The Problem of Thor Bridge

The next meeting of the Harpooners of the Sea Unicorn, whether it be an attended meeting at our local meeting place or another online, the discussion will be about THOR.

I just reread the story and found it to be one of my favorites, again.

Much has been discussed over the years about THOR, including the condition that caused the victim to kill herself.

The line that jumped out at me in this reading was;
 "I produced it from my hip-pocket, a short, handy, but very serviceable little weapon. "

Much discussion has been centered around the weapon or weapons Holmes and Watson may have carried, starting with the very first story when Watson said; '"I keep a bull pup."
Many agree that Watson probably also had a service revolver from his military days which probably would have been larger than the 'bull pup', (if you believe he meant a gun by that statement) and probably, in my opinion, not the one carried in THOR.

Below are a couple of links of other people thoughts on weapons in the Canon. Enjoy.




http://coastconfan.blogspot.com/2014/08/john-hamish-watson-md-or-mystery-of.html

https://simanaitissays.com/2015/05/15/firearms-of-the-holmesian-canon/

https://forums.gunboards.com/showthread.php?281503-Dr-Watson-s-quot-Service-Revolver-quot-in-Sherlock-Holmes-Books

Started an interesting discussion with someone on Facebook yesterday.. . .

It was based on paper written by J.T. Crammond for a meeting of the Parallel Case of St Louis scion society.

Mr. Crammond's paper was titled 'Can we trust the Canon?' Of course it was done as Playing the Game.

While his paper is not the discussion here, someone falling the meeting on Facebook stated that 'he' never trusted Watson. His statement was, "John, I've always been of the opinion that you cannot trust Watson. However, I've never really considered it when it comes to The Canon itself."

To me that statement doesn't seem possible how can you, One; not trust Watson. Two; if you don't or do, how can you have either without the  context of the Canon.

We went back and forth a little on this without him really backing up his comment, but in the end he suggested that a back and forth reply on Facebook was not the venue he wanted to explore the topic.

I look forward to him following it up somewhere else.

What are your thoughts? Do you 'trust' Watson?

I will fill in my thoughts latter in the day.

Let me know yours.

My BLUE paper for 2019 Harpooners of the Sea Unicorn meeting

“BLUE 2019”

by John-T Foster

I have probably done a paper on BLUE, well I know I have, more than any other story in the Canon.

HOUN would be second.

On Blue I have examined:

• the pub, the markets, the food of the season and women in the story. And I even explored the atmosphere of the holidays and 221B.
• What a Carbuncle is and looks like has been done, as well as wether of not a goose has a crop. Victorian Christmas traditions have been covered.
• The difference between dinner and supper as terms has been covered. Did Peterson ever get the reward was covered.
• Where was Mrs. Hudson was discussed.
• Whether or not Doctor Watson and Mary invited Holmes to their house for holiday dinner should be discussed.

All these and many others have been covered.

It is one of my favorite stories in the tales of Holmes and Watson. It can make one think of the joys we find in 221B, and perhaps even the loneliness of the holiday season.

There is a separation between Holmes and Watson that we could find unsettling. Yet we also see an enduring friendship.

But after having done a paper on BLUE so many times it has become a little difficult to find another aspect to explore. Well, at least one that I can explore in the time I usually have for such projects.

I usually wait for inspiration to come as I start thinking about the tale. I don’t even need to re- read it again to find that inspiration. I have read it enough to have a good idea where I might look.

I keep wanting to return to the scene in the pub and explore that again, but I have done that a few times. We have discussed its location and real name. We have discussed the difference between a public bar and a private bar (or snug).

We have made light of how we (I) think Watson got a little mad at not being able to stay long enough to finish his beer.

I find comfort in the atmosphere of a pub, so of course I want to revisit there as often as I can.

With this tale, as with others I have covered, what I believe the outcome of my research will be at the beginning of said research often transforms quite a bit by the time I am done.

Most of the time I hope for an 'A-ha!' moment of Sherlockian scholarship, but usually get a quiet 'oh-yea' instead.

