View source for Angels of Darkness: An Unpublished Play

{{Cargo_Research_Articles
 |date=1993-01-01
 |author=Cameron Hollyer
 |topic=Dramatisation
 |summary=This scholarly study examines Angels of Darkness, Arthur Conan Doyle's unpublished stage adaptation of A Study in Scarlet, analysing its manuscript history, copyright status, dramatic structure, and divergence from the novel. It evaluates the play's artistic weaknesses, racial stereotyping, and canonical implications, situating it within Conan Doyle's early theatrical ambitions.
}}
''Angels of Darkness: An Unpublished Play'' is an article written by [[Cameron Hollyer]] published in the [[A.C.D. - The Journal of The Arthur Conan Doyle Society]] (Vol. 4, 1993).

This study examines [[Angels of Darkness]], [[Arthur Conan Doyle|Conan Doyle]]'s unpublished stage adaptation of [[A Study in Scarlet]], analysing its manuscript history, copyright status, dramatic structure, and divergence from the novel. It evaluates the play's artistic weaknesses, racial stereotyping, and canonical implications, situating it within [[Arthur Conan Doyle|Conan Doyle]]'s early theatrical ambitions.

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== Angels of Darkness: An Unpublished Play ==
[[File:Acd-society-journal-1993-vol4-p46-angels-of-darkness.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[A.C.D. - The Journal of The Arthur Conan Doyle Society]] (Vol. 4, 1993, p. 46)]]
[[File:Acd-society-journal-1993-vol4-p47-angels-of-darkness.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[A.C.D. - The Journal of The Arthur Conan Doyle Society]] (Vol. 4, 1993, p. 47)]]
[[File:Acd-society-journal-1993-vol4-p48-angels-of-darkness.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[A.C.D. - The Journal of The Arthur Conan Doyle Society]] (Vol. 4, 1993, p. 48)]]
[[File:Acd-society-journal-1993-vol4-p49-angels-of-darkness.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[A.C.D. - The Journal of The Arthur Conan Doyle Society]] (Vol. 4, 1993, p. 49)]]
[[File:Acd-society-journal-1993-vol4-p50-angels-of-darkness.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[A.C.D. - The Journal of The Arthur Conan Doyle Society]] (Vol. 4, 1993, p. 50)]]
[[File:Acd-society-journal-1993-vol4-p51-angels-of-darkness.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[A.C.D. - The Journal of The Arthur Conan Doyle Society]] (Vol. 4, 1993, p. 51)]]
[[File:Acd-society-journal-1993-vol4-p52-angels-of-darkness.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[A.C.D. - The Journal of The Arthur Conan Doyle Society]] (Vol. 4, 1993, p. 52)]]
[[File:Acd-society-journal-1993-vol4-p53-angels-of-darkness.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[A.C.D. - The Journal of The Arthur Conan Doyle Society]] (Vol. 4, 1993, p. 53)]]
[[File:Acd-society-journal-1993-vol4-p54-angels-of-darkness.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[A.C.D. - The Journal of The Arthur Conan Doyle Society]] (Vol. 4, 1993, p. 54)]]
[[File:Acd-society-journal-1993-vol4-p55-angels-of-darkness.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[A.C.D. - The Journal of The Arthur Conan Doyle Society]] (Vol. 4, 1993, p. 55)]]

The idea of a [[Sherlock Holmes]] play without [[Sherlock Holmes]] sounds as improbable as the idea of Hamlet without the title character. Yet such a play exists in manuscript form. It was written by [[Arthur Conan Doyle]][[Arthur Conan Doyle]] and was based almost entirely on the second part of [[A Study in Scarlet]]. Dealing only with the American episodes of the book, but utilising some characters from the London section, including [[Dr. Watson|Dr John Watson]], the play is a literary curiosity of some interest. Entitled [[Angels of Darkness|Angels of Darkness: A Drama in Three Acts]], the play did not satisfy its author, and he put it aside and probably forgot about it. 

The manuscript of [[Angels of Darkness]] survived the author's death and became a part of his estate. After the death of the author's literary executor, [[Adrian Malcolm Conan Doyle|Adrian Conan Doyle]], the manuscripts in his possession were divided among the immediate heirs. In this division [[Adrian Malcolm Conan Doyle|Adrian]]'s widow, [[Anna Charlotte Andersen|Anna]], received [[Angels of Darkness]] and some other manuscripts. 

