Have you ever tried reading Sherlock Holmes in chronological story order rather than publication order? > Likes and Comments

I’ve been working out a reader-friendly chronological order for the Sherlock Holmes canon, and it made me think about how different the stories can feel when you stop following publication order.

For me, reading chronologically made me notice things I had missed before—especially in the later stories, where Holmes and Watson aren't quite the same people they were in the early Baker Street years.

Have you ever tried reading the canon chronologically? If so, what was your experience—did it change how you felt about the stories?

Yes, the last time I read the short stories (I skipped the novels) I read them according to Baring-Gould's chronology. The experience was a bit weird, as I've read the first three compilations so many times that reading them in a different order felt confusing at times. Especially when some of the not so great later stories popped up. It didn't really change how I felt about the stories, but it did change the overall reading experience.

It was a worthy experiment, but I think that the next time I'll again go through them in the usual publication order, but this time probably including the novels.

I have an old copy of Baring Gould, and read through it some time ago. I did find the introductory material and side notes quite interesting. On the site Arthur Conan Doyle Encyclopedia, he lists about 10 chronologists and if you read the stories on that site, at the beginning of each there is a note stating where various chronologists place it in the Canon.

I know that Baring Gould and Leslie Kiinger tried to put the stories in chronological order. It's very easy with the Gloria Scott and The Musgrave Ritual, and not too difficult with earlier stories but it seems that once Watson gets married - especially since it seems Watson married more than once! - it gets a little confusing.