I don’t think I have ever come up with any remarkable Sherlockian discoveries, but I keep trying.

And such went my research for this months paper.

I usually wait for an idea to come along that just seems to want to stick around and cries out for research.

Sometimes the idea doesn’t bare up to too much research and needs to be put aside.

Sometimes the idea takes on a life of its own and becomes bigger than you expected. Tonight’s paper falls somewhere in between.  I don’t know where it came from or how it developed, it was just there at some point while thinking about BLUE.

So here goes:

There are no women present in BLUE. By present I mean none make a physical appearance. We assume the presence, a couple times, of Mrs. Hudson, but we can never be quite sure. We assume she is the one that opens the door for Mr. Baker and Watson, but Watson doesn't actually ever say that.

Several other women are mentioned in BLUE, but, once again, are never physically present.

This got me thinking; Is this the only story in the Canon that no women make an appearance? 

I was hoping that was the case and that I had made a vital Sherlockian scholarly discovery.

But, like I said earlier, this discovery fell somewhere between a dull thump and angelic bells ringing.

So like any good researcher I had to back up my theory with a little literary foot work. Or, if you like, 'The Game was afoot.'

That meant go through each story and see if a female physically makes an appearance or not. 

I had to apply a few ground rules in my research, well, actually only one.

The women in question had to actually interact with Holmes or Watson within the tale and not as an interaction discussed or described as part of a conversation that took place somewhere else.

It seems to us lovers of the Canon and even to the romantic in most of us that women are a vital part of the just about all of the stories.

We all remember the names of many of them; Violet, Kitty, Irene, Beryl, Elsie and so may others. OH yea, and Mrs. Hudson!

It can’t be possible that there could be more than just a couple without woman actually being present.

Maybe, if I am lucky, it would just be BLUE.

So in earnest I started my research.

In many of the 'cases' I could recall an interaction without having to crack the tome, like SPEC and SOLI, and HOUN and SCAN. And what about MILV!

Others I had to spend a little worthy time in the Canon, rereading till I found proof one way or another. Many of the women just briefly passed through, only taking up a couple lines of text.

Others, like Irene and Violet and Beryl inhabited many paragraphs or pages.

Mrs Hudson, who is almost as revered as Holmes and Watson, and who’s absence we can not imagine from the Canon, has very little presence for her Canonical stature. Her lines are few, but her presence is mighty.  So mighty that most of us assume her place to be greater , when she is often not named.

Or, even more likely, our memory and desire place her somewhere where she is not actually mentioned.

But that also has been discussed before.

While my research did not take me to the conclusion I was hoping for, it did take to a conclusion that I found surprising.

I found that in 37, just over 61%, of the tales documented by Holmes and Watson, women make a physical appearance. They actually, in some way, interacted with either Holmes or Watson. With the exception of LADY Francis Carfax. While physically present, she really didn’t interact with anyone.

But I did indeed put her in the yes camp.

She can’t help that she wasn’t given any lines.

So that left a remarkable 23, or about 38%, of the tales without a women actually walking (or in the case of LADY laying) through the story.

In many cases women are mentioned and indeed play a significant part in the story, but don’t actually come on stage.

In BLUE, noticeable in their absence, but still important, are sister Mrs. Oakshott, partner in crime Catherine Cusack, and to lesser degree the Countess.

All vital to the story, but budget would not allow for actors.

Imagine if you can SCAN being told in such away that Irene would not have had to be present.  We can’t.

Last year we discussed the perceived or possible participation of Catherine Cusack in the BLUE. We discussed how much or how little she had to do with the romancing of the stone. But never did she have to be present to be important to the story.

Does this absence of women in 38% of the tales as a physical presence now change how you look at your memory of the Canon.

One thing I think it does say about the stories is that the women characters who do show up in body are memorable, strong females. So much so that like many things in the Canon the images we paint for ourselves are so vivid that the colors spread out into all the other stories. We populate and picture individuals that never do really make an appearance. Or our minds expand their roll to be bigger than it really is.

