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I just finished reading the Complete Sherlock Holmes (the 56 short stories and four novels in one volume, which wasn't too expensive) and it was pretty impressive in a lot of ways. The last collection ('The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes') wasn't so good, with the exception of 'The Adventure of the Illustrious Client', but the rest was all interesting enough. Holmes really is a quite unlikable character; irritable and arrogant, misogynist, possibly somewhat rascist. And he injected cocaine, of course (Watson didn't approve), the swine. Despite all that, he is interesting enough to want to read more about him, if only for more evidence of his brilliance (although we are told that said brilliance is eclipsed by the analytical excellence of his elder brother, Mycroft).

Moriarty as arch-enemy seems to be largely a creation of the movies and television series; Moriarty appears in one short story, 'The Final Problem' (the one where Holmes was first killed off by Arthur Conan Doyle) and then in one 'The Valley of Fear' that was written later but was set before 'The Final Problem'. Moriarty's henchmen are also mentioned in at least one other short story; apart from that it is just in Holmes' lamentation of the lack of a good villian nowadays that Moriarty is mentioned again.

Conan Doyle has some interest in America; clearly, he wasn't that impressed by the Mormons, as they pretty much comprise the villians in the Study in Scarlet; he also features, in the 'Five Orange Pips', we have the Ku Klux Klan (he says that they are named after the sound of a rifle bolt being drawn) and also in 'The Valley of Fear' he features an American organisation that is basically an evil trades union.

The Sign of Four was my favourite of the four novels. Some of the good short stories were:

The Adventure of the Illustrious Client.
The Stock-Broker's Clerk
The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb
Silver Blaze (from which we get the dialogue: "Is there any point to which you would wish to draw my attention?"
"To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time."
"The dog did nothing in the night-time."
"That was the curious incident," remarked Sherlock Holmes.)
The Adventure of the Golden Pince-Nez

I have read quite a bit of detective fiction but I hadn't read any Holmes since I was about 12 or so; although he wasn't the first fictional detective (he was probably one of the first, I guess, but I think that Poe at least had written some detective stuff before Conan Doyle did) he has probably been the most important. I'm not sure what modern detective fiction would have been like without Conan Doyle's writing coming before it; all the deductive and observational detection written about today certainly seems to spring from Conan Doyle's writing about Holmes' methods. On the other hand, maybe our fascination with the police wouldn't have been great enough for appalling nonsense like the film S.W.A.T. to be made. It could be an even trade, in that case.

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I have never read any Holmes stories, but maybe I will pick one up.

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Dad will probably hit this thread. He's always tried to get me to read Doyle, and I've always resisted for some reason. I'm still wading through Werfel at the moment, and I'm starting to eye longingly some of the other books about the house.

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Smug, I think that you would definitely enjoy Samuel Rosenberg's book "Naked Is The Best Disguise" which is a psychological analysis of Arthur Conan Doyle based upon consistent tendencies and patterns in his Sherlock Hoilmes stories. I don't know whether I agree with it totally but it is a unique approach to literary criticism. I think that Sam Rosenberg was one of the most unusual men who ever existed. He made his living by proving that ever author was a plagiarist and that there were no new plots in literature.

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What is sort of interesting (and often repeated) about Doyle is that while his character Holmes was relentlessly logical, Doyle himself was a fool for spiritual stuff; he was completely taken in by the fakes, produced by two English girls, of pictures of fairies, for example.

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Quite true except that it was the parents of the two little sisters who perpetrated the hoax on Doyle---and he swallowed it hook line and sinker.
What Rosenberg detected---if you buy his theory--is the acting out of a sexual fantasy in every Sherlock Hiolmes story that is consistent as to plot and dimension. Doyle also carried this bit of tomfoolery into other works such as "The White Company". Rosenberg puts forth a pretty convinccing case.

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Good to see you, oxsan.

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I saw a show on it recently (the faerie hoax) and it said that the girls had done it and had admitted it years and years after. But I could have misheard.

It was just paper cut-outs of fairies, nothing sophisticated.

Doyle was a smart guy, but I don't know anything about him, really. He enjoyed a good practical joke, it is said (he is often credited with sending a few important me a note to the effect of 'all is discovered. Flee at once' only for some of them to leave the country).

I wonder how writers feel to have their work analysed, and motives put to them, particularly if they know the analysis to be pretty much wrong. It must be rather weird.

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I picked up volume 1 of the complete novels & stories today. $6.95 US.

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I thought of R. Crumb and his brother when reading the first appearance of Mycroft. Crumb was inspired by his brother and was anti-social and weird but could function enough in society to become a famous artist. His brother ended up becoming a crazy shut-in. Although it seems that Mycroft does have some things going on in his life, but is just too lazy to be a detective.

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In a later story, there is a bit more about Mycroft, but he doesn't really turn up all that much.

