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In A Study in Scarlet, Dr. Watson says, "I was standing at the Criterion Bar" when Stamford taps him on the shoulder. That brief meeting sends Watson toward Baker Street and Sherlock Holmes. (gutenberg.org) The Criterion's literary role is structural as much as atmospheric: a fashionable public room at Piccadilly Circus where metropolitan chance encounters feel believable. Doyle uses an eminent West End address to turn casual urban sociability into the origin point of the Holmes partnership. This interpretive point is inferred from the novel's scene and the restaurant's prominence. (gutenberg.org)