When [[Anna Charlotte Andersen|Anna Conan Doyle]] died in December 1990 she left the [[Arthur Conan Doyle|Conan Doyle]] manuscripts then in her possession to the Arthur Conan Doyle Collection of the Metropolitan Toronto Library. She owned four manuscripts at the time of her death. Although the language of the will specified that any manuscripts which she owned that were 'unsold' would go to the Toronto library, her other heirs maintained she had meant to leave the library only those that were 'unpublished'. The bequest is therefore being contested. Since [[Angels of Darkness]] was certainly never published, the manuscript was released and sent to the Metropolitan Toronto Reference Library in 1992, where it is now part of the Arthur Conan Doyle Collection. (1) 
 

=== Legal Status of the Play ===

Although copyright in [[Arthur Conan Doyle]]'s published works expired in 1980 in Great Britain and Canada — his works from 1918 on are still in copyright in the United States this does not apply to works not published during the author's lifetime. [[Angels of Darkness]], as an unpublished work, is still subject to copyright in all three countries. Ownership of the manuscript does not signify ownership of the copyright, and there are several parties with a legal interest in the work, including the author's daughter and surviving heir, [[Lena Annette Jean Conan Doyle|Dame Jean Conan Doyle]]. 

[[Lena Annette Jean Conan Doyle|Dame Jean Conan Doyle]] will not allow the publication, performance or direct quotation of the play. The manuscript may, however, be read, viewed, or examined in the [[Arthur Conan Doyle]] room in Toronto. Since the room is not always open during library hours, it is best to write beforehand to arrange a suitable time to visit. The play is of average length and would take about two hours to read. (2) 


=== Description of the Manuscript ===

The manuscript is contained in five ruled exercise books, cloth or board covered of octavo size (20cm x 15cm). The text is written in ink on the right-hand pages of the notebooks, with brief descriptive entries for the characters, when they first appear, on the left-hand pages. Each volume has the author's name and address written on the inside of the cover or the first page as follows: 

: [[Arthur Conan Doyle|A. Conan Doyle]] M. D. 
: Bush Villa 
: Southsea 

Each volume (except for the last) is labelled on the cover with the title and the act or acts included in the volume. Several pages preceding the first act in volume one and the last few pages of volume three have been clipped, but the text appears to be complete. (Other material may have occupied the pages removed). Not all the pages have been used in three of the volumes. The contents of the volumes are as follows: 

: [Vol.1] Acts I - II [67pp] 
: [Vol.2] Act II (continued) [32pp) 
: [Vol.3] Act III [52pp] 
: [Vol.4] Act III (concluded) [15pp] 
: [Vol.5] Act IV [deleted. Partial revision of Act III. 21pp] 

This description is mainly based on the catalogue entry by Mary Eleanor Smart, Special Collections cataloguer. Square brackets indicate that the words are not in or on the volumes. The page counts do not include blank pages. The text thus consists of 166 pages, plus 21 additional pages of an alternate text for Act III, making a total of 187 pages. The pages are unnumbered. Each page has about 20 lines of text. The number of words per page, as in most plays, varies but the average is about 150 words. The text including the revised portion is approximately 25,000 words long. 

The title page reads as follows: [[A Study in Scarlet]] (cancelled) / [[Angels of Darkness]]. / A Drama in three Acts. / [[Arthur Conan Doyle|A Conan Doyle]].
 
As is usual with [[Arthur Conan Doyle|Conan Doyle]] manuscripts the text contains a minimal number of corrections and deletions and is written in a very legible hand. There are no insoluble puzzles and the manuscript is, on the whole, as clear as if it were in print. 


