Sherlock Holmes: the Baker Street Case-Files, Mark Mower, MX Publishing, 2017, £8

“I AM AN OMNIVOROUS READER” Book reviews by DAN ANDRIACCO, LISA BURSCHEIDT, ALISTAIR DUNCAN, MARK MOWER, SARAH OBERMULLER-BENNETT, JOHN SHEPPARD, JEAN UPTON and ROGER JOHNSON The Life and Death of Sherlock Holmes: Master enhanced by the very impressive introduction and Detective, Myth and Media Star by Mattias Boström. annotated transcription by Neil McCaw, Professor of Head of Zeus, 2017. 597pp. £25.00 (hbk) Victorian Literature at the University of Winchester. This is the story of the birth and enduring life of the This is a splendid work of scholarship and essential character whose name means “detective” in almost reading for all Sherlockian students and collectors. every language. And what a fascinating story it is! Professor McCaw’s introduction provides valuable “Reads like fiction” is a cliché that’s hard to avoid in context for the story and a brief history of Conan describing this engrossing narrative full of quirky Doyle’s time in Southsea. He examines the rather characters and twists and turns of plot. The 497 pages negative reputation which the story has gained over the of text, followed by 100 pages of notes and index, fly years. Consideration is given to Conan Doyle’s writing by. in his later career, the impact of World War One on the The book begins in 1878 with Arthur Conan Doyle. author’s view of the world and the claim that this story It ends in 2015 with the rediscovery of the lost William is more science fiction than detective fiction. Professor Gillette film of his classic melodrama Sherlock Holmes. McCaw rejects the view that the writing is weak. For The closing lines remind us, however, that the story will example, Professor Presbury’s unorthodox search for go on. With so much ground to cover — literal ground eternal youth has much in common with present day across many countries as well as metaphorical ground procedures. across more than a century — even such a hefty tome as The original Strand Magazine story is included with this couldn’t give detailed attention to everything. So the facsimile of the manuscript and Professor McCaw’s Boström had to be selective about what to sketch lightly scholarship. The manuscript is part of Richard Lancelyn and what to put under the magnifying lens. This he did Green’s bequest to the City of Portsmouth, and our late almost perfectly. Most of the 111 brief chapters, greatly Chairman, I am certain, would have been so pleased to expanded from the original Swedish version, involve see it published alongside Sherlockian scholarship of material that I’m somewhat familiar with after more the highest quality. This book is the perfect way to than five decades of Sherlockian reading. And yet, celebrate the ninetieth anniversary of the publication of almost every chapter also contains material that was The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes. new and interesting to me. The book is neither too The frontispiece of this beautifully presented volume elementary nor too advanced for anyone interested in advises: “Read at once if convenient- if inconvenient the Holmes phenomenon. read all the same.” The reader will be thoroughly It would be hard for me to pick a favourite part, but absorbed! the account of how the first female members were The book is available from www. added to the ranks of the Baker Street Irregulars is visitportsmouth.co.uk/conandoyle/TheCreepingMan. among the most dramatic and moving. And the DJ explanation of the Sherlock Holmes copyright ownership, a complex thread running through multiple The Man Who Would be Sherlock by Christopher chapters and many years, was most enlightening. I first Sandford. The History Press. 2017. 320pp. £20.00 interviewed Mattias Boström about this book just over (hbk) four years ago. I’m delighted to be able to finally read it This book concerns Conan Doyle’s excursions into in English and learn that it’s just as good as I expected. the world of true crime. Inevitably, it predominantly If I had a much smaller Sherlockian library, this book dwells on the cases of George Edalji and Oscar Slater, would still be an indispensable part of it. which account for over 50% of the book. They are also DA the events that have caused a lot of other authors to put pen to paper (including yours truly). Beyond these, the The Adventure of the Creeping Man by Sir Arthur Chicken Run murder also features as do some crimes Conan Doyle. Facsimile edition with an Introduction that Conan Doyle encountered when travelling outside and annotated transcript by Neil McCaw. University of the UK on his Spiritualist lecture tours. Winchester (supported by Portsmouth City Council), Perhaps surprisingly, a considerable amount of time 2017. 