Arthur Conan Doyle Collection

The Toronto Reference Library has one of the world's foremost collections of library materials devoted to the life and work of Arthur Conan Doyle. Much of the collection, of course, is devoted to Doyle's most famous character, Sherlock Holmes. The Collection is housed in a room evoking 221B Baker Street, where people can browse along open shelves in a manner unusual in a special collection.

Doyle wrote much more than the Sherlock Holmes stories for which he is most famous. In addition to other literary genres, he wrote extensively on spiritualism, true crime, history, and current issues of the day.

The library collects different editions of Doyle's works, from the first to the most recent, along with simplified versions, translations, and adaptations to stage and screen. The collection also includes parodies, pastiches and any works in any medium that uses Doyle's stories or characters. The most popular character by far, of course, is Sherlock Holmes, but in recent years Doyle himself made a surprising number of appearances in fictional works.

Secondary material, such as critical, bibliographical, and biographical studies, is also collected. Both primary and secondary material is published by university presses, commercial publishers, individuals, the many societies devoted to Sherlock Holmes, and the one society devoted to Arthur Conan Doyle.