Posted on by Selena

Goals

Cover of 1930 edition of The Complete Sherlock Holmes

At the end of 2017, I decided that I would read my copy of the 1930 Doubleday edition of The Complete Sherlock Holmes, cover to cover, during 2018. I started on January 1st with the preface by Christopher Morley, and I finished “The Retired Colourman” in the evening of December 31st.

I wrote out a schedule for the year that broke the reading down more or less evenly over 52 weeks, though I ended up reading it in bigger chunks less regularly. It was an interesting experience, immersing myself in the Canon in approximate publication order, having read some stories many times before, and others only once or twice.

This year, I’m going to explore the Canon from a different angle, and read through my Baring-Gould annotated edition.

Do you have any Sherlockian goals for 2019?

9 Replies to “Goals”

  1. Bravo! Congratulations on your achievement. I am in awe of your dedication. A complete reread from cover to cover in a single year is a goal I have yet to meet. Perhaps 2019 is my year.

    By the way, our first Boy in Buttons told me reread his Doubleday from cover to cover every summer for more than thirty years— perhaps you are on a similar path. ?

  2. I don’t have a Holmesian to-do list for 2019, but I have been mentally compiling a Holmesian bucket list lately.

    1. Meet and shake hands with as many Holmesians as possible, including, but not limited to:
    Mattias Bostrom
    Margie Deck
    Brad Keefauver
    Steve Rothman
    Howard Ostrom
    Auberon Redfearn
    Elinor Gray

    2. Get Lyndsay Faye to sign my copy of The Whole Art of Detection

    3. Attend the BSI Weekend (especially the Baker Street Babe’s Daintiest… Ball.)

    4. Go to the Reichenbach Falls (preferably via the route Watson and Holmes took.)

    5. Live long enough to see Holmes and Doyle done justice in the form of a decent Holmesian museum in my home town of Portsmouth.

    6. Attend 221b Con.

    7. Attend the Sherlock Holmes Society of London Annual Dinner

    8. Get my kids to put down their phones and actually read a proper ACD Sherlock Holmes story.

    9. Make and try as many Sherlock Holmes cocktails as possible.

    10. Buy myself a copy of H W Bell’s …Chronology of Their Adventures, instead of just drooling over the ones at my library.

    11. Put together an authentic Colonel Sebastian Moran outfit for myself.

    12. Chuck my children out so I can turn their room into the sitting room of 221b. With special attention paid to recreating the bookshelves accurately.

    13. Visit the Sherlock Holmes statue in Karuizawa, Japan.

    14. Visit the Sherlock Holmes statue in Moscow.

    15. Visit Groombridge Manor House in Groombridge, East Sussex which is the original of Birlstone Manor from the Valley of Fear.

    16. See The International Exhibition of Sherlock Holmes.

    17. Get 100 Holmesians to dress as Sherlock Holmes and do the sand dance. I can’t explain where this one came from, but ever since it popped into my head last year, I just think it would be really cool.

    2. I’m in for the sand dance– not sure about doing all the steps, but the costume is totally me. Daisy

  3. OK, Paul and Margie, You have covered it for me!! But the travel details change and some other things. 1. compile an SH/ACD library at my son’s second home north of Seattle; 2. read the stories with my grandkids and grand pups (not the real “scary ones” though–they like the SIXN without the murder–you know, young kids like smashing anything and the Frankland part in HOUN because spying is always fun); 3. read the ACD non-SH stories I have; 4. do TH7 with Margie, Cameron, and other team members; 5. cudgel my brain with more of pawky puzzler’s quizzes in the Watsonian; 6. read more of the 250+ pastiches I have on my e-reader, good or not–have to be in the Holmes and Watson world a lot of the time; 7. and viola!! continue to have so very much fun in my “declining” years. Daisy

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