April 24th 1891: Holmes was attacked by Moriarty’s ruffians. (FINA)
On April 22nd…
April 22nd 1890: Carlo the Staff attacks Jethro Rucastle. (COPP)
Weekly Forum 2015: #16
Today’s topic is from our fellow JHWS member “Willow.” Thank you!
If you wish to offer an idea for a Weekly Forum topic, please contact me at carla@johnhwatsonsociety.com
Enjoying the Canon
When you sit down to read the Canon purely for the pleasure of doing so (not counting research or studying for a quiz), which version do you read:
Doubleday, Baring-Gould Annotated, Klinger Annotated, Oxford, John Murray, Limited Edition, an illustrated version, paperback edition, something else? …and also, why?
On April 21st…
April 21st 1890: Violet Hunter enters the forbidden Room. (COPP)
On April 20th…
April 20th 1890 Carlo the Mastiff was last fed. (COPP)
On April 19th…
April 19th 1888
Holmes, Watson and Athelney Jones chase the Launch Aurora down the Thames (SIGN)
Tonga was shot by Holmes or Watson, or both.
Watson finds the true treasure of the tale, his beloved Mary.
An ode added by Chips in honor of beloved Mary:
Limerick to Sign of the Four
by Isaac Asimov, BSI and Sherlockian extraordinaire
Muttered Sherlock, “Never mind Cocaine’s pleasure,
Let us seek the famed Agra Treasure.”
Answered Watson, “No pearls,
for myself only girls,
And its Mary that’s made to my measure.”
On April 18th…
April 18th 1888
The Baker Street Irregulars started their search for the Launch Aurora. (SIGN)
The Baker Street Irregulars started their search for the Launch Aurora. (SIGN)
April 18th 1887
The Acton House was broken into. (REIG)
Holmes and Watson arrived in Baker Street from Lyons.
April 18th 1897
Dr. Sterndale murders Mortimer Tregennis. ( DEVI)
On April 17th…
April 17, 1888: Toby leads Holmes and Watson on a creosote trail. (SIGN)
April 17, 1888: The launch “Aurora” disappeared. (SIGN)
On April 16th…
April 16, 1888: Holmes,Watson and Mary Morstan went to Pondicherry Lodge. (SIGN)
April 16, 1896: Brenda Tregennis was murdered and two brothers lost their sanity. (DEVI)
On April 15th…
April 15, 1876: The Worthingdon Bank Gang was sent to prison. (REIS)
April 15, 1887: Watson arrived at Holmes’s bedside in Lyons. (REIG)
April 15, 1888: Toga kills Bartholomew Sholto with a poison dart. (SIGN)
On April 14th…
April 14, 1887: Holmes lay ill in the Hotel Du Long in Lyons. (REIG)
Weekly Forum 2015: #15
Today’s topic is a thought offered by our fellow JHWS member “Dash.” Thank you!
If you wish to offer an idea for a Weekly Forum topic, please contact me at carla@johnhwatsonsociety.com
Doctor Watson’s Descriptive Words
“Cut out the poetry, Watson,” Holmes famously declared in RETI.
What are your favorite examples of Watson’s descriptive writing?
On April 13th…
Chips’s Tid Bits returns with new canonical events to mark on your calendar…
April 13, 1890: Violet Hunter sat in the window seat a second time. (COPP)
Weekly Forum 2015: #14
Another one of our members was kind enough to contact me and anonymously offer an interesting topic for us to discuss. If you wish to offer an idea for a Weekly Forum topic, please contact me at carla@johnhwatsonsociety.com
The Detective’s Capacity for Love
In SCAN, Watson notes of Holmes:
“It was not that he felt any emotion akin to love for Irene Adler. All emotions, and that one particularly, were abhorrent to his cold, precise, but admirably balanced mind. He was, I take it, the most perfect reasoning and observing machine that the world has seen; but, as a lover, he would have placed himself in a false position” (emphasis added).
Yet, one or two years later (depending upon which chronologist you consult), Watson seems to have hopes that Holmes will find a match in Violet Hunter of COPP. The good doctor notices how Holmes is “favourably impressed by the manner and speech of his new client.” Watson also notes that Holmes calls Miss Hunter an “exceptional woman.” Then, at the story’s end, the good doctor says:
“As to Miss Violet Hunter, my friend Holmes, rather to my disappointment, manifested no further interest in her when once she had ceased to be the centre of one of his problems…” (emphasis added)
According to Klinger, TWIS, IDEN, BLUE, FIVE, BOSC, STOC, NAVA, ENGR, HOUN, CROO, and REDH occur between SCAN and COPP. Is there something about Holmes that Watson observed or discovered during these cases that would cause him to change his mind about the Great Detective’s capacity for love or, at the very least, his ability to find and keep a suitable mate? Or, are the good doctor’s musings in COPP merely a reflection of his hopeful character and perhaps his misguided wishes for his friend’s marital happiness? What evidence (or lack thereof) leads you to your conclusions?
Coin of the Canonical Realm by Nicholas Utechin “Rex.”
