the role of Bond from Sean Connery in 1972, and made his first appearance as 007 in Live and Let Die (1973). The longest serving Bond to date, Moore portrayed the spy in six more films.

Worldwide fame arrived after Simon Templar in a new adaptation of The Saint, based on the novels by Leslie Charteris. Moore said in an interview in 1963, that he wanted to buy the rights to Leslie Charteris's character and the trademarks. 

It was only after Sean Connery had declared in 1966 that he would not play Bond any longer that Moore became aware that he might be a contender for the role. However, after George Lazenby was cast in 1969's On Her Majesty's Secret Service and Connery played Bond again in Diamonds Are Forever (1971), Moore did not consider the possibility until it seemed abundantly clear that Connery had in fact stepped down as Bond for good. At that point Moore was approached, and he accepted producer Albert Broccoli's offer in August 1972. In his autobiography Moore writes that he had to cut his hair and lose weight for the role. Although he resented having to make those changes, he was finally cast as James Bond in Live and Let Die (1973).

Roger Moore playing James Bond

After Live and Let Die, Moore continued to portray Bond in The Man with the Golden Gun (1974); The Spy Who Loved Me (1977); Moonraker (1979); For Your Eyes Only (1981); Octopussy (1983); and A View to a Kill (1985).

Moore was the oldest actor to have played Bond, he was 45 in Live and Let Die (1973), and 58 when he announced his retirement on 3 December 1985.

In 1976, he played the character of Sherlock Holmes in the film Sherlock Holmes in New York.

Moore's friend Audrey Hepburn had impressed him with her work for UNICEF, and consequently he became a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador in 1991. He was the voice of Father Christmas or 'Santa' in the 2004 UNICEF cartoon The Fly Who Loved Me.

His family announced his death in Switzerland on 23 May 2017.

More information: Roger Moore

Over the next two years UNICEF will focus on improving access to and the quality of education to provide children who have dropped out of school or who work during school hours the opportunity 

to gain a formal education! 

Roger Moore

ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE & THE ASPERGER'S SYNDROME

Arthur Conan Doyle

Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle (1859-1930) was a Scottish writer best known for his detective fiction featuring the character Sherlock Holmes. Originally a physician, in 1887 he published A Study in Scarlet, the first of four novels about Holmes and Dr. Watson. In addition, Doyle wrote over fifty short stories featuring the famous detective.

Mrs. Hudson, you're underfoot!

Sherlock Holmes's long-suffering landlady and housekeeper often saw, at close range, how impatient, insensitive, inconsiderate, and indifferent he could be with people.

More information: Sherlockian

His obsessive interest in the craft of crime-solving crowded out almost everything else from his life, including the possibility of warm and reciprocal relationships. His colleague Dr. John Watson was the only person privileged to share his personal space, with the possible exception of his brother Mycroft. And the relationship with Watson was bounded to that of wizard and apprentice.

These three core characteristics have led many to speculate that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, his creator, had, more or less unconsciously, diagnosed him with what's now known as Asperger's Syndrome.

Holmes was a fictional character, created for the amusement of Londoners in the late Victorian and early Edwardian periods. How can a fictional person be diagnosed with a developmental disorder?

So, how did Conan Doyle manage to craft this character over 100 years ago, considering that the Austrian psychiatrist Dr. Hans Asperger didn't show up to propose the syndrome until 1944?

Sherlock Holmes

Well, for starters, Conan Doyle had several of the elements of the character in his own experience, and possibly in his own head. 

He was a brilliant intellectual, educated at the University of Edinburgh, in Scotland. He became a physician, which placed him in frequent contact with the whole spectrum of normal and abnormal people.

Conan Doyle was also a super-achiever, a polymath, proficient in many sports, keen to travel the world, and willing to relocate in the service of his developing career. Holmes was often characterized as wiry, unusually strong, and agile when dire circumstances demanded it.

