University of Iowa Iowa Research Online Theses and Dissertations Spring 2014 Tracking the great detective: an exploration of the possibility and value of contemporary Sherlock Holmes narratives Jacob Jedidiah Horn University of Iowa Follow this and additional works at: https://ir.uiowa.edu/etd Copyright © 2014 Jacob Jedidiah Horn This dissertation is available at Iowa Research Online: https://ir.uiowa.edu/etd/6766 Recommended Citation Horn, Jacob Jedidiah. "Tracking the great detective: an exploration of the possibility and value of contemporary Sherlock Holmes narratives." PhD (Doctor of Philosophy) thesis, University of Iowa, 2014. https://doi.org/10.17077/etd.wo55-van2 Follow this and additional works at: https://ir.uiowa.edu/etd TRACKING THE GREAT DETECTIVE: AN EXPLORATION OF THE POSSIBILITY AND VALUE OF CONTEMPORARY SHERLOCK HOLMES NARRATIVES by Jacob Jedidiah Horn A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Doctor of Philosophy degree in English in the Graduate College of The University of Iowa May 2014 Thesis Supervisor: Associate Professor Corey Creekmur Copyright by JACOB JEDIDIAH HORN 2014 All Rights Reserved Graduate College The University of Iowa Iowa City, Iowa CERTIFICATE OF APPROVAL ________________________________ PH.D. THESIS ________________________________ This is to certify that the Ph.D. thesis of Jacob Jedidiah Horn has been approved by the Examining Committee for the thesis requirement for the Doctor of Philosophy degree in English at the May 2014 graduation. Thesis Committee: _______________________________________________________ Corey Creekmur, Thesis Supervisor _______________________________________________________ Brooks Landon _______________________________________________________ Loren Glass _______________________________________________________ Kembrew McLeod _______________________________________________________ Matthew Brown To Elise, who patiently listened as I rambled about Holmes and genre literature. ii Behold the fruit of pensive nights and laborious days. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, “His Last Bow” iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First I must thank Professor Priya Kumar, without whose encouragement for my writing on Sherlock Holmes this dissertation would be much different. I did not begin graduate school with a plan to write on Conan Doyle’s detective, but it is now hard for me to imagine a better topic. Alongside Professor Kumar’s support, Professor Corey Creekmur’s knowledge of Holmes specifically and detective fiction more broadly were of incredible assistance to this work. Coming from a background more focused on science fiction and fantasy, Professor Creekmur’s advice and direction were invaluable. My family offered me great support as I devoted time to my dissertation that would have otherwise been spent with them. My mother has always been there for excellent advice and commiseration, and my father was quite happy to see me make the decision to go to graduate school. I cannot thank them enough. Lastly, I should thank some of the people who offered time, effort, and information to me throughout the writing of this material without any thought of recompense. Among the many who helped, Jon Lellenberg, Betsy Rosenblatt, and Chris Redmond deserve special mention. iv ABSTRACT Created at the end of the nineteenth century, Sherlock Holmes has remained a regular feature of popular culture for now more than a century. However, versions of the detective that have appeared in recent years are strikingly different from the character created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, while some characteristics remain similar. This dissertation examines the persistence of Holmes as a function of copyright management that matched shifting literary expectations, following this with an exploration of three categories of discourse in which contemporary Holmes texts participate: feminism, postcolonialism, and neurodiversity. It first locates Holmes’s difference from prior detectives in his humanist characteristics and then demonstrates that a restrictive character management strategy shared by Conan Doyle and his sons, the subsequent rights-holders, constructed a base version of the character. When the copyright passed out of their hands, the new owners’ more permissive attitudes toward using Holmes matched popular interest in deconstructing characters and ideas, allowing for a variety of new approaches to the detective. The second half of the dissertation explores some of these new approaches, beginning with critiques of Holmes’s masculinist, misogynist science that are exposed and repaired through new texts. Following that, a pair of postcolonial texts demonstrates contrasting styles of handling the detective’s imperial associations, and a final discussion of Holmes as a neurologically different individual brings him to both neurodiversity and disability studies. Authors’ deployment of the detective can contain complex narratives, and while these texts are fascinating the dissertation will conclude with a note of concern regarding their continuing popularity. v TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION ...............................................................................................................1 CHAPTER I. THE ADVENTURE OF CREATION AND CONSOLIDATION ..................15 Situating the Great Detective in Genre ......................................................21 Copyright, New Media, and Holmes as Genre ..........................................40 II. THE ADVENTURE OF POSTMODERNITY AND TRADEMARKS .........65 Tracking into Postmodernism ....................................................................70 Interrogating and Trademarking Detection ................................................89 III. THE ADVENTURE OF THE FEMINIST INVESTIGATOR ......................106 The Scientific Holmes..............................................................................111 Holmes and the Feminine ........................................................................124 Feminist Critique of Science ....................................................................138 The King Intervention ..............................................................................151 IV. THE ADVENTURE OF THE SOUTH ASIAN MIRRORS .........................169 A Weakened Holmes ...............................................................................177 The Colonial Connection .........................................................................187 The Mandala and the Postcolonial ...........................................................201 Norbu in Exile ..............................................................................204 History and Independence ............................................................208 Postcolonial (Re)Visions .............................................................214 Holmes as Pastiche and Endorsement......................................................222 The Failures of Pastiche ...............................................................224 Detective and Lama .....................................................................227 Politicized Postmodern History ...................................................234 Truth and History in Fiction ....................................................................239 V. THE ADVENTURE OF THE DISABILITY DESCRIPTION .....................248 Investigating the Detective’s Mind ..........................................................252 A Disabled Detective ...............................................................................268 Tracks Leading to Autism ........................................................................282 CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................294 vi BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................................307 vii 1 INTRODUCTION “What do you know about Sherlock Holmes?” I posed this question to a Taiwanese student of mine and was surprised at her sheepish reply that she did not know what I was talking about. Intrigued, I mimed holding a pipe and outlined the shape of a deerstalker cap on my head, at which her eyes widened and she smiled, relieved to recognize the reference: “Oh, he’s the detective!” She quickly established that he solved mysteries, that he had a partner, and that he was pretty old (though whether she meant physical age or age of creation was unclear). However, she could neither name a single Holmes story nor recall a specific text—in any medium—from which her information came. Our inquiry stalled, lacking a specific point of reference, and we were forced to assume that she had learned about him in piecemeal from texts that referred to him or his most iconic characteristics. Changing tack, I asked her what kind of person she thought Holmes was, and she grew uncertain again. “A good guy?” she hazarded, “Someone who solves mysteries?” After a little thought she finally asked “He is kind of mean sometimes?” I assured her that she was right on all counts, including the apparent conflict between being “mean” and “a good guy,” and though we moved to other topics the exchange continues to fascinate me. Our discussion occurred during my preliminary research for this project and reinforced my interest in the persistence of the great detective; my student, despite her unfamiliarity with any specific material, knew enough about Holmes to have not only a sense of his basic characteristics but also some confusion about