132pp. £35.00 (hbk) is spent on Conan Doyle’s Spiritualist work and his run- Facsimile editions of the Sherlock Holmes stories ins with Harry Houdini. Sandford has covered this are to be treasured, and this edition of “The Adventure ground before, in greater detail, so some of his work in of the Creeping Man” shines as brightly as any. The this area will be familiar if you’ve read his earlier book. rather eccentric story of Professor Presbury is greatly However, here this is used as background material in connection with Conan Doyle’s ideas about the use of people forming a message in Dancing Men code. mediums in the solving of crime. Mention of the Robert Graham recalls how that remarkable icon came Cottingley Fairies is harder to justify but I guess it is about. (A copy is displayed at The Hill House in very easy to talk about how credulous Conan Doyle was Happisburgh, where Conan Doyle’s story was in such matters if you lean on the fairies as an example. conceived.) Margaret Bird tells the story behind the As a means to this end their inclusion makes sense. first, ground-breaking expedition to “The Country of If you are a student of Conan Doyle’s life you’re the Broads”, and explains why Horsey Hall is the real likely to have read a good deal about Edalji and Slater “Donnithorpe”. There follow extracts from some of the so you may be wondering what you’ll get out of letters exchanged in 1983 between Mrs Bird and Sandford’s book. Therein lies my problem. I thoroughly Thomas Cubitt, who welcomed the Society at Honing enjoyed the book but I’m not sure it will add a huge Hall the next year. Shirley Purves goes back further, to amount to what is already known. I’m still very glad I her researches in 1963 and her correspondence with have it, and if you have no books in this area — go for Thomas’s uncle Reginald Cubitt. Randall Stock looks at it. the inspired phrase “Dancing Men” (see also his essay AD in Dancing to Death: A Facsimile of the Original Manuscript of “The Dancing Men” by Arthur Conan Sherlock Holmes from Screen to Stage: Post- Doyle, published by the BSI). Nick Utechin considers millennial Adaptations in British Theatre by Holmes’s friend Victor Trevor, an unfairly overlooked Benjamin Poore. Palgrave Macmillan, 2017. 268pp. character. And there’s more! I was there in 1984 and in £66.99 (hbk) 2017, and I’m keen to explore more of Holmes’s The Sherlock Holmes phenomenon is now the Norfolk. subject of serious academic commentary, some of it RJ dull or pretentious. Fortunately, Benjamin Poore writes to be read; he’s genuinely enthusiastic about his subject The Mile End Murder: The Case Conan Doyle and he communicates that enthusiasm. Couldn’t Solve by Sinclair McKay. Aurum Press, Traditionally the play comes before the film. True, 2017. 320pp. £20.00 (hbk) Basil Rathbone and Jeremy Brett transferred their own In 1901 The Strand Magazine published “The portrayals of the detective from screen to stage, with Debatable Case of Mrs Emsley”, in which Arthur sharply contrasting results, but that’s not Dr Poore’s Conan Doyle studied the murder in 1860 of an elderly theme. He has attended as many Holmes plays as and wealthy widow, unforgiving and “an object of possible since 2000, read all the scripts he could access, mingled dislike and curiosity among the inhabitants of and watched all the available film and TV adaptations. Grove Road, Stepney”. When Mary Emsley was found Consequently he can indicate how the writers of various beaten to death in her own house there was no lack of plays have adopted aspects of, say, Sherlock or the Guy suspects, but there were problems. Who could have Ritchie blockbusters, and what use they’ve made of gained access to the house without apparent them. Unlike a film, though, a play can directly involve disturbance, and got away without being seen? the audience. Usually that’s a comedy technique (Move Eventually James Mullins, one of her own employees, Over Moriarty, Potted Sherlock) but Clive Francis and was convicted and hanged. Conan Doyle wrote: “After Simon Williams made it a feature of their thrilling reading the evidence one is left with an irresistible versions of The Hound of the Baskervilles, and others impression that, though Mullins was very likely guilty, have followed suit. One chapter examines the plays in the police were never able to establish the details of the which audience interaction is a real comic or dramatic crime, and that there was a risk of a miscarriage of game. Another looks at The Hound of the Baskervilles, justice when the death sentence was carried out.” the most frequently and variably adapted story, but one Sinclair McKay has examined the case in detail, and of the least obviously suitable for the stage.

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