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I went today to buy Vol. II (I am nearing the end of the Bantam Vol. I). They had two versions of Vol II, the Bantam one picks up where Vol. I leaves off. Then they had a Barnes & Nobel Classics edition that has "The Return of Sherlock Holmes" which was in my Vol. I but leaves out The Hound of the Baskervilles. I ended up buying the B&N edition because it has two parodies by Doyle (The Field Bazaar and How Watson Learned the Trick) and two essays by Doyle (The Truth about Sherlock Holmes and Some Personalia about Mr. Sherlock Holmes). Bantam didn't include those. I picked up Hound of the Baskervilles separately, so it ended up costing me more.

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The Vol. II I picked up ended with a couple parodies by Doyle and a couple essays. In The Truth About Sherlock Holmes he quotes a parody written by James Barrie. Barrie was a friend of Doyle's and became ill and Doyle was asked to step in and finish an opera he was writing. The result was apparently horrendous and closed shortly after opening. Barrie wrote this on the flyleaf of one of his books:

quote:

---

The Adventure of the Two Collaborators
In bringing to a close the adventures of my friend Sherlock Holmes, I am perforce reminded that he never, save on the occasion which, as you will now hear, brought his singular career to an end, consented to act in any mystery which was concerned with persons who made a livelihood by their pen. "I am not particular about the people I mix among for business purposes," he would say, "but at literary characters I draw the line."
We were in our rooms in Baker Street one evening. I was (I remember) by the centre table writing out "The Adventure of the Man Without a Cork Leg" (which had so puzzled the Royal Society and all the other scientific bodies of Europe), and Holmes was amusing himself with a little revolver practice. It was his custom of a summer evening to fire round my head, just shaving my face, until he had made a photograph of me on the opposite wall, and it is a slight proof of his skill that many of these portraits in pistol shots are considered admirable likenesses.
I happened to look out of the window, and perceiving two gentlemen advancing rapidly along Baker Street asked him who they were. He immediately lit his pipe, and, twisting himself on a chair into the figure 8, replied:
"They are two collaborators in comic opera, and their play has not been a triumph."
I sprang from my chair to the ceiling in amazement, and he then explained:
"My dear Watson, they are obviously men who follow some low calling. That much even you should be able to read in their faces. Those little pieces of blue paper which they fling angrily from them are Durrant's Press Notices. Of these they have obviously hundreds about their person (see how their pockets bulge). They would not dance on them if they were pleasant reading."
I again sprang to the ceiling (which is much dented), and shouted: "Amazing! But they may be mere authors."
"No," said Holmes, "for mere authors only get one press notice a week. Only criminals, dramatists and actors get them by the hundred."
"Then they may be actors."
"No, actors would come in a carriage."
"Can you tell me anything else about them?"
"A great deal. From the mud on the boots of the tall one I perceive that he comes from South Norwood. The other is as obviously a Scotch author."
"How can you tell that?
"He is carrying in his pocket a book called (I clearly see) 'Auld Licht Something.' Would any one but the author be likely to carry about a book with such a title?"
I had to confess that this was improbable.
It was now evident that the two men (if such they can be called) were seeking our lodgings. I have said (often) that my friend Holmes seldom gave way to emotion of any kind, buy he now turned livid with passion. Presently this gave place to a strange look of triumph.
"Watson," he said, "that big fellow has for years taken the credit for my most remarkable doings, but at last I have him - at last!"
Up I went to the ceiling, and when I returned the strangers were in the room.
"I perceive, gentlemen," said Mr. Sherlock Holmes, "that you are at present afflicted by an extraordinary novelty."
The handsomer of our visitors asked in amazement how he knew this, but the big one only scowled.
"You forget that you wear a ring on your fourth finger," replied Mr. Holmes calmly.
I was about to jump to the ceiling when the big brute interposed.
"That Tommy-rot is all very well for the public, Holmes," said he, "but you can drop it before me. And, Watson, if you go up to the ceiling again I shall make you stay there."
Here I observed a curious phenomenon. My friend Sherlock Holmes shrank. He became small before my eyes. I looked longingly at the ceiling, but dared not.
"Let us cut the first four pages," said the big man, "and proceed to business. I want to know why -"
"Allow me," said Mr. Holmes, with some of his old courage. "You want to know why the public does not go to your opera."
"Exactly," said the other ironically, "as you perceive by my shirt stud." He added more gravely, "And as you can only find out in one way I must insist on your witnessing an entire performance of the piece."
It was an anxious moment for me. I shuddered, for I knew that if Holmes went I should have to go with him. But my friend had a heart of gold. "Never," he cried fiercely, "I will do anything for you save that."
"Your contined existence depends on it," said the big man menacingly.
"I would rather melt into air," replied Holmes, proudly taking another chair, "But I can tell you why the public don't go to your piece without sitting the thing out myself."
"Why?"
"Because," replied Holmes calmly, "they prefer to stay away."
A dead silence followed that extraordinary remark.
For a moment the two intruders gazed with awe upon the man who had unravelled their mystery so wonderfully. Then drawing their knives --
Holmes grew less and less, until nothing was left save a ring of smoke which slowly circled to the ceiling.
The last words of great men are often noteworthy. These were the last words of Sherlock Holmes: "Fool, fool! I have kept you in luxury for years. By my help you have ridden extensively in cabs, where no author was ever seen before. Henceforth you will ride in buses!"
The brute sunk into a chair aghast.
The other author did not turn a hair.