Think about some of the most memorable, good or bad people in the Canon. Most of them show up far less than their perception would suggest.

Think how few times both Mycroft and Moriarty populate the Canon. Yet both have a lasting presence throughout the conversation. Same goes for Mrs. Hudson and Irene. And maybe even most of all Mary.

Every time Watson is not in 221B we place him, hopefully, living happily with Mary. Even though she seldom makes an appearance.

Moriarty, Mycroft and Irene have all gone on to literary fame of their own.

The Baker Street Irregulars I believe only appear in three stories, STUD, SIGN and CARD.  Yet we can not imagine a London without these diminutive street urchins. Yet they now appear in books of their own and soon a NETFLIX series about them (from what I read, it doesn’t sound like it will be flattering for Holmes).

I think I can honestly say that BLUE is still one of my favorites, even after so many readings of it. Doing research on it and, for that matter, any of the stories not only gives me a chance to make new, hopefully Canonical discoveries, but it also makes me examine how I remember or perceive the stories.

I thought it would be rare to find a Canonical story that did not include the physical presence of a women. The women that are present have left a strong impression.

So strong that at least I have populated the stories even more with women.

Well, that’s it till next year. Maybe then I will get my 'A-Ha!' moment.

—John-T F.

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Did anyone read It!

Apparently when a doll house was made for Queen Mary, started in 1920, that contained a new Sherlock Holmes story written by ACD.
Did anyone read it?

Somewhere in this little library is there an unknown Sherlock Holmes story?

Some nice photos.


And yes it has been read.

Well at least he made the list. . . .

Harry Potter, the British Royals and Premier League football revealed as the main reasons why tourists come to the UK

But good old British grub apparently isn't appealing...

Chinese tourists visiting Britain come for the Royal Family, Harry Potter and Premier Leaguefootball, but sidestep seaside fish and chips, a Visit Britain report has suggested.

More than 250,000 holidaymakers from China spent more than half a billion pounds in the UK last year and these figures are expected to grow sharply fuelled by growing middle and affluent classes.

The report revealed that Chinese tourists rate Britain highly for both its heritage and contemporary culture with a particular focus on museums and films.

It said: "They are mostly interested in symbolic elements: the Royal Family, Shakespeare, Sherlock Holmes, Harry Potter and Downton Abbey.

"The Chinese outbound market is booming: visits abroad more than doubled in five years, from about 41m overnight stays in 2011 to 85m in 2016. By 2020, it is forecast to exceed 110m trips overseas."

the full story here.

Are we over thinking Sherlock Holmes?

No really, maybe we are over thinking Sherlock Holmes.

As I came up as a Sherlockian most discussions were centered around details in the Canon (or lack of) and not Sherlock's proclivities.

Yea, sure, there were discussions about his sexual orientation (which I never understood) and how many times Watson was married to his moving wound many years ago. But seldom, if ever, did it become the center of the debate.
It, in and of itself, has become the backbone of many 'fans'.

Most of the time we explored history, details and 'things' within the stories; history of the martini, the 'dancing men' alphabet, what kind of dog was the 'Hound'.

So much debate (and sometimes not in a nice way) centers to much around what we desire Sherlock (or Benedict) to be rather than what we can discover just from the readings or research.

Sure, we can spend a lot of time arguing about whether or not Holmes would meet the Queen in just a sheet, or whether or not he could have been an over sexed ex-drug addict.

But in the end we are not really discussing the Canonical Sherlock Holmes.

With much of the recent, over the last several years, debate, we are trying to reshape a puzzle piece to fit into a different puzzle.

Lets all just relax a little and get back to our core.

It's a bust!

It's speculation time.
I must admit I am not one to follow closely the news about upcoming episodes of 'Sherlock'. Feels to much like watching the news and the info you really want is not till the very end of the broadcast.

That doesn't mean I don't catch some of what is going on.

Two of the upcoming episodes have supposedly been named and the names released to the public.

They are; "The Lying Detective" and "The Six Thatchers".

While the web site, The Blog of John Watson has already done a piece on a broken statue mystery, we probably should not expect that to be the same story coming to us as "The Six Thatchers".

