Discussion Post: A Study in Scarlet
Sep. 2nd, 2012 12:21 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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sherlock60Welcome, readers! Let's talk about A Study in Scarlet, a legend in literature and culture in general. As always, I've written up a few of my random thoughts and questions, which are behind the cut. Please add your own in the comments!
- Holmes and Watson meet, and a storied partnership begins. It begins the instant they meet, in fact. Watson certainly needs a friend, a home, a place to belong after his long death-defying battle with injury and illness. He finds all of that in Baker Street and Sherlock Holmes. For his part, Holmes seems almost to have been waiting for him. A man who regards nearly everyone with mild to utter disdain takes to Watson immediately, agreeing to share rooms with him on the spot. Any thoughts on that? Holmes was in the flush of a great discovery at that moment -- do you think their meeting would have gone differently if his experiment had failed?
- The novels sometimes send us on long voyages away from the familiar climes of London to far-off places of desperation like the Country of the Saints. The middle section of STUD is blackly beautiful in a way, as harsh and unforgiving as the barren land it describes.
- What would have happened if Jefferson Hope hadn't been conveniently hours from death from an aortic aneurysm? Do you think he could have been deliberately trying to set it off (or hurry it) during that futile attempted jump through the window glass?
- There's no Granada version of A Study in Scarlet, depriving us of that imagining of the meeting of Holmes and Watson. There's no version of their last case together (His Last Bow), either. I prefer it that way -- there is no beginning and no end to their friendship. It is eternal, or better said, always 1895.
Join us next week for The Speckled Band in canon and Granada!
- Holmes and Watson meet, and a storied partnership begins. It begins the instant they meet, in fact. Watson certainly needs a friend, a home, a place to belong after his long death-defying battle with injury and illness. He finds all of that in Baker Street and Sherlock Holmes. For his part, Holmes seems almost to have been waiting for him. A man who regards nearly everyone with mild to utter disdain takes to Watson immediately, agreeing to share rooms with him on the spot. Any thoughts on that? Holmes was in the flush of a great discovery at that moment -- do you think their meeting would have gone differently if his experiment had failed?
- The novels sometimes send us on long voyages away from the familiar climes of London to far-off places of desperation like the Country of the Saints. The middle section of STUD is blackly beautiful in a way, as harsh and unforgiving as the barren land it describes.
- What would have happened if Jefferson Hope hadn't been conveniently hours from death from an aortic aneurysm? Do you think he could have been deliberately trying to set it off (or hurry it) during that futile attempted jump through the window glass?
- There's no Granada version of A Study in Scarlet, depriving us of that imagining of the meeting of Holmes and Watson. There's no version of their last case together (His Last Bow), either. I prefer it that way -- there is no beginning and no end to their friendship. It is eternal, or better said, always 1895.
Join us next week for The Speckled Band in canon and Granada!
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Date: 2012-09-03 03:54 am (UTC)a) Something (an experiment gone wrong, perhaps) has caused the rooms in Montague street to be less than ideal for living in and Holmes has been kicked out of his flat and is spending all his time at the labs for a roof over his head as well as a distraction. He needs to get into other rooms fast before he is found out.
b) We don't know how long Holmes he has had his eye on the Baker Street suite, nor how many others he may have considered to be potential flatmates, before bemoaning his luck to Stamford. He may well have been running out of time to seal the deal getting the rooms and desperate to find another with whom to split the rent at least until his business picked up. We know that he sums up Watson quite neatly very quickly- a medical and military man, used to chemicals and shared spaces, will suit him nicely. I mean, he even manages to behave extremely well for the first few months!
c) Slash goggles firmly affixed, now: Holmes just plain thought Watson was pretty, all tanned and skinny.(on second thought.... no, not really.)
2. Doyle got carried away on his sub-plots at times, I think, in an effort (as was said before) to add in some exoticism and romantic adventure here. America! Ecaped Convicts! Love Triangles! The Moor! Glowing Demonic Doggies- erm, Hounds-!! Or he got paid by the word, I am not certain. These locales might have appealed especially to his audience who may rarely get outside of London at the time.
3. I think that Jefferson Hope began his to bring hs Lucy to justice the moment he knew he was a doomed man by his anyurism. I suspect he knew he had not long to live no matter what. Was the attempt to Jump through the glass to escape his captors or hurry along inevitable death? I think he meant to flee and in his panic fogot his heart condition.
4. I really like your thoughts on this. Hurray for it always 1895, let the fog roll in!