=== The Date Being...? ===

The manuscript is undated. According to the label from an exhibit catalogue (unidentified) pasted to the inside front cover it was written in 1889-90. But the dates may have been a year earlier than this (1888-89). The authorities differ. It was certainly written before the author moved his practice to London (1891) and probably before he left for Berlin (November 1890). No one has suggested that it was written prior to the publication of the book on which it was based (December 1887). It is safe to say, therefore, that it was written sometime between 1888 and 1890. (3) 


=== The People of the Drama ===

The characters of the drama are listed under the heading 'Dramatis Personae' on the left-hand page opposite the first page of the play. There are seventeen characters listed. Of these the following are derived from the book: [[John Ferrier]], [[Lucy Ferrier]], [[Jefferson Hope]], [[John H. Watson|John Watson]], M.D., Elder Johnstone (=Johnston), John Drebber (=[[Enoch J. Drebber|Enoch Drebber]]), Lovejoy Stangerson (=[[Joseph Stangerson]]), Hiram Cooper (=[[Cowper]]), Mrs Carpenter (=[[Madame Charpentier]]), Rose Carpenter, her daughter (=[[Alice Charpentier]]), Short and Stephens (Avenging Angels unnamed in the book). Characters wholly new to the play are Sir Montague Brown, an English aristocrat, Elias Fortescue Smee, a travelling salesman, Splayfoot Dick, a fugitive slave sheltered by the Ferriers, Biddy McGee, an Irish maid, and Ling-Tchu, the Ferrier's Chinese servant who acts as a spy for the Mormons. [[Brigham Young]], who appears in the book, is replaced by the Elder Johnstone in the play. 


=== Contents of the Play ===

The first two acts are set in [[John Ferrier]]'s farmhouse, outside Salt Lake City, and the principal events follow very closely those of Chapters 2-4 of Part 2 of [[A Study in Scarlet]]. 

In the play, there is no mention of the time of these events, but presumably they take place in the year 1860, when [[Lucy Ferrier|Lucy]] is about 17. We know from the book that [[John Ferrier]] died on 4 August 1860. 

In the first act [[Jefferson Hope]] proposes to [[Lucy Ferrier|Lucy]], and then departs for the mines, first warning [[John Ferrier]] about the Avenging Angels and the Council of Four. A sympathetic Mormon, Hiram Cooper, reinforces these warnings. Elder Johnstone threatens Ferrier with retribution if Lucy does not choose to marry either Drebber or Stangerson in the next thirty days. Lucy is terrified but neither she nor her father will agree to a polygamous marriage. Four other characters play prominent roles in the act: Elias Fortescue Smee, a travelling notions salesman; Splayfoot Dick, the Ferrier's black servant; Ling-Tchu, a Chinese servant; and Biddy McGee, an Irish maid. These characters furnish local colour and comic relief. Except for Ling-Tchu, who is a spy for the Mormons, they all prove to be loyal friends and staunch supporters of the Ferriers in their hour of crisis. 

The second act opens a month later, two days before the ultimatum expires. The Mormons are watching the house. Lucy refuses Drebber and Stangerson. Hiram Cooper, the Mormon, tells Ferrier he cannot help him, advising flight. Biddy and Dick discover that Ling-Tchu is the Mormons' inside man and throw him into the cellar. Hope returns at the last moment, as he does in the book, and tells Ferrier and Lucy to prepare for an escape. Smee accompanies them as they sneak out of a side window. Ling-Tchu emerges from the cellar and tries to warn the watchers but Dick and Biddy overpower him as the curtain falls. 

In the third act, the author departs from the book and devises quite a different ending for his story. The action takes place in the front garden of Mrs Carpenter's boarding house in San Francisco. Eight months have elapsed. Lucy and Smee have taken refuge here, John Ferrier (actually) and Jefferson Hope (apparently) having been killed in a Mormon ambush. Drebber, in the guise of a French count, is also on the scene, plotting with the absent Stangerson and two Avenging Angels to kidnap Lucy. Also in residence is a San Francisco physician, John Watson (no middle initial is given), who is taking care of Lucy and is in love with her. She, however, refuses his proposal in loyalty to Hope. Toward the middle of the act, Hope appears in a very fragile state, and Dr Watson saves his life by administering ether (though he is tempted to let his rival die). 

