Discussion Post: The Retired Colourman

[spacemutineer.livejournal.com]

Welcome, welcome! It's discussion time again. What did you think of The Retired Colourman? It's not one of the better known stories, but it has plenty of interest to it. As always, I've included a few of my thoughts and questions. Please add your own!

-- ETA: This question is factually wrong. The last published story is actually Shoscombe Old Place. Thanks for the heads up, wytchcroft! Sorry, everyone. I messed this one up. -SM
This is the last story published in Doyle's canon, although not the last chronologically. Does it make for a satisfying closing case for a reader? It has a lot of familiar elements to previous cases in it; it made me think of a greatest hits album. Holmes seems to feel the end coming here, with a particularly bleak existential monologue about the futility of life. By the finale, he is a bit more wistful. "You can file it in our archives, Watson. Some day the true story may be told." And so it all has.

-- I enjoyed all the references to the telephone, although it seemed odd for a story set in 1898. Another reflection of the late date of writing, I suspect.

-- In his melancholy mood, Holmes is rough on poor Watson. First he sends him on a fact-finding errand only to insult him about his meager skills and his propensity for flowery language when he returns. Then he forces Watson on a time-wasting journey to nowhere with the miserable Mr. Amberley. Ouch. At least Holmes notices his behavior is a problem and tries to apologize somewhat.

-- The Retired Colourman has a tremendous climax! "Only this: What did you do with the bodies?" Wow, that's some line. You can just hear the crescendo of music crashing on the soundtrack with that. DUN DUN DUNNN!!!

-- Does Amberley just carry around lethal suicide poison all the time for whenever he needs it or just since he committed a double murder?

-- What do you make of Mr. Barker, Holmes' "hated rival upon the Surrey shore"?

Comments

[hisietari.livejournal.com]

I was a little surprised about the abrupt "What did you do with the bodies?". That was unusually strong for someone like Holmes, who will often play the game to the very end (or at least that's the impression he usually left with me).

For a last case, I found this rather open, as if it was supposed to leave a few options for the future. Or maybe Arthur Conan Doyle didn't want to strike people so heavily again, after their reaction to Holmes's death before.

What I noticed was this - Holmes and Watson must be in their 60s in this, right? Yet this man still performs formidable physical action as if he was a teenager. Remarkable! ;)

[spacemutineer.livejournal.com]

It's not the last case chronologically for Holmes and Watson, it is just the last story published. I'm sorry I didn't make that clear. I changed the wording a bit to clarify.

H&W were perfectly active late in life -- there's quite a bit of action in His Last Bow, their chronologically last case. If you missed that one, definitely check it out. :-)

[hisietari.livejournal.com]

Argh, so it happened again... I read stories and bits and pieces here and there over the years, and only recently started from the beginning (in order of publishing, and taking notes appropriately) again. I'm very sure that I missed those stories before. Thank you for pointing that out!

[wytchcroft.livejournal.com]

Eh? Shoscombe Old Place - koff! koff!

[wytchcroft.livejournal.com]

that's the joy of the stories - and sites like this (thanks to Spacemutineer) - continual rediscovery... :)

[wytchcroft.livejournal.com]

always wrong foots me this little story - it is a harsh one, but brief? Good Heavens yes! Less, alas, is less here - strange echoes too of the Cardboard Box as Shoscombe echoes Silver Blaze.

[hisietari.livejournal.com]

I'm afraid it's a three brains problem. One for the stories, one for the timeline, and one to keep in mind that my tea is turning into solid caffeine soup.

[tweedisgood.livejournal.com]

In the BBC radio version they do make it his last Baker Street case, IIRC - with a sad little coda where Watson comes to bid him goodbye to find he's already left for Sussex, sniff, because he doesn't like awkward goodbyes.

I think Holmes genuinely likes and respects Barker, thinks he has some promise, and the "hated rival" line is a bit of snark - maybe to reassure Watson?

[wytchcroft.livejournal.com]

i have no problem with caffeine soup.

[tweedisgood.livejournal.com]

In serial form, yes, but RETI appears last in the volume "Case Book", so I presume that's what spacemutineer means.

A Casebook of Mistaken Identity?

[wytchcroft.livejournal.com]

Not in my copy it doesn't.

A tangled skein indeed - hmm, i shall go search for clues, i'm intrigued i must confess. It is useless to theorise without data but perhaps it's a UK/USA publishing difference?

Re: A Casebook of Mistaken Identity?

[tweedisgood.livejournal.com]

perhaps it's a UK/USA publishing difference?

I'm going by the reproduced complete works on the Camden House site
here (http://www.ignisart.com/camdenhouse/canon/index.html) which does indeed seem to be based on a UK edition, so that may well be the answer.

Re: A Casebook of Mistaken Identity?

[wytchcroft.livejournal.com]

according to Wiki the solution would appear to be that of earlier versus recent editions.
"Because of the two orderings, "The Adventure of the Retired Colourman" has often been incorrectly identified as the last Sherlock Holmes story written by Arthur Conan Doyle to be published, when the last such story to be published is in fact "The Adventure of Shoscombe Old Place"."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Case-Book_of_Sherlock_Holmes

but they offer no concrete evidence of this... my own copy is an old one however which would seem to back up the notion.

:)

Re: A Casebook of Mistaken Identity?

[spacemutineer.livejournal.com]

Ah, crap. I try hard to make sure everything is accurate, but it looks like I failed here. I even looked at the Wikipedia article. That I missed that bit is just really sad. My apologies. I will fix it.

Re: A Casebook of Mistaken Identity?

[wytchcroft.livejournal.com]

Pfff! it was an interesting case! :))

and i can understand why the later ordering would be preferred.

Re: A Casebook of Mistaken Identity?

[wytchcroft.livejournal.com]

and i apologise for my eager over-posting, but -
i was thinking about Holmes and the telephone reference (which you rightly mention).

i don't know much about the spread of telecommunications but i'm fairly sure that (as with the change from silent film to talky) the phone service would have been quite primitive still - whereas telegrams (certainly in the Victorian era) were much more akin to email as it is now.
But more than that - i'm wondering about Conan Doyle and the canon as a whole...
compare the unselfconscious reference to a phone in Sign of Four with the later stories (e.g. Garrideb and Colourman), i wonder if the change is in Doyle himself?
At some point Doyle began to see Holmes and Watson as flies in amber never to leave the nostalgic glow of yestertimes. This of course is because Doyle himself was now forced to recreate the settings and trappings of a bygone age rather than describing a culture first hand.

i sometimes think that Holmes himself would have been forward looking and embracive of his times than Doyle (not without some little reader pressure) chooses to make him.

But when exactly did the 'change' take place? And how does it effect the tone of the stories??