To A. Conan Doyle,
From his friend J. M. Barrie

---

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Anybody read about the Sherlock Holmes scholar that killed himself this weekend?

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Link: http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/Co...ol=968705899037

LONDON - Sherlock Holmes enthusiasts got a rare glimpse into the private world of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle as thousands of personal papers - from his passport to his jotted-down story ideas - went on display today. At the same time, the archive has become entwined in a mystery worthy of Doyle's celebrated fictional detective: the bizarre death of a leading Holmes scholar.

The papers are to be auctioned off Wednesday, perhaps to disappear again into the obscurity of private ownership, a fate that had obsessed Richard Lancelyn Green, a former chairman of the Sherlock Holmes Society of London.

Green, 50, was found dead in his bed on March 27, garroted with a shoelace tightened by a wooden spoon, and surrounded by stuffed toys.

At an inquest last month, Coroner Paul Knapman said suicide was the most likely explanation, but he acknowledged there was no note, that garroting was a painful way to kill oneself, and that it therefore had been a "very unusual death." He said the deceased had been acting paranoid, but that people assumed it was baseless.

Family and friends said Lancelyn Green had become fixated on the Conan Doyle archive, believing it should be available to students and scholars, not sold and dispersed.

"He might have been in the prime position to write the definitive biography of Conan Doyle," said his friend, Nicholas Utechin, editor of The Sherlock Holmes Journal.

The items for sale are displayed at Christie's auction house and viewable on the Internet.

The notebooks provide a fascinating picture of how one of history's most successful authors practiced his craft. They contain Conan Doyle's story ideas and research notes, as well as rough scenarios of how plots might unfold.

They are a reminder, too, that although Sherlock Holmes was Conan Doyle's greatest creation, he wrote with great success of Professor Challenger in "The Lost World," of a cavalryman in Napoleon's army with "The Exploits of Brigadier Gerard," and of medieval history in "The White Company.''

Other items provide intimate glimpses of a man who dearly loved his family - his well-worn wallet contains fond birthday letters from his children and a creased photo of a son who died.

Affectionate letters to his wife, Jean, are addressed to "My own sweet love," and "You dear little angel.''

Up for auction are about 25 to 30 percent of the papers that would have been in Conan Doyle's study when he died in 1930, said Tom Lamb, head of Christie's books and manuscripts department. He said family members had been selling items over the years.

The auction is a great disappointment to scholars who hoped the papers would be donated to a public institution.

Lancelyn Green, co-author of an important bibliography of the author, was most deeply affected.

"He did become sadly obsessive about this matter in the weeks leading towards his death," Utechin told BBC radio on Thursday. He was "quite clearly very perturbed indeed about the sale of these items at Christie's.''

At Lancelyn Green's inquest, his sister, Priscilla Lancelyn West, said "something about this sale was worrying him enormously, and I tried to get him to explain to me what it was.''

His cryptic comments, she said, sounded like "the beginning of a thriller novel.''

At Christie's, Lamb said the auction house had consulted Lancelyn Green as an expert and "he was very happy to help us.'' In fact, eight of the photographs that illustrate the sale catalogue are "by courtesy of Richard Lancelyn Green.''

The auctioneer expects the sale will earn about $3.5 million for the beneficiaries of the author's daughter-in-law, Anna Conan Doyle.

In the 1940s and 1960s, two Conan Doyle scholars had access to the papers, but after the death in 1970 of the author's son Adrian, court battles broke out over the estate, and the collection was locked up in a lawyer's office for about 25 years.

Sir Christopher Frayling, head of the Arts Council, which allocates government arts funding, called the papers "a vast piece of English heritage" that should be kept together for future scholars.

"If this was Jane Austen or Charles Dickens, there would be a national outcry," he told BBC Radio.

Lamb said the estimated 3,000 papers have been divided in ways designed to encourage institutional buying.

"There are whole lots devoted to particular causes and interests of Conan Doyle, such as all the Boer War material in one large box," he said.

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I saw that story, garroted himself or something. He was opposed to the selling-off of Doyle's papers.

http://www.canoe.ca/JamBooks/may15_sherlock-ap.html

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Damn it, Paint.

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Still, it's how he wanted to go.

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