And, it would be very un-"Sherlock" to allow 'The Six Thatchers" to follow to closely the story line of "The Six Napoleons."

So what else could it mean?

Are Thatcher look-alike's being knocked-off?
Are roofing thatchers being knocked-off? Perhaps due to a thatcher strike.
Is there really something hidden in statues of the former Prime Minister? Probably something like a flash-drive or clues to who Moriarty really is.
Or maybe clues to when Natalie Dormer is coming back to 'Elementary'? (Oh, please, Oh, please, Oh, please!)
Or are six people being targeted, belonging the an organization called 'The Thatchers'?
Or (which is more than likely) am I not even close to what it could be?

What do you think?

The Adventure of the Creeping Man.

This coming Friday I will once again have the pleasure of attending a meeting with the Chester Baskerville Society in Chester Ill.

One of the cases to be discussed on Friday will being The Adventure of the Creeping Man. And because I am not an illuminating source myself, I some times need to reread the source material to make sure I get most of the things I discuss straight.
And so I did with CREE.

Some of the richest material in the Canon can be found in the first couple of paragraphs. Especially as it pertains to the relationship between Holmes and Watson. Usually those first paragraphs are often my favorite parts of the story. I love Baker St. as the setting and the things that take place there. This also proves to be the case with the Creeping Man.

The story was published in 1923, and Watson states in the first paragraph; ". . .  twenty years ago agitated the university and were echoed . . ." and clearly stating in the next paragraph that in took place in Sept. of 1903. So we can accept the date.

Holmes was not quite 50 years old, and as Watson states, this was one of his last cases. His retirement was not far away.

We have often assumed by various references that Holmes and Watson did not see a lot of each other once Holmes moved to Sussex. Watson even suggests the the relationship between the two men was rather peculiar.

And when you read that line in the third paragraph of CREE, we should probably start wondering if Watson had started to tire of his role. Was the relationship starting to get strained between the two?
In the paragraph that follows, Watson does not describe how he sees himself in that role in a very good light.

Watson says;

"The relations between us in those latter days were peculiar. He was a man of habits, narrow and concentrated habits, and I had become one of them. As an institution I was like the violin, the shag tobacco, the old black pipe, the index books, and others perhaps less excusable. When it was a case of active work and a comrade was needed upon whose nerve he could place some reliance, my role was obvious. But apart from this I had uses. I was a whetstone for his mind. I stimulated him. He liked to think aloud in my presence. His remarks could hardly be said to be made to me—many of them would have been as appropriately addressed to his bedstead—but none the less, having formed the habit, it had become in some way helpful that I should register and interject. If I irritated him by a certain methodical slowness in my mentality, that irritation served only to make his own flame-like intuitions and impressions flash up the more vividly and swiftly. Such was my humble role in our alliance."

Such does not sound like a man who was thrilled to receive the message; "Come at once if convenient—if inconvenient come all the same. — S. H."
While to most Sherlockians this is one of our favorite quotes from the Canon, it can be suggested that Watson may not have been as excited as we would like to think it recieving it.

In the next paragraph Watson continues; "With a wave of his hand he indicated my old armchair, but otherwise for half an hour he gave no sign that he was aware of my presence."
We are not surprised by this behavior from Holmes, as we have come to expect this posture from Holmes, but one can sense some annoyance in Watsons tone at this dissmissal.
Watson doesn't seem to relish his role as much as we may have once believed.
Was he tired of being expected to come if inconvenient all the same?
Had his practice and his private life made coming if inconvenient difficult? (We know once again that Watson was married.)
Had his priorities changed?
Did he not require the stimulation of the chase as much as he once did?

The reasons are really not all that important to us unless we look at this growing distance between the two as a gradual cooling of the friendship that we as Sherlockians may not wish to consider.

I don't get the feeling in those first two paragraphs that the return to Baker St. was as comforting a ritual for Watson as it had once been.
Like his old armchair, had the relationship become worn and tattered?

