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sherlock60Welcome back, everyone! Let's have some canon Sherlock Holmes discussion, shall we? What did you all think of Charles Augustus Milverton? As always, I've written up a few of my own random thoughts and questions, which are behind the jump. Please add your own in the comments!
Discussion about the Granada adaptation of this story, called The Master Blackmailer, is available in this week's Granada discussion post.
- So just a few weeks ago we read my favorite canon story, The Devil's Foot, and this week we read my number two: Charles Augustus Milverton. What a great story this is. It's jam-packed with so many wonderful pieces. Suspense! Excitement! Loyalty! Bravery! A repulsive villain, one of the most wicked and effective in the canon! Sherlock Holmes in a place of weakness, forced to negotiate with a man he is too disgusted by to even touch! The edges of criminality and ethics walked and crossed in pursuit of a monster! Oh, there's so much to love.
- And if you lean that way, there's even more for those looking for subtext that's not maybe as sub as usual in this case. Holmes and Watson, hand in hand in the dark of Milverton's estate, venturing through scented gardens and silent hallways, knowing any sound louder than the beating of their hearts will bring disaster. Lips brushing softly against skin with furtive whispers of warning. Two bodies pressed together behind a curtain, tensed and anxious, with danger but an arm's reach away. A chase into the night nearly ending in capture, but pulling each other on, the runners escape into the freedom of the cold night air side by side. Delicious.
- "Surely you have gone too far?" - For all these goodies, there is one serious point of trouble: Sherlock Holmes becoming engaged to a woman as a ploy during an investigation. Holmes has proven himself not above many dubious things in these stories, and now apparently lying to a woman with false promises of marriage is one of them. It's appropriate that in his quest to undo Milverton's evil, Holmes commits an egregious cruelty himself. Gaze too long into the abyss, after all, and the abyss gazes also into you. Did his behavior here bother you? Were the means justified by the ends? Would Holmes have done things this way if there hadn't been another man waiting in the wings to blunt the inevitable pain of heartbreak for Agatha? Also: "Good heavens, those talks!" I want to know exactly what he meant by that. Is he saying the talks were interminably dull? Vacuously inane? Or perhaps deeply romantic? The ambiguity is enticing.
- If Holmes is morally grey, our dear Doctor Watson is a white knight. He nearly hits Milverton with a chair in Baker Street to keep him and get the blackmail material he's carrying, an assault intensely deserved. When Holmes comes to him proposing a burglary, he expresses his disapproval for the idea being dangerous and against the law, but his only real question is when do they start on the plan. Together. Holmes protests, telling him he's working alone, but Watson will have NONE of it. "Then you are not going." It's spectacular. The doctor even goes so far as to threaten to bring in the police if Holmes tries to leave him behind. His will is iron. "Other people beside you have self-respect and even reputations." God, I love you, John Watson.
- So Inspector Lestrade at the end: is he really that dense? Standing in front of the two men he's describing, did he actually not connect any of those dots? Holmes' tries direct misdirection: "Why, it might be a description of Watson!" Lestrade reacts to that with "amusement", Watson says. Is it possible he knows/suspects more than he lets on? It's clear to everyone justice was served, so perhaps he's willing to not ask as many questions as he normally would knowing he may not prefer the answers.
Comment away, and join us next week for The Six Napoleons!
Discussion about the Granada adaptation of this story, called The Master Blackmailer, is available in this week's Granada discussion post.
- So just a few weeks ago we read my favorite canon story, The Devil's Foot, and this week we read my number two: Charles Augustus Milverton. What a great story this is. It's jam-packed with so many wonderful pieces. Suspense! Excitement! Loyalty! Bravery! A repulsive villain, one of the most wicked and effective in the canon! Sherlock Holmes in a place of weakness, forced to negotiate with a man he is too disgusted by to even touch! The edges of criminality and ethics walked and crossed in pursuit of a monster! Oh, there's so much to love.
- And if you lean that way, there's even more for those looking for subtext that's not maybe as sub as usual in this case. Holmes and Watson, hand in hand in the dark of Milverton's estate, venturing through scented gardens and silent hallways, knowing any sound louder than the beating of their hearts will bring disaster. Lips brushing softly against skin with furtive whispers of warning. Two bodies pressed together behind a curtain, tensed and anxious, with danger but an arm's reach away. A chase into the night nearly ending in capture, but pulling each other on, the runners escape into the freedom of the cold night air side by side. Delicious.
