Air Canada walks back new seat selection policy change after backlash
Air Canada has paused a new seat selection fee for travellers booked on the lowest fares just days after implementing it.
One summer evening in 1889, Arthur Conan Doyle and Oscar Wilde sat down for dinner at the Langham Hotel in London with J.M Stoddart, the American businessman and editor of Lippincott’s Monthly Magazine.
By the time they left, Wilde had committed to writing "The Picture of Dorian Gray" and Conan Doyle had agreed to write "The Sign of Four," one of his most famous Sherlock Holmes stories.
Now, Conan Doyle’s letters recounting that fated dinner and his sole handwritten manuscript of "The Sign of Four" are being auctioned by Sotheby’s New York, alongside other literary treasures.
The manuscript alone is expected to fetch up to US$1.2 million, given its unique significance and status as the most valuable Conan Doyle item ever offered at auction, a Sotheby’s statement said.
"It’s hard to think of two contemporary authors who might be less similar than Conan Doyle and Oscar Wilde," Selby Kiffer, the auction house’s international senior specialist for books and manuscripts, told CNN.
"And yet there they are at a dinner table together and talking about what they're currently working on.
"So you’re put in the milieu of the time, and that really helps (us) understand the genesis and the creation of the manuscript in a way that very seldom happens."
The manuscript itself is exceptionally clean, bearing only Stoddart’s edits to Americanize spellings and a few crossed-out words as Conan Doyle himself tweaked his work.
All of Conan Doyle’s other surviving manuscripts, most of which reside in museums, similarly show little sign of being edited, Kiffer added.
The 'Sign of Four' was published in 1890. (Courtesy Sotheby's via CNN Newsource)
"Whether Doyle spent a lot of time just thinking out in his mind before he put the words down… but it seems to have sprung almost fully formed, from his mind to his pen," he said.
"The Sign of Four" was Conan Doyle’s second Sherlock Holmes novel, commissioned by Stoddart to capitalize on the popularity of the detective’s first adventure in "The Study in Scarlet."
Lippincott’s Magazine published the story in 1890 and, once again, the adventures of Holmes and Dr. Watson proved hugely popular with readers on both sides of the Atlantic.
The manuscript is just one fraction of a collection that was assembled by Dr. Rodney P. Swantko, a Chicago-based collector, who died two years ago.
Other lots include four novels inscribed by F. Scott Fitzgerald, one of which is a copy of "The Great Gatsby" he signed from Scott and Zelda, on behalf of his wife, which is expected to fetch up to US$250,000.
First edition copies of "Lolita" that its author Vladimir Nabokov addressed and sent to fellow writer Graham Greene, as well as to his wife, Vera, are also included in the sale.
The auction will be held as a live sale in New York at 10 a.m. ET on June 26.
Air Canada has paused a new seat selection fee for travellers booked on the lowest fares just days after implementing it.
An ongoing municipal strike, court battles and revolt by half of council has prompted the province to oust the mayor and council in Black River-Matheson.
Three officers on a U.S. Marshals Task Force serving a warrant for a felon wanted for possessing a firearm were killed and five other officers were wounded in a shootout Monday at a North Carolina home, police said.
A Calgary elementary school principal has been charged with possession of child pornography, authorities announced Monday.
The Vancouver Island Health Authority is downplaying what staff describe as a cockroach infestation in a medical unit of Saanich Peninsula Hospital.
Toronto police say 12 people are facing a combined 102 charges in connection with an investigation into a major credit fraud scheme.
One of the winners of a historic US$1.3 billion Powerball jackpot last month is an immigrant from Laos who has had cancer for eight years and had his latest chemotherapy treatment last week.
Britney Spears and her father Jamie Spears will avoid what could have been a long, ugly and revealing trial with a settlement of the lingering issues in the court conservatorship that controlled her life and financial decisions for nearly 14 years.
The clock is ticking ahead of the deadline to file a 2023 income tax return. A personal finance expert explains why you should get them done -- even if you owe more than you can pay.
Since 1932, Montreal's Henri Henri has been filled to the brim with every possible kind of hat, from newsboy caps to feathered fedoras.
Police in Oak Bay, B.C., had to close a stretch of road Sunday to help an elephant seal named Emerson get safely back into the water.
Out of more than 9,000 entries from over 2,000 breweries in 50 countries, a handful of B.C. brews landed on the podium at the World Beer Cup this week.
Raneem, 10, lives with a neurological condition and liver disease and needs Cholbam, a medication, for a longer and healthier life.
The lawyer for a residential school survivor leading a proposed class-action defamation lawsuit against the Catholic Church over residential schools says the court action is a last resort.
Mounties in Nanaimo, B.C., say two late-night revellers are lucky their allegedly drunken antics weren't reported to police after security cameras captured the men trying to steal a heavy sign from a downtown business.
A property tax bill is perplexing a small townhouse community in Fergus, Ont.
When identical twin sisters Kim and Michelle Krezonoski were invited to compete against some of the world’s most elite female runners at last week’s Boston Marathon, they were in disbelief.
The giant stone statues guarding the Lions Gate Bridge have been dressed in custom Vancouver Canucks jerseys as the NHL playoffs get underway.