A few paragraphs later, after Holmes as some what explained the case to him Watson says; "I sank back in my chair in some disappointment. Was it for so trivial a question as this that I had been summoned from my work?"

This does not sound like the response of a man who is once again excited to be involved with a case with his former room-mate. This does not sound like a man who has come with an open mind, who trusted that his friend would not waste his time.

And in the next line Holmes says; “The same old Watson!”. After all those years had Watson grown tired of being "The same old Watson!"?

From that point on (except while drinking that "bottle of the famous vintage of which Holmes had spoken . . .") Watson keeps suggesting solutions that would allow him to escape as soon as possible.
He is not excited to be involved! 
Has Watson tired of 'The Game'?

Most Chronologies show only two more cases recorded by Watson after CREE. The next would be six years later, with the last one five years after that. And if we are good Sherlockians we might assume that one or two unknown ones still lie in that old tin box, but maybe not as many as we would like to believe.

None of us like to think of friendships drifting apart, and if we are honest, it really unsettles us if it happens to Holmes and Watson, even more so if it is not just because of distance.

Was it an attempt by Holmes to rekindle what once was?

What was their relationship like at the time of CREE?

Maybe I have read too much between the lines. But, hey! That's what playing the game is all about.

Another wonderful quote from this case would be; "It’s surely time that I disappeared into that little farm of my dreams." 

And I leave you with one thought; Did no one think to talk to the coachman earlier?
"The uproar had brought the sleepy and astonished coachman from his room above the stables. “I’m not surprised,” said he, shaking his head. “I’ve seen him at it before. I knew the dog would get him sooner or later.”"



But to leave on a happier note, here are two images that may make us imagine where Holmes and Watson stayed on this adventure. Possible locations for the Chequers.

Happy St. Parrick's day!

Arthur Conan Doyle’s Irish Mystery

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By Tom Deignan, Contributor
December / January 2013

As Sherlock Holmes fans celebrate the 125th anniversary of the novel in which Arthur Conan Doyle introduced his famous sleuth, Tom Deignan investigates the author’s Irish roots.

The two recent Sherlock Holmes movies starring Robert Downey, Jr. and Jude Law have earned well over one billion dollars worldwide, so it’s no surprise that screenwriters are currently toiling away at another installment of the lucrative franchise. Current Hollywood buzz has it that filming of the third Sherlock Holmes flick will begin sometime next year, with the movie in theaters possibly by Christmas 2014.

Sherlock Holmes — who celebrates his 125th birthday this year — shows no signs of slowing down. Author Arthur Conan Doyle’s most famous creation, who first appeared in the 1887 murder mystery novel A Study in Scarlet, has had a long life in books and on radio, in television and stage adaptations, and in the movies.

Generations of Sherlock Holmes fans have watched the sleuth, alongside his trusty sidekick Dr. Watson, wield his trademark magnifying glass in order to navigate fog-shrouded British streets, debating theories in plummy accents. The most iconic Holmes, perhaps, is Basil Rathbone, who played the great detective in over a dozen films, and even Robert Downey, Jr.  earned raves for his British accent.

Though he never really went out of style, Doyle is currently enjoying a renaissance. In addition to the film franchise, consulting detective Holmes is also the subject of two hit television series that give Doyle’s stories a contemporary spin: In Britain, the BBC mini-series Sherlock, starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman, and in the U.S., the new CBS show Elementary, featuring Johnny Lee Miller, Lisa Liu, and Aidan Quinn.

Exploring Irish History
Given Sherlock Holmes’ undeniable British pedigree, it may come as a surprise to some that his creator actually comes from a strong Irish Catholic background. Indeed, both the Conan and Doyle families — not to mention the Foleys, on the great writer’s mother’s side — all hail from Dublin. One of Arthur’s uncles, Henry Doyle, was a prominent artist who went on to serve as director of the National Gallery of Ireland.