- "Surely you have gone too far?" - For all these goodies, there is one serious point of trouble: Sherlock Holmes becoming engaged to a woman as a ploy during an investigation. Holmes has proven himself not above many dubious things in these stories, and now apparently lying to a woman with false promises of marriage is one of them. It's appropriate that in his quest to undo Milverton's evil, Holmes commits an egregious cruelty himself. Gaze too long into the abyss, after all, and the abyss gazes also into you. Did his behavior here bother you? Were the means justified by the ends? Would Holmes have done things this way if there hadn't been another man waiting in the wings to blunt the inevitable pain of heartbreak for Agatha? Also: "Good heavens, those talks!" I want to know exactly what he meant by that. Is he saying the talks were interminably dull? Vacuously inane? Or perhaps deeply romantic? The ambiguity is enticing.
- If Holmes is morally grey, our dear Doctor Watson is a white knight. He nearly hits Milverton with a chair in Baker Street to keep him and get the blackmail material he's carrying, an assault intensely deserved. When Holmes comes to him proposing a burglary, he expresses his disapproval for the idea being dangerous and against the law, but his only real question is when do they start on the plan. Together. Holmes protests, telling him he's working alone, but Watson will have NONE of it. "Then you are not going." It's spectacular. The doctor even goes so far as to threaten to bring in the police if Holmes tries to leave him behind. His will is iron. "Other people beside you have self-respect and even reputations." God, I love you, John Watson.
- So Inspector Lestrade at the end: is he really that dense? Standing in front of the two men he's describing, did he actually not connect any of those dots? Holmes' tries direct misdirection: "Why, it might be a description of Watson!" Lestrade reacts to that with "amusement", Watson says. Is it possible he knows/suspects more than he lets on? It's clear to everyone justice was served, so perhaps he's willing to not ask as many questions as he normally would knowing he may not prefer the answers.
Comment away, and join us next week for The Six Napoleons!
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Sunday, 21 July 2013
Date: 2013-07-21 09:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-21 10:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-22 11:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-22 06:14 am (UTC)I happened to listen to the Burt Coules adaptation again last night, and it always amazes me that an otherwise decent girl who is clearly with a fine man would toss him to the side so quickly like that (in that adaptation it seems like Holmes wins her hand in only one night!). I tend to prefer the interpretation that she was using the other man's jealousy to make him work harder to make more money, start his own business or something to compete with Escott. This still doesn't reflect well on her, but at least it makes more sense.
Also, I wonder if she was questioned at all following Milverton's death? Are the police looking for an Escott? After all, the housemaid provided him with information of the house and then he disappears on the night Milverton dies. Surely she puts two and two together.
But may we take for a moment to absorb the ridiculous fact that letters to a previous boyfriend or lover would be enough to end marriages? I know people, especially the wealthy, were crazy about appearances back then, but this just seems absurd to me. The Lady Eva is as much a victim of her time as she is of Milverton.
no subject
Date: 2013-07-22 11:18 pm (UTC)Good questions about the investigation of Milverton's murder! Now I'm extremely curious as to what happened? Is Escott forever on the wanted list? Maybe the maid never speaks up because she thinks she'd be blamed or connected to the murder. And it's not like it would matter if she did - Holmes is too clever for that, and the police not nearly clever enough.
And YES, thank you for the comment about the insanity of this Victorian reputation system. That was one of my question ideas, because I just cannot understand it. Take the Earl, for example. Let's say Lady Eva came to him with her "imprudent" letters. Is that really enough to ruin her life over? Potentially his own, if he actually cared about Eva at all. I know family honor was the highest priority among the elite class, but this seems like sheer madness. It's hard to comprehend in this day and age.
no subject
Date: 2013-07-23 04:50 am (UTC)About the letters, at least Holmes seems as confused as we do about whether the Earl will really cast Lady Eva aside over them. I remember the first time I read this story, and I ended it feeling that she'd be better off leaving him and finding someone who wouldn't do that. Milverton wasn't even threatening public exposure - it was just to reveal the letters to the fiance. No one else needed to know! I mean, if "very sprightly" means overflowing with graphic sexual references and otherwise inappropriate conversation I could see why the Earl might be taken aback by it, but if he loved her I don't see why he couldn't overlook them.
no subject
Date: 2013-07-24 11:06 pm (UTC)This is the best of all things. :)