As a writer as well as a trained scientist, I often ask Is fiction really fiction? Is our knowledge of human beings limited to the truths we discover in research laboratories, or would we be better advised to think of all of life as the laboratory?

More information: Flavorwire

To measure the success of our societies, we should examine how well those with different abilities, including persons with autism, 

are integrated as full and valued members. 

Ban Ki-moon

012, EMERGENCY SERVICE: HOW CAN I HELP YOU?

Paula Bond and King Kong in NYC

Today, The Bonds are still in Washington. They are practising some vocabulary about justice and Social English about requesting and offering. 

They are very interested in creating good compositions, this is the reason because of they are working with the connectors.

More info: Justice System Vocabulary

Paula Bond is with the family again after spending some days in the Empire State with King Kong, her new friend from Skull Island. 

After talking about sugar and its benefits in our lives, remembering Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and his famous character Sherlock Holmes, the family are learning how to use their twitter accounts.

Jaume Bond and his new friend

After that, The Grandma is talking about Romanesque Art in the exile around the world because of the war and she is explaining a story about Roman superstitions.

Finally, Jaume Bond is explaining his experience face to face with a hurt bird which reborn after phoning to emergency services and The Grandma is remembering some beautiful songs of Leonard Cohen and Barbara.

Tomorrow, the family is meeting Fox Mulder and Dana Scully in the FBI Headquarters. Together, they're going to investigate voodoo practices and how to prevent them.

May you need some needles...

 No one is free, even the birds are chained to the sky.

Bob Dylan

LAST DAY IN BERLIN: MUSINGS OF THE BONDS

Jaume Bond

Imagine...

The Bonds are in Berlin. They visit as monuments as they can and enjoy the city. They learn History and they talk about the recent events in this incredible city.  They're together and spend all days doing different and interesting things. Eli Bond is at home again. She feels happy and wants to remember her childhood in the capital of Germany. They are special days for her. Mariona Bond practises German everywhere. She's from Luxembourg, German is very easy for her.

More information: Present Simple

The Bonds don't forget their English classes. They talk about Present Simple and its uses in Future and Past. It's an interesting verb tense. They write down some rules and clues about this Present and its Question Tags. The course continues with some important preparations: create a profile, write a postcard and talk about Social English. They use hypothetical deduction method, like Sherlock Holmes. They practise with Who is Who and listen some new Grandma's stories. She talks a lot. She hopes they start to talk and don't feel ashamed. This is Grandma's goal.

Juanjo Bond wants to travel to The USA because a closer orange friend of him is going to do something important. The family joins him.

Life is beautiful and fantastic in Berlin with The USA in mind until an unexpected thing happens: Jaume Bond is not with the family. Where's Jaume?

Think... 

I have a lot of great memories, but I can't imagine 

anything more exciting than the life I have now. 

Rob Lowe

BRITISH CELEBRITIES (VIII): SHERLOCK HOLMES

Sherlock Holmes

Elementary, My Dear Watson

Sherlock Holmes is a fictional and bohemian character created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, a Scottish physician and writter. Holmes was the most prestigious detective in London at the end of the XIX Century thanks to his ability using forensic science (shoe and tire impressions, handwriting analysis, ballistics, and fingerprints) and logical reasoning for solving the most difficult cases. 

He doesn’t work alone. John Watson, a physician, is his partner. Both of them live at 221B Baker Street.

Sherlock Holmes is considered the most portrayed movie character by Guiness World Records with more than 70 actors playing him in over 200 films.

It is simplicity itself... My eyes tell me that on the inside of your left shoe, just where the firelight strikes it, the leather is scored by six almost parallel cuts. Obviously they have been caused by someone who has very carelessly scraped round the edges of the sole in order to remove crusted mud from it. Hence, you see, my double deduction that you had been out in vile weather, and that you had a particularly malignant boot-slitting specimen of the London slavey.

More information: Sherlock Holmes Site