About UsAwardsFAQsPDF filesBuy/DonateContact Us

The Beacon Award Winner 2007

Ms. Judith Howell

The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

High School: 12th grade Honors, British Literature

Summer Reading Assignments

  • Creating a project illustrating a thorough knowledge of the novella
  • e.g. a diorama of the moor and surroundings of Baskerville Hall
    •
  • Keeping a log of unfamiliar words they encounter and defining them
  • SAT vocabulary preparation -- 85 words are found on the final list
    •  　
  • Writing a thoughtful paper on the importance of the setting to the work

Classroom Analysis

Once classes begin, Hound is analyzed at the rate of a chapter a day, with special focus on:

  • Structure of the novella
  • Plot development
  • Characterization
  • Irony
  • Literary devices such as similes, metaphors, and imagery.

Teaching Topics

Students are encouraged to be analytical as they reread each chapter to recognize and appreciate the themes included. They come to realize the surprising complexity of the story and are encouraged to think in new ways by applying some of the characters’ words to themselves. They examine their own friendships as they gain understanding of the bonds between Holmes and Watson.

Regular reading-check quizzes are given in a wide variety of formats to insure a thorough reading on the part of each student. Sketches, true and false, quote identification, sequencing of events, charts, and thought-provoking questions are used.

Quotes from Holmes

　
  • The world is full of obvious things which nobody by any chance ever observes.
  • Evil indeed is the man who has not one woman to mourn him.
  • It is in noting your fallacies I am occasionally guided towards the truth.
  • Now is the dramatic moment of fate, when you hear a step upon the stair which is walking into your life, and you know not whether for good or ill.
  • We have never had a foeman more worthy of our steel.
  • A touch, Watson – an undeniable touch!...I feel a foil as quick and supple as my own. (Mrs. Howell displays a fencing foil during discussion of the final two.)

Themes in Hound

  • The abuse of nature
  • Doyle’s treatment of love in the novella
  • The roles of women in the Victorian era
  • Betrayal

Literary Analysis Topics (on completion of entire book)

  • Stapleton as the ultimate villain
  • Doyle’s view of Americans as revealed in his portrayal of Sir Henry Baskerville
  • Doyle’s use of character foils – choose 3 sets
  • Doyle’s concept of good versus evil as revealed in Hound
  • Is it personified by characters? Revealed by the setting? By the action?
  • What is the power of each?
  • How does the ending of the novella strengthen his position?

Once the students have chosen a topic and have a rough draft composed, Mrs. Howell models a paper to enhance the students’ understanding of the expectations for college-level writing.

For the remainder of the semester, references are made back to Doyle and The Hound of the Baskervilles, applying the techniques and concepts included in the book to subsequent literature.