Victorians! discussion

Haven't read it yet. Introductory comments to come!

I've read the first 2 chapters. As enjoyable as I remembered.

I'm not going to be rereading this this month as I only listened to an audiobook version (the BBC Derek Jacobi one) a few weeks ago - after having read all the books a couple of years afo.

Overall it's fairly enjoyable; I love the introduction to Sherlock Holmes and Watson (even if the characterisation does shift a bit in later books) and the mystery, though far from the best, is pretty good.

Buuut...I hate the first part of the second half, it's just horrible. I'm not going to go into spoilers as to why here until other people have read it and want to discuss - but I do go into it a fair bit in my review (two book collection so my review for The Sign of the Four is there as well).

What I might do though is, after I've read the Poe stories for July, go back and reread the paragraph/chapter where the characters discuss Holmes in comparrison to Dupin. I just can't bring myself to reread the whole book so soon.

Listening to The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes now though, and remembering why people (including me) love the stories so much. A lot better than the first two novels (and the second novel is much more smoothly written than the first).

I have a complete works from my in-laws, but it has been 20 years since I re-read Study in Scarlet. I'm realizing how much I forgot about the characterization Doyle created. So I can't remember the beginning of the second part Louise mentions. Now I know I'll look for the Dupin comparison.

I have recently watched A Study in Pink on Sherlock (BBC video) and I wanted to compare the book with the video. When I came to Part 2 I skipped the part that you are talking about and went to the last 2-3 chapters for the conclusion of the tale. Now I am going back to read the middle of the book. The video left all that out, so it made sense to leave it out while reading this time!

Is there anywhere you can get a free ebook version of A Study in Scarlet that is compatible with a kindle?

Project Gutenberg ( http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page ) and ManyBooks ( http://manybooks.net/ ) both have it, Grace.

Zorro wrote: "I have recently watched A Study in Pink on Sherlock (BBC video) and I wanted to compare the book with the video. When I came to Part 2 I skipped the part that you are talking about and went to the..."

Interesting! I loved A Study in Pink! Fantastic writing that. I'll be reading Scarlet this week.

Now I have finished reading 'the story in the middle' of A Study in Scarlet. Strange to put these two stories together. The middle story explains why he 'done it'...but who cares!

Should have skipped that middle part, too ... Much as I love this book, that background story was totally superfluous, in my humble opinion.
But then again, it would have felt as if I'd missed something ... so I forced myself to read it.
Never mind, Doyle's depictions of foggy London with its sinister creatures make up for any disappointment he may otherwise cause.

The middle part was ok for me, although could have been shorter, I suppose. I was just wanting to get through it and back to Holmes and Watson. Enjoyed it, overall, and want to read more. Thankfully, I have the complete collection now on my ereader so it's ready when I am. :-)

Yeah, I hope the spoiler-on discussion will allow more freely the discussion of the beginning of Part II. I started reading it and thought I'd downloaded a highjacked edition. I even stopped reading for a bit until I could get my print copy and make sure it really was a part of the same novel!

Grace wrote: "Is there anywhere you can get a free ebook version of A Study in Scarlet that is compatible with a kindle?"

Grace, my kindle version only cost $.99 for the whole Works.

Just started this the other night, and found I had to read it out loud, at which point my husband and daughter began listening in rapt attention. It was so amazingly close to the BBC adaptation that we found it difficult to imagine the Victorian setting. What a superb job they did of it. But it's super fun to read. I will say I read A Scandal in Bohemia a few weeks ago, and clearly the BBC kind of went their own way with that very short story. Still, that show is so excellently written I can't complain.

The only problem I'm having now is that I have to wait to read when the others are available to listen, which is slowing me down considerably.

Last night I watched Sherlock 1:2....I think it may be 3 books/short stories combined. Hmmm. This may be too difficult to figure out how to read and combine the 3 -

""This episode takes the concept of coded messages from The Valley of Fear (using book references) and The Adventure of the Dancing Men (using pictorial messages).[1][2] The rest of the plot makes more allusions to the stories. The markings on the feet of the Black Lotus members reference the markings of the "Scowrers" in Valley of Fear, along with the plot of escaping a secret society and being tracked and killed in England. The messages themselves, which appear to be plain graffiti, allude to the "Dancing Men", which appeared to be childish drawings, but are replacement ciphers known only by a criminal organization.
A murder victim found inside of a locked room accessible only by climbing is an allusion to The Sign of the Four, as is the fact that the intruder had unusually small feet.""

Interesting ... I actually had in mind to watch episode 1.2 today or some day soon, and I already knew parts of this story were based on "The Dancing Men" (Moffat himself mentions only this story as a source for The Blink Banker when asked during a Q/A for PBS). As I'm currently reading The Valley of Fear, I'm all the more keen on watching the film.

