Art of Telling Detective Stories: Archetypal Reading of Narrative Pattern in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s A Study in Scarlet

This paper is a reading of Arthur Conan Doyle‟s A Study in Scarlet in the light of Northrop Frye‟s archetypal criticism. Northrop Frye, in his Anatomy of Criticism, suggests a structural formula for the detective fiction as „a man-hunter locating a scapegoat.‟ Against the background of this view, this paper analyzes Arthur Conan Doyle‟s A Study in Scarlet to see how this structure is recurrent in the text. The character of detective corresponds to the man-hunter image and the scapegoat image can be found in the performers of crime. The man-hunter locates the scapegoat through a process of cross-examination and tracing foot print.