Arthur Conan Doyle? Edgar Allan Poe? Dorothy L. Sayers? Apocryphal? Question for Quote Investigator: A famous fictional detective once explained the methodology for solving mysteries. The sleuth should gather facts and systematically eliminate hypotheses that are impossible. When a single hypothesis remains, however improbable, it must be the truth. The description of this approach has …
Tag Archives: Arthur Conan Doyle
Quote Origin: When Hopes Seem Hardly Worth Having, Just Mount a Bicycle and Go For a Good Spin Down the Road
Arthur Conan Doyle? Sherlock Holmes? Diane Ackerman? Jeremy Withers? Apocryphal? Question for Quote Investigator: Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes, was a bicycle enthusiast. He suggested that taking a spin down the road on a bicycle would dispel feelings of discouragement and unhappiness. I do not know the precise phrasing Conan Doyle used. …
Elementary, My Dear Watson
Sherlock Holmes? Arthur Conan Doyle? J. Murray Moore? Franklin P. Adams? P. G. Wodehouse? Apocryphal? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: When Arthur Conan Doyle’s famous detective Sherlock Holmes was explaining to his good friend John A. Watson the nature of his latest deduction he supposedly employed the well-known phrase: Elementary, my dear Watson. I was astonished …