As for Arthur Conan Doyle himself, though best known for creating Sherlock Holmes, he also wrote many stories that explore Irish themes and characters. Perhaps most interesting to Irish Americans is the fourth and final Sherlock Homes novel, The Valley of Fear (1915), which may have been inspired by two notable episodes in Irish history — the rise of the Molly Maguires, the secret organization that sought to improve labor conditions in Pennsylvania in the 1870s, and the Phoenix Park murders in Dublin in May of 1882. (Lord Frederick Cavendish, the newly appointed Chief Secretary for Ireland, and Thomas Henry Burke, the Permanent Undersecretary, were fatally stabbed by members of the Irish National Invincibles.)

More broadly, Doyle (1859 – 1930) was alive to witness some of the most tumultuous years of Irish political history, from the post-Famine years to the Easter Rising to the Irish Civil War.

Doyle actively followed the so-called “Irish question” and corresponded with prominent Irish nationalists such as Erskine Childers and Roger Casement.

However, from his fiction to his political positions, Doyle was complicated. For example, despite his strong Irish roots, he once defended British policy in Ireland. So it is fitting that the greatest mystery writer of them all has created quite a mystery about his own past: Precisely how did Arthur Conan Doyle’s Irish background influence his writing?

A Dublin Family
John Doyle (Arthur’s grandfather) was born in Dublin in 1797, into a devoutly Catholic family with an artistic bent. John, who was already showcasing his work at 17, married fellow Dubliner Marianne Conan, a daughter of a tailor, in 1820. Two years later they sought a new life in London, where they soon had three children while John was struggling to succeed as a painter.

After changing his artistic style, John Doyle eventually found success as a political cartoonist. The children kept on coming, as the family moved to the more affluent neighborhood of Hyde Park. They lived in a home where party guests included Benjamin Disraeli and Charles Dickens.

John and Marianne gave birth to Arthur Conan Doyle’s father, Charles, in 1832.

The great writer’s mother, meanwhile, was born in Dublin. The daughter of a doctor who died young, Mary Foley moved to Edinburgh, Scotland, where her mother  established a boardinghouse. Charles also had moved to Scotland as a young man. Mary Foley and Charles Doyle married in 1855 and settled in Edinburgh.

Doyle himself acknowledged his strong Irish roots in his 1924 autobiography Memories and Adventures. “I, an Irishman by extraction, was born in the Scottish capital,” Doyle wrote.

Of his parents, he said: “Two separate lines of Irish wanderers came together under one roof.”

A Visit to Waterford
Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle was born on May 22, 1859. He was baptized at St. Mary’s Cathedral and received a Jesuit education into his teenage years, before studying medicine at the University of Edinburgh.

Doyle was only 20 years old when he published his first story in a Scottish journal. As early as 1881, Doyle spent time with family in Ireland, visiting Waterford during a time of agrarian unrest that came to be called “The Land War.” Doyle wrote of his time in Ireland in an essay (with photographs) called “To the Waterford Coast and Along It.”

In 1885, Doyle married Louisa Hawkins, and the couple went to Ireland for their honeymoon. Throughout the 1880s, however, Doyle struggled as both a writer and doctor. Patients were not exactly knocking down the door of his practice, and publishers and journals rejected many of Doyle’s manuscripts. One magazine that finally agreed to publish a new work by Arthur Conan Doyle was Beeton’s Christmas Annual. The November 1887 edition of that magazine contained a story called “A Study in Scarlet.” Critics in The Scotsman and Glasgow Herald newspapers liked the story. Little did they know that the history of literature was about to change.

Sherlock — and Support for Irish Home Rule?
“A Study in Scarlet” was the first story to feature a detective named Sherlock Holmes and his sidekick Dr. Watson. Doyle eventually achieved widespread popularity, with Holmes starring in three subsequent novels: The Sign of the Four (1890), The Hound of the Baskervilles (1902) and The Valley of Fear (1915).

But just as he was more or less creating the modern detective novel, Doyle was also exploring Irish themes in stories such as “That Little Square Box,” “The Heiress of Glenmahowley,” “Touch and Go: A Midshipman’s Story,” and “The Green Flag.”