Hope tells Watson how he was shot by the Mormons in an ambush, fell over a cliff, landed on a convenient rock spur (shades of Sherlock!) and was rescued by prospectors. Knowing that he has little time left, he has tracked down Stangerson and killed him in a fair fight and is now on the track of Drebber. Refusing to enter the house (he does not wish to alarm Lucy), he waits for his enemy. Drebber emerges and, having learned of Stangerson's death, prepares to fly. Hope tries to engage him in a duel but the Mormon treacherously stabs Hope in the back. Smee kills Drebber, and Lucy takes the dying Hope in her arms. Realising that Watson loves Lucy, Hope secretly puts Watson's hand in hers and makes her promise to marry the man whose hand she holds. Thinking that it is Hope's hand, Lucy agrees. Then Hope dies, and Lucy discovers she is engaged to Watson after all. 

Part of the rather crowded third act concerns the love affair between the globe-trotting English aristocrat, Sir Montague Brown, and Mrs Carpenter's coy daughter, Rose. Their story ends happily in marriage. Splayfoot Dick also takes part in the action, reporting on events in Utah. 

The third act undoubtedly gave the author trouble. It is longer than the other acts, and the fifth notebook contains a partial revision of it. The play, however, is complete as it stands. 


=== Religious, Racial and Ethnic Stereotypes ===

Before attempting to evaluate the play as a whole, it would be well to consider the feature that is most likely to prejudice the modern reader against it: that is the use the author makes of racial, religious and ethnic stereotypes. 

The view of Mormonism in the play is basically that of the book. That view, though sincere, is undoubtedly biased. But in some respects the play softens the anti-Mormonism of the book by giving a prominent role to the sympathetic (though heterodox) Mormon, Hiram Cooper, and by dissociating Brigham Young from the Mormon zealots who persecute the Ferriers. In the book, the Prophet delivers the ultimatum to John Ferrier and stands squarely behind it. In the play he does not appear and is said to disapprove of the activities of the Council of Four and the Avenging Angels but to be unable to control them. Thus the principal villains, Drebber and Stangerson, may be seen as acting against the highest authority in the Mormon religion. 

To impart local colour, to provide comedy, and perhaps to add 'verisimilitude to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative', the author added a variety of stock types to the original story. Most of these are harmless enough. The Yankee pedlar, Elias Fortescue Smee, epitomises Sam Slick and his tribe of slick and canny gentlemen of commerce. He will sell anything to anyone at any time and is a master of the art of persuasion. His name of course is a fine example of the author's appellative genius. He plays a necessary role in the plot by rescuing Lucy and bringing her to San Francisco. The comic English aristocrat, Sir Montague Brown, is another familiar stage figure of the time: a kind of proto-Peter Wimsey, an apparently foolish and foppish fellow who is nothing of the sort. Biddy McGee, the Irish maid, who speaks in brogue and wields a deadly broom, is obviously designed as a sympathetic figure and a potential audience pleaser. Drebber in his role as French count mangles English in a somewhat French way, but he is not very successful at it and the canny Brown sees through him easily. 

It is the two characters who embody racial stereotypes that the modern reader will find difficult to accept. But we must remember that white chauvinism was so firmly embedded in the society of the time that few people questioned it. No one at that time had ever heard of political correctness. Reading the play made me once again admire [[Arthur Conan Doyle|Conan Doyle]] for the comparatively small use he made of ethnic and racial stereotypes, dialects and accents in the Sherlock Holmes stories and in his work as a whole. His use of such stereotypes in an unpublished play should not, in my opinion, alter our views of the author's usual fairness in such matters. 

Having said that, I have to admit that in his depiction of the Chinese, Ling-Tchu, the author put his foot in a trap from which the most sympathetic commentator will find it difficult to extricate him. Ling-Tchu combines the features of the pig-tailed Chinese laundryman who speaks a pidgin English in which almost every word ends in 'ee' — Bret Harte's 'Heathen Chinee' — and the sinister Oriental immortalised by Sax Rohmer. Ling-Tchu, of course, is far inferior as a character to the Moriarty-like Fu Manchu, but he comes out of a lower drawer in the same cabinet. The type was commonplace in the popular literature of the time, but it has long gone the way of the pigtail and the Chinese laundry to be replaced by the Kung-fu King, the sage philosopher, and the eager student. 