Published in December 2013.
58 pages, perfect bound.
Price: $9.00 USD
US Postage: $3.00 USD
International Postage: $5.00 USD
In this, the first monograph published by the John H Watson Society, Nicholas Utechin sets out to make 21st century sense of all the 19th century mentions of money in the Sherlock Holmes stories.
Have you ever stopped to wonder exactly what a ‘half-sovereign’ would buy today? Find out what Mary Morstan stood to gain if the Agra treasure had not been hurled out of the Aurora. How much in dollars – then and now – would Neville St. Clair’s daily begging takings have amounted to? Could Sir Henry Baskerville’s $6 boots be bought for an equivalent sum in 2014?
Coin of the Canonical Realm is an important work whose validity might not survive all-engulfing world inflation, but currently provides the first ever detailed snapshot of the practicalities of Holmes’s financial world.
The Society is covering its printing and postage costs with $1.50 remaining to contribute to future publishing projects. Please support the Society’s efforts to further original research in Canonical topics. Payment may be made via PayPal or credit card.
About the author: NICHOLAS UTECHIN is a Director-at-Large of the John H. Watson Society (‘Rex’), a Baker Street Irregular (‘The Ancient British Barrow’) and an Honorary Member of The Sherlock Holmes Society of London (having edited “The Sherlock Holmes Journal” from 1976-2006). He is a freelance journalist and worked for many years as a producer and presenter on BBC radio. He lives in Oxford, U.K.
The Saga of Holmes and Watson Endures
(“Chips’s Tid Bits” returns with a very special message from our dear friend, Chips. – Carla Buttons)
Hello to my fellow Society members,
The passage of our beloved Don hit me hard as it did all of us. As I am want to do in times of turmoil I submerge my self in rereading the Canon and the Scholarship about those tales. I found a passage that reminded me of Don. In the words of Christopher Morley:
“What other body of modern literature is esteemed as much for its errors as its felicities? The saga of Holmes and Watson endures as a unique portrait of a friendship and of a civilization. It is not strange that in our recent years of turmoil and dismay there has been so keen a nostalgia for the shape of things gone by. The Victorian age had many cruel faults yet in some phases it reached the highest accomplishment and assurance human beings have known. When Watson is talking we know where we are. Right is right and wrong is wrong; an aristocrat always looks like an aristocrat; he has a high beaky nose, wide-open haughty gaze, and sags a little at the knees. Mrs. Hudson’s joint of cold beef is on the sideboard (no one dreamed of an icebox in those days), and Holmes is smoking the cherrywood pipe which he reserves for disputatious mood. Let us enter the argument. So, in Vincent Starrett’s phrase, we revisit a world ‘where it is always 1895.'”
I can see Don with Holmes and Watson sitting and discussing the Case.
I miss him so much.
“Chips” aka Ron in Denver
221B Con
It is just one week until 221B Con, the “Fan Con for all things Sherlock Holmes” in Atlanta, Georgia. I’ll be attending for the first time, and I’ll be part of the panel for the session on ASH, BSI, and Other Sherlockian Organizations. That panel is scheduled for 11:00 a.m. on Saturday, 11 April, in Salon C. (NB: The schedule is subject to change.)
I’ll also have 150 of these:
Will you be there? Saturday the 11th is also the Society’s second birthday, so I propose a lunchtime Consultation immediately following the panel. Hope to see you there!
Weekly Forum 2015: #13
Today’s topic is a thought offered by our fellow JHWS member “Dash.” Thank you!
If you wish to offer an idea for a Weekly Forum topic, please contact me at carla@johnhwatsonsociety.com
Holmes ruminates about God more than once in the Canon. Does Watson express any thoughts about religion? What does that tell us?
The 29th Running of The Silver Blaze
This news will be of interest to our East Coast Watsonians. Here is an announcement from fellow Watsonian, Greg Ruby “Robin”:
The Silver Blaze (Southern Division) that was held annually from 1972 to 1998 is returning to Pimlico on Saturday, May 23rd.
You can find out more about this upcoming event at: http://fourthgarrideb.com/silver-blaze/
Weekly Forum 2015: #12
Today is a return to one of our favorite past times: The Weekly Forum. One of our members was kind enough to contact me and anonymously offer a clever topic for us to discuss:
BBC Sherlock & the Victorian Age
Considering the popularity of BBC’s Sherlock…is the historical setting of Watson’s stories necessary? What does the Victorian Age add to them? When they are reset in the present age, is something about these stories lost? Is something gained?
On the BBC website, Steven Moffat (executive producer and head writer of Sherlock) is quoted as saying,
“Conan Doyle’s stories were never about frock coats and gas light; they’re about brilliant detection, dreadful villains and blood-curdling crimes—and frankly, to hell with the crinoline. Other detectives have cases, Sherlock Holmes has adventures, and that’s what matters.”
However, news recently broke that there will be a Sherlock special set in Victorian England, so perhaps, Mr. Moffat has noticed something missing… Thoughts?