The Reigate Squires: Discernment

[gardnerhill.livejournal.com]

Title: The Reigate Squires: Discernment
Author: gardnerhill                        
Word Count: 60
Rating: G
Warning: None.
Summary: It’s not just knowing how to write, but what to write.
                                                                                       
***

Holmes frowned at my manuscript. “You immortalise a petty family squabble over land but not the broad-reaching villainy of Baron Maupertuis?”

I hid my smile at his pique over Paget’s illustration of his feigned faint. “That case showed your gifts at their best, truly. But Strand readers would yawn over the details of Dutch stock market fraud. A murder, however…”

The Reigate Puzzle: Ankle-Deep

[okapi1895.livejournal.com]

Title: Ankle-Deep
Canon Story: The Reigate Puzzle
Rating: Gen
Summary: Somewhere in Lyons, two women feel Mrs. Hudson's pain.
Author's Note: ...his room was literally ankle-deep with congratulatory telegrams...

The pair stood in the doorway.
“Mon Dieu! What has he done to the room?” cried the first.
“Heureusement the mustachioed one convinced him to go home!” exclaimed the second.
“Are those bullet holes?”
“These tobacco stains, will they ever be washed out?”
“Better to burn those curtains and these,” she said, attacking the paper-strewn floor with a broom, “too!”

Discussion Post: The Reigate Squires

[scfrankles.livejournal.com]

This week, the canon story we’re looking at is The Reigate Squires (aka The Reigate Puzzle), and the chosen topic is Firearms in Victorian England.

( Discussion continues... )

Mrs. Hudson's Poetry Page: The Reigate Squires

[scfrankles.livejournal.com]

Welcome once again to my poetry page!

I hope each week you will read Dr. Watson’s delightful narrative and then go on to write a poem related to it in some way. All forms of poetry are permitted, and further down the page there is a selection you might like to consider using over the coming weeks.

And here, courtesy of my housemaid Rachel, is this week’s suggested poem to read—a suggestion inspired by the themes and subjects in this week's story. Hopefully you will enjoy the poem, and perhaps it may give you some ideas for a poem of your own or allow you to look at Dr. Watson's story in a new way.


Happiness

by Susan Griffin

Note from Rachel: Mr. Holmes’s health is failing in this story, and Dr. Watson convinces him to recuperate in the country. This poem might be Mr. Holmes’s inward reflections as he haltingly attempts to appreciate nature and quiet companionship for once, while battling an extreme acuity of perception that is almost painful. I see the internal commentary, set aside in parentheses, as perhaps Dr. Watson’s side of the conversation as he tries to understand what has led to his friend’s collapse. It is ultimately a confused, wandering, but hopeful poem about a sensitive and driven person trying to let themselves be happy.



Thank you so much to Rachel. And here is my suggested form to revisit this week: the rime couée. (The link will take you back to a previous poetry page.)


But you do not have to use that form. Any form of poetry is welcome this week—and every week! Here are a few suggestions for you:

221B verselet, abecedarian poetry, acrostic poetry, alexandrine, ballad, beeswing, blackout poetry, blues stanza, bref double, Burns stanza, call and response, chastushka, cinquain, circular poetry, clerihew, colour poems, concrete poetry, Cornish verse, curtal sonnet, diamante, doggerel, double dactyl, ekphrasis, elegiac couplet, elegiac stanza, elfje, englyn, epigram, epitaph, epulaeryu, Etheree, fable, Fib, found poetry, ghazal, haiku, Italian sonnet, jueju, kennings poem, lanturne, limerick, lyric poetry, mathnawī, micropoetry, mini-monoverse, palindrome poetry, pantoum, Parallelismus Membrorum, poem cycle, quintilla, renga, riddle, rime couée, Schüttelreim, sedoka, septet, sestina, sonnet, tanka, tercet, terza rima, tongue twister poetry, triangular triplet, triolet, Tyburn, villanelle


Please leave all your poems inspired by The Reigate Squires in the comments on this post. I look forward to seeing them!



Warm regards,

Mrs. Hudson

The Reigate Squires: An Extraordinary Assortment

[scfrankles.livejournal.com]

Canon Story: The Reigate Squires
Title: An Extraordinary Assortment
Author: scfrankles
Rating: G
Author's Notes: "What an extraordinary assortment!" I exclaimed.
"Oh, the fellows evidently grabbed hold of everything they could get."


“Just grab anything, you old fool!”

(...an odd volume of Pope’s Homer…) Ah, my arrogant Odysseus, who believes no-one can defeat him.

(...two plated candlesticks…) So appealing on the surface but worthless within;

(...an ivory letter-weight…) so hard and unyielding;

(...a small oak barometer…) swinging from sunshine to storms.

(...a ball of twine…) If only I could escape this labyrinth.

The Reigate Squires: A Different Opinion

[thesmallhobbit.livejournal.com]

Canon Story: The Reigate Squires
Title: A Different Opinion (the serialisation of the Private Journal of Dr Watson)
Author:thesmallhobbit
Rating: G

To my mind a quiet rest in the country comprises evenings of drinking brandy and quiet conversation, with days of gentle walks, interspersed with the occasional shot at some game birds.  It does not include rescuing my companion from being strangled, nor indeed seeing another draw a revolver to threaten us.  As usual, Holmes is of an entirely different opinion.