In the character of Splayfoot Dick, the ex-slave, it seems to me that the author begins with a caricature and ends with a human being. Unlike the Chinese, Blacks in the literature of the period were rarely portrayed as villains (except in tales of the Reconstruction like The Clansman.) They were usually pictured as good-natured, shiftless, lazy, superstitious, cowardly, and simple-minded — in other words as comic figures. Dick with his broad negro dialect, his credulousness where Smee is concerned, his eager ingestion of misunderstood facts, his delight in foisting off all of his jobs on Ling-Tchu, seems, at the beginning of the play, to fit the stereotype. But as the play progresses, he turns out to be shrewd (he unmasks Ling-Tchu), loyal to the man who rescued him, brave, true-hearted and willing to work when there is man's work to be done. It is almost as if an unconscious anti-racism on the part of the author worked to undermine the racial stereotype he was attempting to use; or, if that is going too far, that the author possessed a fine innocence that prevented him from denigrating a representative of an oppressed race. The stereotype was very important in America, for it justified the subordination of black people to white people. But in England, with its different history, it mattered less. Starting with a stereotype, the author wrote a man. 


=== Evaluation ===

It is easy to understand the author's lack of success in his attempt to base a play on [[A Study in Scarlet]], for it is a very difficult novel to dramatise. The problem is that it consists of two separate stories far removed from each other in time and space, each with its own set of characters. But these stories are connected in such a way that neither is complete without the other. Such diversity of plot is more easily handled in the novel than it is in a stage play. It is notable that the story, despite its importance in the Holmes saga, was skipped in the Granada television series. 

To simplify his task, the author dropped the first (and to the modern reader more interesting) part of the book and concentrated on bringing the second part to life. In the first two acts he was on solid ground, for he could follow the book, embellishing it with the addition of comic characters. Much of the dialogue is taken verbatim from the book, and the admittedly melodramatic plot moves smoothly, swiftly and logically to its crisis. The second act ends with the flight of the Ferriers with Hope and Smee. 

Now the author faced a problem which he could not solve, for in eliminating the first part of the book, he deprived his story of its conclusion. Jefferson Hope's story in its original version ends in London two decades after the events dramatised in the first two acts of the play. The author had to find a new ending for his play, and in the process the play lost its unity of action and its coherence. Unity of time and of place are not necessary to a play, but unity of action is; and in the third act two new plots contend for supremacy with the original action: Watson's love for Lucy and Sir Montague Brown's courtship of Rose Carpenter. The latter plot could have been eliminated; but the author's decision that Hope would die and Lucy live (contrary to the events in the book) required that Lucy's future should somehow be provided for. An extra hero was needed. The author could not find a suitable candidate in the second part of the book, so he turned back to the first part, and kidnapped Watson (along with the Charpentiers) and transported him (and them) through time and space from 1880s London to 1860s San Francisco. 

Watson, of course, will not do as a hero. He was created as a foil for Holmes. As a romantic hero he is out of his element. Yet he is the pivot upon which the third act turns. His decision to save Hope, and Hope's somewhat excessive gratitude to him for doing what a doctor would be bound to do in the circumstances, creates a bond between the two men that receives more dramatic emphasis than their relations with the heroine. Hope does the decent thing in handing Lucy on to Watson. But one cannot help thinking that this gentlemanly gesture is terribly unfair to Lucy. The poor lady has no more choice in the matter than the Mormons offer her in their insistence that she marry Drebber or Stangerson. She will certainly abide by her promise to Hope, for all the good characters are motivated by romantic codes of conduct and not by realistic considerations. The author was, of course, following the romantic conventions of the time, soon to be overthrown by the realistic theatre of Ibsen, Shaw and Chekhov. But even considered as representative of its genre, the play does not quite come off, as the author wisely recognised. 


=== Summary ===

[[Angels of Darkness]] is an apprentice work in which the author made his first attempt to dramatise one of his fictions. In subsequent plays, such as Waterloo and The Speckled Band (based on short stories), he was to have more success, though his plays (some still unpublished) constitute a minor part of his work. In attempting to dramatise [[A Study in Scarlet]], the author undertook an all but impossible task. 