“These stories are testimonies to Doyle’s keen and sympathetic interest in Irish political grievances,” writes Catherine Wynne, author of the scholarly text The Colonial Conan Doyle.

And yet, despite his roots and his visits to Ireland, the now-successful Arthur Conan Doyle opposed Irish Home Rule in the early 1900s.

“I was what was called a Liberal-Unionist, that is, a man whose general position was Liberal, but who could not see his way to support Gladstone’s Irish Policy,” Doyle himself wrote in his memoirs, referring to the British prime minister who supported Home Rule for Ireland.

The famous writer’s attitude changed in the coming decade. In February 1912 he wrote a letter to Roger Casement stating: “Yes, I feel strongly for Ireland and hope I may strike some blow in that cause.”

On the other hand, Doyle felt compelled to add: “I see the British point of view very clearly, also. However, from both points of view, I am convinced that Home Rule is the solution.”

Scholars such as Catherine Wynne believe Doyle never quite resolved the tensions he felt about Ireland. On the one hand he saw himself as an Irishman, visited Ireland and followed the political situation there. But he was also a successful writer who shied away from more radical political ideas. Wynne believes this conflict manifested itself in Doyle’s writing, leading him to follow the tradition of Gothic Irish literature, a genre perhaps best exemplified by the Dublin-born writer Bram Stroker, the author of Dracula.

Doyle and Ireland
Doyle’s “preoccupations with colonialism are demonstrated in recurring obsessions with land, mind, racial identity and sexuality,” Wynne writes. “The Gothic is an important mode within the colonial context because… it gives a voice to those who are without power and are disenfranchised.”

Doyle’s complex take on Irish matters is perhaps most evident in the final Sherlock Holmes novel, Valley of Fear.

Part of the novel takes place in 1875, and features a meeting on a train during which two passengers (one carrying a gun) identify themselves as members of a secret society most critics believe was based on the Molly Maguires.

Doyle was said to be fascinated by James McParland, the detective who infiltrated the Molly Maguires. He met with William Pinkerton – head of the private detective agency that McParland worked for – and many speculate that hearing the Molly Maguires story from Pinkerton inspired Doyle to write Valley of Fear and to base the detective character on McParland, who was born in Armagh.

One of the key characters in Valley of Fear is lost at sea. However, Sherlock Holmes fears he was in fact executed and thrown overboard. This echoes the death of James Carey, who informed on his fellow comrades in the Irish National Invincibles, the group that perpetrated the murders in Phoenix Park. Carey was shot dead on board a ship by Donegal man Patrick O’Donnell, an Irish revolutionary who likely had relatives who belonged to – you guessed it – the Molly Maguires. O’Donnell may even have visited Pennsylvania as part of his search for the informant who exposed the Phoenix Park assassins.

In the end, Arthur Conan Doyle’s relationship with Ireland may have been complicated, but it was most certainly intimate. In fact, if Robert Downey, Jr. and Jude Law stay at this long enough, it’s more than likely that they will someday be in a scene featuring an Irish-American coal miner with a gun on a train.

Source

What do you think?

Snooping out the best portrayal of Sherlock Holmes? Elementary!

There are two things I can't abide in a movie:

The first thing is that the dog must not die.

And the second thing is that the great detective Sherlock Holmes must not be played for laughs, and certainly not by some wooden-faced pretty boy without the wit to fill a thimble.

We had a vigorous debate on Facebook the other day on the best actor to play Holmes. Most readers picked Basil Rathbone, he of the aquiline nose.

Yes, he looked good in tights. But he was best in tweeds, tromping around London, fighting evil with his mind.

So who is your favorite Holmes?

"Trying to judge the best Holmes is rather like trying to judge the best pizza," said Donald J. Terras, a retired professor of anthropology and leader of The Hounds of the Baskerville, a prominent group of Sherlockians.

"Tastes vary," said the head hound. "But there are certain traits, a certain quirkiness, that audiences expect from Holmes."

So for every Robert Downey Jr. playing Holmes as part Iron Man, part snarky Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, there's a Basil Rathbone.