Now let me return to our actual 'Study': What do you all make of the book title? What did you initially think it would allude or refer to?

A Study in Scarlet....hmmmmmm. I guess the room where Watson and Holmes worked (The Study) was decorated in plush velvet sofas and chairs and wallpaper that werre SCARLET in color??? I hope someone out there has a better guess!

Zorro wrote: "Last night I watched Sherlock 1:2....I think it may be 3 books/short stories combined. Hmmm. This may be too difficult to figure out how to read and combine the 3 -

""This episode takes the con..."

Thank you for this!

I've not been able to continue, yet. I may just have to go on with it on my own. But it is a really fun read. I haven't a guess, as yet, what scarlet refers to. If I hadn't seen A Study in Pink, I would assume it was blood. But having seen that, I haven't a clue now.

It comes from the original title of the book which was the Scarlet Skein and there's a quote about the red skein that runs through it all in the first chapter. He then changed it to a Study in Scarlet, but left the quote in the first chapter alone.

@V.r. I'm in another group and we're reading this there as well. We're reading it in smaller chunks which might work better for you.

'There’s the scarlet thread of murder running through the colourless skein of life, and our duty is to unravel it, and isolate it, and expose every inch of it.'
That must be the quote you mean, Deborah (couldn't find it in the book, just copied it from Wikipedia). I must admit I had difficulties figuring out why he uses this odd metaphor ...
Besides, the first thing that sprang to my mind when I came across the title was an artist at work at his easel (I read study as a synonym of 'sketch' or painting). I thought it'd be interesting to hear what kind of associations other people had.

I've always thought simultaneously of an artist's "studies" (particularly Whistler), and of the scarlet of blood.

Jo that quote is in chapter 4. I did a search in my ebook.

I have only read one chapter so far and so far I like the way it is written better than Poe.

Jo wrote: "Now let me return to our actual 'Study': What do you all make of the book title? What did you initially think it would allude or refer to? "

Jo, I found the quote in the book: At the end of Ch. 4, Sherlock says "...the finest study I ever came across: a study in scarlet, eh? Why shouldn't we use a little art jargon. There's the scarlet thread of murder running through the colourless skein of life, and our duty is to unravel it, and isolate it, and expose every inch of it."

Thanks to both of you! No wonder I've been searching in vain ... thought it was in chapter 1.
Sherlock actually says 'art jargon', haven't notice this before. So my first guess wasn't altogether wrong, it seems.
And of course 'scarlet' also made me think of blood.

Yes, having only read chapter one so far, scarlet definately makes me think blood.

Jo wrote: "Should have skipped that middle part, too ... Much as I love this book, that background story was totally superfluous, in my humble opinion.
But then again, it would have felt as if I'd missed som..."

We should perhaps keep in mind that when he published ASiS Doyle was not yet a writer of any real ability. He trained as a doctor and had his own practice; while waiting for patients he wrote a number of short stories and a novel (not published until later), none of them in my opinion of much literary merit. ASiS was his first published novel, with Sherlock Holmes based on a former teacher of his, Joseph Bell. But my opinion is that it's the middle story which he viewed as, at the time, the main theme of the story (I think this because most of his writing to that time had been of the adventure genre, much of his later writing was, also) and used the Holmes/Watson wrap-around as an interesting way to get into the adventure part of the story. (He might even initially have written that as a short story, and expanded it into the novel later, though that's pure speculation on my part.) If I'm right, he would have had no way of knowing at the time that Holmes and Watson would have been part of the story to make his fortune, and the adventure story would be dismissed by later readers as almost irrelevant.

He was never that much in love with Holmes, feeling that he interfered with his more serious writing, and tried to kill him off, but the public would have none of it.

I have read the first two chapters and do enjoy Doyle writing of Holmes much more than Poe's writing of Dupin. Dupin feels very arrogant and impressed with himself while Holmes is too but in a way that is more palpable and somewhat endearing. This fellow may be very clever," I said to myself, "but he is certainly very conceited," is the way Watson perceives Holmes and perhaps because it is through Watson's eyes that we see Holmes that there is more of an interpersonal tale being told.

Doyle's writing seems better, friendlier to the reader and interestingly enough he does belittle a bit the Dupin tales of Poe. Perhaps he too, felt the stories were lacking a bit of humanness and endeavoured to make Holmes a bit more endearing to the reading public, which of course he ultimately does whether he wanted this great ourpouring of devotion his reading public had or not. Although what Everyman said about Doyle's not liking Holmes makes me think I might be incorrect.