Of little intrinsic value, the play is nevertheless of interest in relation to its author's career, which was approaching a major turning point. Micah Clarke (1889), The Sign of the Four (1890), The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1891-3), and The White Company (1891) were soon to establish [[Arthur Conan Doyle|Conan Doyle]] as one of the most popular and prosperous writers of his day. The author was content to consign the play to oblivion. Its primary interest (and this is a very strong one) is its relationship to the Sherlock Holmes canon, considered from a Sherlockian viewpoint. Can it be used, for example, to deduce facts about Watson's background? Did he (heaven forbid!) marry Lucy Ferrier? Did he ever live in San Francisco? 

The answer to the first two questions is 'No'. As for the third question, Watson may have lived in San Francisco, but we cannot prove it by the play. Clearly the play and the novel are incompatible, so much so that if the events of the play were genuine, the London episodes of [[A Study in Scarlet]] would never have taken place and the novel itself would not have been written. The canonical Watson could not have been more than eight years old at the time of the play, and the 'real' Watson never met, much less married, [[Lucy Ferrier]], who died when he was a child. [[Richard Lancelyn Green]] remarks that 'the John Watson of the play appears to have no connection with the companion of [[Sherlock Holmes]]'. He is certainly right from the biographical point of view. The two Watsons do not collate. But from the literary point of view it seems clear that the author took the character from the book he was dramatising for use in a different context. I have explained why I think he was forced to do so. 

A [[Sherlock Holmes]] play without [[Sherlock Holmes]] is an impossibility. With the gift of hindsight, we could have told the author that such a project was doomed to failure. The Holmes stories depend on the delicate balance of reason and romance. Without its counterbalance, reason falls with a dull thud, and romance flies off somewhere. But when the balance is restored, romance itself becomes reasonable and reason romantic. In [[A Study in Scarlet]], [[Arthur Conan Doyle|Conan Doyle]] balanced his ingredients delicately if precariously, and the book succeeds. In [[Angels of Darkness]] he removed the weight of reason with disastrous results. 

In the Holmes-Watson combination, [[Arthur Conan Doyle|Conan Doyle]] held a winning hand, one that would bring him fame and fortune. But he did not yet realise it. Reading [[Angels of Darkness]] is like watching a man who hunts for loose change in the sofa cushions, unaware that he has a diamond of infinite value in his vest pocket. 


=== References ===

1. [[Anna Charlotte Andersen|Anna Conan Doyle]] visited the Toronto Arthur Conan Doyle Collection in 1974 in connection with a possible sale of manuscripts to the library. Although the sale could not be arranged, she was favourably impressed by the collection and very kindly remembered it when she made her bequest. The other manuscripts which she owned when she died were '[[Some Personalia About Mr. Sherlock Holmes|Some Personalia about Mr Sherlock Holmes]]' (published in The Strand Magazine, December 1917); The Crown Diamond (published by The Baskerette Press, New York, 1958); and the author's page of notes for [[A Study in Scarlet]], reproduced in the Carr biography and elsewhere. 

2. Write to: Victoria Gill, Curator, Arthur Conan Doyle Collection, Metropolitan Toronto Reference Library, 789 Yonge Street, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4W 2G8. 

3. In his ''The Life of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle'' (London; Murray, 1949), [[John Dickson Carr]] says that the first two acts were written in 1889 and the third in 1890 (p. 92). On the other hand, Geoffrey Stavert says that [[Arthur Conan Doyle|Conan Doyle]] worked on the play in December 1888 and January 1889 (''A Study in Southsea'', Portsmouth; Milestone, 1987, p. 137). In his Introduction to ''The Uncollected Sherlock Holmes'' (London; Penguin, 1983), [[Richard Lancelyn Green]] notes that The Portsmouth Crescent, on 28 September 1888, mentioned that the author planned to dramatise his work [[A Study in Scarlet]]. [[Richard Lancelyn Green|Mr Green]] also informs me that the play in mentioned as a going project in [[Arthur Conan Doyle|Conan Doyle]]'s notebook for 1889, which is in his possession. So the play may have been begun as early as 1888 and finished as late as 1890. 

4. I am indebted to my friend Pooh-Bah for this explanation. 

5. [[Richard Lancelyn Green|Green]]: ''The Uncollected Sherlock Holmes'', p. 47. 








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