Or my personal favorite, Jeremy Brett, whose perfect Holmes can be found free, on the Internet, in the superb and faithful productions of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's stories from Granada Television.

Earlier in his career, Brett sang a love song to the lovely Audrey Hepburn in "My Fair Lady." The tune was "On the Street Where You Live."

8

But as Holmes, Brett was brilliant, sarcastic and somewhat cruel. The series ran for years, story after story, the historical detail absolutely perfect, the manner, the distance between social classes. And Brett was exquisite.

It is in popular fiction where you can learn about a time and how the people were, and Brett's Sherlock takes you there.

And what of Benedict Cumberbatch, the Holmes on BBC in the role that made him an international star? I loved the series at first, especially for how it shows a brilliant man thinking out a problem, with written ideas, fragments and snatches of information floating around him.

I can't give up on Cumberbatch just yet, but his Holmes almost lost me when he got weepy at Dr. Watson's wedding. His eyes were wet.

Sherlock Homes does not cry.

Holmes may find fulfillment in battles with archcriminals and write the occasional monograph on jungle poisons or cigar ashes, but he doesn't get moist around the eyeballs.Holmes may play the violin, take his seven-per-cent solution to relieve his boredom, smoke like a fiend, ridicule lesser minds and deduce your intimate secrets from the scratches on your pocket watch, but he doesn't cry.

Holmes never cries. (Spoiler alert for the true Sherlockian: not even for "The Woman.")

The list of actors who've played Holmes is longer than a row of hansom cabs waiting outside Victoria station. But if, on your list of great Sherlockian performances, you mentioned said Roger Moore, then I prohibit you from reading any more of this column. Good day!

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"Certainly Jeremy Brett was a breakout, in my opinion had the habits down right and the temperament, at least as I read the stories," said Terras. "Another contemporary Holmes is Cumberbatch, and he offers the necessary quirkiness."

"A lot of people are developing a renewed approval of the way Basil Rathbone portrayed Holmes. He had the kind of energy and physical grace that is necessary. And the temperament as well."

Most of us mention Rathbone, Brett and Cumberbatch , but Terras tossed out one I hadn't considered:

Peter Cushing, famous as Professor Van Helsing in the vampire movies, playing Holmes in "The Hound of the Baskervilles."

"That is my favorite 'Hound of the Baskervilles,' " said Terras. "The characters are similar. Holmes and Van Helsing are men of science. And Cushing's Sherlock Holmes has an edginess to it that the others do not have."

Some of you may know that I had a rather difficult childhood. Oh, we had plenty to eat. We were warm in the winter.

We were allowed only one TV program a week, and back in the day, WGN-TV ran Rathbone as the dashing Sherlock.But my mother would not let us watch TV or go near comic books. So I read everything I could grab, including detective stories, like the great child detective Encyclopedia Brown, and Sherlock Holmes.

Each movie was introduced by a wizened old man in a leather wing chair with a clipped English accent.

"The old man was Rathbone himself," said Terras.

Excellent! I almost cried.

Elementary, he didn't say.

"A number of us tried to find the old segments on WGN, but we weren't able. I think they might be gone now."

There is a new Holmes, appropriately titled "Mr. Holmes," starring the Gandalfian actor Ian McKellen, that is scheduled to hit theaters soon.

McKellen's Holmes lives in 1947 as a doddering 93-year-old, slowly losing his formidable memory. I read that he's tortured by an unsolved case that forced him into retirement 30 years before.

Holmes losing his mind? Feeble in the brain? That marvelously balanced instrument of logic and reason growing weak? Holy Reichenbach Falls!

McKellen is a great actor, and watching Holmes struggle to keep his faculties might be worse than being haunted by any dead movie dog since Old Yeller.

"The Ian McKellen version looks interesting," said Terras. "He might be able to pull it off."

I'll see it, because, well, I have no other choice. It's a Sherlock Holmes movie.

And if there's a dog in it, just do me a favor and put me out of my misery and tell me now:

Does the dog bark?

jskass@tribpub.com

Twitter @John_Kass

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