![]() ![]() What separates Raffles from Holmes is that he’s more recognizably human and fallible - he doesn’t always lift the loot, and bad luck throws him a few curve balls. On the surface, Raffles is a gentleman cricketer straight out of the pages of Boy’s Own - yet from the very first story, The Ides of March, we discover that this is all a pretence: behind the mask is a bankrupt who commits a series of sensational crimes to finance his champagne and cigars lifestyle - and his flat in The Albany. For Raffles operates on the wrong side of the law, yet remains a magnetic and sympathetic personality. ![]() Hornung was not as well-known as his brother-in-law, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, yet in many ways, Hornung was a better writer and Raffles a cleverer star then even Sherlock himself. But The Albany was also the address for one of the greatest fictional creations of late 19th-century crime writing, AJ Raffles. ![]() This is The Albany, an imposing warren of ‘bachelor’ apartments which has been home to a string of celebrities for over two centuries, from Lord Byron to Terence Stamp. If you walk down London’s Piccadilly, you come across an elegant Georgian building set back from the constant stream of traffic. By night - he's London’s most notorious thief! Classic crime to rival Sherlock Holmes. By day, AJ Raffles is a debonair man-about-town and one of England's finest cricketers. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |