The Beryl Coronet | A Sherlock Holmes story by Arthur Conan Doyle | Narrated by Simon Stanhope

Описание: A distressed banker seeks help from Sherlock Holmes after disaster befalls "one of the most precious public possessions of the empire" which has been left in his care – and the culprit appears to be his own wayward son... The story begins at 00:01:15

Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):

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Timestamps:
00:00:00 Introduction
00:01:15 The Beryl Coronet
01:03:33 Credits, thanks and further listening

The music used at the beginning and end of the story is an extract from 'Duet for Two Violins' by Luigi Boccherini, Op 5 N2 Larghetto. The track is used under licence from Storyblocks.com

If you enjoyed this recording, you may like to listen to some of my previous Sherlock Holmes readings:    • Sherlock Holmes Stories  

About the author: Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle (1859–1930) was a Scottish doctor and author, celebrated for his world-famous creation Sherlock Holmes, the consulting detective who set the standard for crime fiction into the 20th century and beyond. In addition to his Holmes stories, Conan Doyle is also remembered for his fantasy and science fiction novels and stories, including 'The Parasite' and 'The Lost World' series of novels, his historical fiction, and for numerous short stories contributed to magazines over a 40 year period. He was knighted by King Edward VII in the 1902 Coronation Honours.

From his debut in Beeton's Christmas Annual in 1887, in 'A Study in Scarlet', Sherlock Holmes established himself as the first, the best and the most famous of all private consulting detectives. His serialised adventures in The Strand Magazine, starting with 'A Scandal in Bohemia' in 1891, developed the character into a literary sensation and in the 20th century he was to become the most portrayed character in screen history.

'The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet' was the 11th Sherlock Holmes short story to be published in The Strand Magazine, in May 1892. It's not one of the detective's best-known adventures, and probably wouldn't rank in most people's top 10, but it holds a special place for me because it happens to be the very first Holmes story I ever read, when I was about nine or ten years old and I picked up a copy of 'The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes' which we had at home. Flicking through it and reading the first lines of several stories at random, to get a taste, I think I was hooked in by the immediacy of the opening of this one in particular – the description of a snow-bound Baker Street and the eccentric client running along the icy pavement. After this story, I went on to read and enjoy the rest of the Sherlock Holmes adventures... which was my gateway to discover this whole genre and era of story-telling. So, in a way, The Beryl Coronet was what ultimately started me on the path to start Bitesized Audio.

This story was one of the minority of Holmes' adventures not to be adapted by Granada Television for the 1980s series starring Jeremy Brett; however it was adapted for television some 20 years earlier, for the 1965 BBC series starring Douglas Wilmer as Holmes and Nigel Stock as Dr Watson. Holmes trivia fans may be interested to know that the character of Sir George Burnwell in that adaptation was played by David Burke, who went on to play Watson opposite Brett's Holmes two decades later.

Recording © Bitesized Audio 2026