British Detective Fiction 1891–1901

This book examines the developments in British serial detective fiction which took place in the seven years when Sherlock Holmes was dead. In December 1893, at the height of Sherlock’s popularity with the Strand Magazine’s worldwide readership, Arthur Conan Doyle killed off his detective. At the time, he firmly believed that Holmes would not be resurrected. This book introduces and showcases a range of Sherlock’s most fascinating successors, exploring the ways in which a huge range of popular magazines and newspapers clamoured to ensnare Sherlock’s bereft fans. The book’s case-study format examines a range of detective series-- created by L.T. Meade; C.L. Pirkis; Arthur Morrison; Fergus Hume; Richard Marsh; Kate and Vernon Hesketh-Prichard— that filled the pages of a variety of periodicals, from plush monthly magazines to cheap newspapers, in the years while Sherlock was dead. Readers will be introduced to an array of detectives—professional and amateur, male and female, oldand young; among them a pawn-shop worker, a scientist, a British aristocrat, a ghost-hunter. The study of these series shows that there was life after Sherlock and proves that there is much to learn about the development of the detective genre from the successors to Sherlock Holmes.

“In this brilliant, incisive study of late Victorian detective fiction, Clarke emphatically shows us there is life beyond Sherlock Holmes. Rich in contextual detail and with her customary eye for the intricacies of publishing history, Clarke’s wonderfully accessible book brings to the fore a collection of hitherto neglected writers simultaneously made possible but pushed to the margins by Conan Doyle’s most famous creation.” 

Professor Clarke's superb new book, British Detective : The Successors to Sherlock Holmes, is required reading for anyone interestedin Victorian crime and detective fiction. Building on her award-winning first monograph, Late-Victorian Crime Fiction in the Shadows of Sherlock, Dr. Clarke further explores the history of serial detective fiction published after the "death" of Conan Doyle's famous detective in 1893. This is a path-breaking book that advances scholarship in the field of late-Victorian detective fiction while at the same time introducing non-specialist readers to a treasure trove of stories that indeed rival the Sherlock Holmes series in their ability to puzzle and entertain the most discerning reader. 

— Alexis Easley, Professor of English, University of St.Paul, Minnesota

“This book is full of refreshing new contexts for familiar arguments about detective fiction, and Clarke’s thorough research brings some of these more obscure characters into the full light they merit.” (Caroline Reitz, Victorian Studies, Vol. 64 (4), 2022)

“This is an ambitious and diverse study that places detective fiction in its broader periodical contexts and makes an important contribution to a growing critical field. … Clarke’s book is a welcome addition to recent critical work … . This engagingly written study offers a much fuller account of 1890s detective fiction and will be essential reading for scholars working on the fin de siècle, Victorian popular fiction, journalism, and the publishing history of the short story.” (‪Emma Liggins, Victorian Periodicals Review, Vol. 54 (1), 2021)

“In this brilliant, incisive study of late Victorian detective fiction, Clarke emphatically shows us there is life beyond Sherlock Holmes. Rich in contextual detail and with her customary eye for the intricacies of publishing history, Clarke’s wonderfully accessible book brings to the fore a collection of hitherto neglected writers simultaneously made possible but pushed to the margins by Conan Doyle’s most famous creation.” 

Professor Clarke's superb new book, British Detective : The Successors to Sherlock Holmes, is required reading for anyone interested in Victorian crime and detective fiction. Building on her award-winning first monograph, Late-Victorian Crime Fiction in the Shadows of Sherlock, Dr. Clarke further explores the history of serial detective fiction published after the "death" of Conan Doyle's famous detective in 1893. This is a path-breaking book that advances scholarship in the field of late-Victorian detective fiction while at the same time introducing non-specialist readers to a treasure trove of stories that indeed rival the Sherlock Holmes series in their ability to puzzle and entertain the most discerning reader. 

— Alexis Easley, Professor of English, University of St.Paul, Minnesota

Clare Clarke is Assistant Professor of English at Trinity College Dublin, Ireland. Her first book, Late-Victorian Crime Fiction in the Shadows of Sherlock (2014), was awarded the H.R.F. Keating Prize in 2015.