Sherlock Holmes fan Lucy Worsley investigates the love-hate relationship between detective and author

What made you want to put your powers of investigation to the subject of Arthur Conan Doyle?

Although I love Sherlock Holmes, I have always felt less warmly about his creator, Arthur Conan Doyle, who seems to me like a man who was a bit pleased with himself. But one thing that did intrigue me, is the way that he seemed to be ashamed of his hugely popular character Sherlock Holmes. I thought we could find a way of making him sympathetic, and interesting – and perhaps even vulnerable – by probing into his life and his papers.

What is it that makes the character of Sherlock Holmes so engaging, and so long lasting in its appeal?

Mr Holmes is a character that you can transport to various times and cultures: he’s so distinctive and he makes sense in different times and places. And you can see that in the endless stream of film and television adaptations of his story.

And also, Conan Doyle’s writing is very modern as well.

Yes, his writing is extremely fast paced and when the original stories were published, they were intensely modern. If we watch screen or TV adaptations now there is a tendency to think there is something ‘heritage’ about them, but Conan Doyle was very up to date with medical technology, with forensic methods with guns and weapons, lots of different skills so for the first readers, Sherlock Holmes was very innovative.

What do you like about the character Sherlock Holmes?

Well, I think that what a person may like about Sherlock does not necessarily reflect well on that individual! He is a loner, he likes reading, he is very immersed in and motivated by his work and he doesn’t like parties, which sound a lot like me!

He also knows how clever he is, which is not something that one should aspire to. But on the plus side, he cares a lot about putting wrongs right, and he is loved by his friend, Dr Watson. who is such a lovely guy. I think there must be something loveable about Sherlock Holmes, if Dr Watson feel so strongly about his friend.

What is the most surprising thing you learned while making the series?

With the success of Sherlock, Arthur appeared to have everything he ever wanted, including appearing in The Strand Magazine as one of the celebrities of the age. On the surface, his life was golden, but he was not happy because it was not the success he dreamed of. He wanted to be taken seriously as an upmarket, respectable establishment figure.

Considering how popular the Sherlock Holmes stories went on to become, it is surprising to discover that Conan Doyle had many rejections before finding a home with The Strand Magazine.

Yes, it is really surprising! Sherlock Holmes was a slow burn and rejected three times before Arthur found a publisher and that is because he was looking in the wrong place. He pitched Sherlock Holmes to very upmarket publishers, like today’s New Yorker.

Sherlock Holmes was just too mainstream for that. The rejections scarred Arthur and made him slightly ashamed of his character, because he wanted to be a high brow writer.

Nevertheless, he persevered because he was short of money, and he had a family to support, and he was also very, very hardworking, and energetic.

Watch Killing Sherlock: Lucy Worsley on The Case Of Conan Doyle from Sunday 10 December at 9pm on BBC Two and BBC iPlayer