The Speckled Bank’ and ‘The Five Orange Pips

How does the writer create mystery and suspense in these stories? Explain how he uses language to create character and atmosphere. What does this tell about the conventions of the Victorian short story? Arthur Conan Doyle’s ‘The Speckled Band’ is about a young girl named Helen Stoner who is in fear of her life and seeks the advice if Sherlock Holmes. Her sister died two years ago and she has been hearing the same things as she heard before she died.

Sherlock Holmes investigates the mystery and finds it is her stepfather that killed her sister with a snake.

‘The Five Orange Pips’ is about a young man called John Openshaw. His uncle Elias and his father have been killed. Just before the killings they both received a letter with five dried orange pips and the letters ‘KKK’. John has got the same letter. Sherlock Holmes finds that the ‘Ku Klux Klan’ killed John his uncle and father. The killers were sailing to America and drowned at sea.

‘The Speckled Band’ and ‘The Five Orange Pips’ are both short stories by Arthur Conan Doyle. The stories tell of a mystical tail and of how the mysteries are solved by Sherlock Holmes with the help of his close friend Dr Watson.

Both the ‘The Speckled Band’ and ‘The Five Orange Pips’ are set in the south of England, ‘The Five Orange Pips’ is on “a small estate in Sussex, near Horsham”, but Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson never go to the estate.

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‘The Speckled Band’ is also set in the south of England, “on the western border of Surrey. ” The reason for setting the stories in the south of England is because it would be familiar to the reader. At that time London was where many rich people lived and they would know the area well around London. The rich readers would be able to identify with the characters and what happens to them.

Another reason is that both the estates that are in the stories are in the countryside and would have been cut off from a big town or city, but still being able to reach each estate within two or three hours. These estates would be remote, Conan Doyle would have done this to create suspense. Both of the stories have links abroad. In ‘The Five Orange Pips John Openshaws uncle emigrated to America when he was a young man and in ‘The Speckled Band’ Helen Stoners stepfather went to India to work as a doctor. The events in the stories both relate to what happened to the main characters abroad.

For example when John’s uncle lived in America he join the Ku Klux Klan and this is why John, his uncle and his farther have died. Helens stepfather worked in India he had snakes, cheaters and baboons set over to England for him. By having links to abroad this introduces mystery to the story because snakes, baboons, cheaters and the Ku Klux Klan are strange and foreign. In ‘The Five Orange Pips’ John turn up late at night again an inconvenient time for Holmes and Watson. When John goes to see Holmes there is a storm outside, “It was in the late days of September, and the equinoctial gales had set in with exceptional violence.

” Conan Doyle uses the storm as a literary device, by mirroring the storm outside as the emotional storm inside John Openshaw’s head. The storm is at night and this would increase the suspense, as the street would be dark when John leaves Holmes’s house and we know he is in danger. In ‘The Speckled Band’ Helen comes at an inconvenient time to see Homes early in the morning, before Holmes and Watson are up. When Holmes and Watson go to Helen’s house they arrive in the day and look around the house and then the action happens at night.

“When you hear him retire for the night, you must open the shutters of your window, undo the hasp, put your lamp there as a signal to us… ” Holmes would only be able to see the lamp at night. Conan Doyle sets all the action at night to increase suspense. If it were to be in the day time and light and sunny there would be not be so much suspense about what is ahead. In the dark you do not see what is happening so everything seems scarier, “The shutters cut off the least ray of light, and we waited in absolute darkness. ” In both the stories the characters can be put in to categories.