Arthur & George (NHB Modern Plays)

Annotation

The gripping story of the sensational, real-life case in which Sir Arthur Conan Doyle found himself playing detective - based on Julian Barnes's Booker Prize-nominated novel. In 1903, Birmingham solicitor George Edalji was found guilty of a terrible crime and sentenced to seven years' imprisonment. Desperate to prove his innocence, he recruited Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of Sherlock Holmes, to help solve his mysterious case and win him a pardon. As absorbing as any Sherlock Holmes mystery, Arthur & George also raises many questions about guilt and innocence, identity, nationality and race. 'That the creator of Sherlock Holmes should turn sleuth himself is a life-mirroring-art marvel that continues to fascinate more than 100 years on. David Edgar has distilled 500 pages into two-and-a-half hours of theatre - involving you in the whodunnit aspect of the case while serving the finer intellectual textures of the novel' - Daily Telegraph