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Etienne Gerard, a brave, vain and gloriously boastful hussar of Napoleon's army, now an old man, tells the stories of his greatest exploits in the wars…
Etienne Gerard, a brave, vain and gloriously boastful hussar of Napoleon's army, now an old man, tells the stories of his greatest exploits in the wars across Europe: how he went to the Castle of Gloom to rescue a friend's beloved, defended the Emperor against Corsican assassins, was taken prisoner by the English and escaped from Dartmoor, and carried secret messages through enemy lines. The joke is that Gerard never notices how ridiculous his vanity makes him, yet his courage is real.
Context and significance
Arthur Conan Doyle published the stories in The Strand Magazine and collected them in 1896; many readers prefer the boastful Gerard to Sherlock Holmes. Doyle based him partly on the memoirs of the real Baron de Marbot. Read The White Company and The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes.
About the author
Arthur Conan Doyle (1859–1930) was born in Edinburgh, trained as a doctor and wrote stories while waiting for patients at his practice in Southsea. Sherlock Holmes, modelled partly on his old teacher Joseph Bell, who could diagnose a patient's life at a glance, first appeared in 1887 and soon made Doyle one of the best-paid writers in the world.