I also thought this was a wonderful explanation for how Sherlock saw the mechanisms of a person's brain. ‘You see,’ he explained, ‘I consider that a man’s brain originally is like a little empty attic and you have to stock it with such furniture as you choose.  A fool takes in all the lumber of every sort that he comes across, so that the knowledge that might be useful to him gets crowded out, or at best is jumbled up with a lot of other things so that he has difficulty laying his hands upon it.  Now the skillful workman is very careful indeed as to what he brings into his brain attic.  He will have nothing but the tools which may help him in doing his work, but of these he has a large assortment, and all in the most perfect order.  It is a mistake to think that that little room has elastic walls and can distend to any extent.’”  (p. 13)

Chapter 3. So how many of us thought Rache was Rachel? I know I did...enjoying so much how Sherlock zings the two pompous detectives!

About the title I found this

“That title was a fin de siècle (relating to a characteristic of an end of century) masterstroke of art jargon.  The painter James McNeill Whistler had recently offered Arrangement in Gray, Note in Pink and Brown, and Nocturne in Black and Gold.  Conan Doyle’s A Study in Scarlet supplied a new and bloody perspective.  And when, a year later, his friend Oscar Wilde published ‘Pen, Pencil, and Poison’ (a sardonic commendation of an artistic murderer), he subtitled it ‘A Study in Green’ in conscious homage to Sherlock Holmes’ first case.”
I might not have gone but for you and so have missed the finest study I ever came across: a study in scarlet, eh? Why shouldn't we use a little art jargon. There's the scarlet thread of murder running through the colourless skein of life, and our duty is to unravel it, and isolate it, and expose every inch of it.

I found in 2004, author Neil Gaiman, (an author I have read and liked) wrote a story called A Study in Emerald which is based on Doyle's story we are reading now. I am going to look into that book. It won the Hugo award for best short story that year.

This is my first introduction to both Doyle's works and the one and only Mr. Sherlock Holmes!! I am thoroughly enjoying it so far, but have to agree with the general consensus about the transition from Part I to Part II of the book. Yet, I too, find myself forced to read it.

Marialyce wrote: "I also thought this was a wonderful explanation for how Sherlock saw the mechanisms of a person's brain. ‘You see,’ he explained, ‘I consider that a man’s brain originally is like a little empty attic and..."

Yes, that wsa pretty good.

I remember reading years ago that someone (I'm thinking it was Einstein, but relying on my memory can be tricky) refused to memorize phone numbers b/c they were readily available to look up in the phone book. His reasoning was why clutter up his brain with unnecessary info? Of course, this was many years before speed dialing. :-)

Or cell phones with memory ;-)

Louise wrote: "I'm not going to be rereading this this month as I only listened to an audiobook version (the BBC Derek Jacobi one) a few weeks ago - after having read all the books a couple of years ago.

That was a brilliant review, Louise. I agree wholeheartedly. The backstory part really dragged the whole book down for me. I hate to say I was a bit offended, but I was a bit offended. And really, as I think someone, (was it you, Louise?) already said, you really could have just cut that part out and the book would have been better. Everything that was necessary to understanding it, even the why, was already there.

Glad I read it, though. The first part was addictively fun, and I'll definitely read more.

I don't think it was me that said it, but I certainly agree! And thanks for liking the review :)

Def do read on though, most of the short stories - particularly those in Adventures and Memoirs - are pretty great. With the exception of The Hound of the Baservilles (no flashbacks!), I think Holmes is just better suited to a short format rather than a novel. More variety and freedom in the sorts of cases he can deal with (the novels are all essentially murder mysteries) and nothing feels stretched out or inserted in just to bulk the page count up.

I am up to chapter two of Part 2 and all of a sudden we are in the desert joining up with Mormons. Yes, I agree, very strange..like a whole new story just dropped out of nowhere. ...and I am thinking from everyone here that the "mystery" of these chapters does not clear itself up at all.

As much as Part 2 is sort of out there, I do think it is very well written and interesting.


You can watch the 1933 movie here:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0024625/

For more on the way that current forensics has been influenced by Doyle, a criminologist named Stanton O Berg, wrote a paper crediting Doyle with
the use of blood testing, the determination of tobacco ashes at the crime scene , dust particles found at the crime scene, the science of finger printing, the study of firearms, the way in which to identify bodies, typewriters, etc.
"Berg's insightful article demonstrates that Doyle's "consulting detective" was not merely a fascinating literary hero but a figure that heralded –and provoked- a new type of criminal investigation."

Lots more to be found here too!
http://www.sherlockian.net/

Throughout the actual detecting chapters in the book, I had a really hard time not imagining BBC's Sherlock. I did try. I promise. And when Dr. Watson talked about how he was going to write about the cases Holmes solved so that he would get the credit instead of the inspectors taking it from him, I was thinking BLOG! And then I finished the book and I paused...wait a minute!...they didn't have blogs back then. Silly me. Even his prose seems modern though, particularly after reading Poe, which is, granted 50 years earlier. But still.

Same here. That happened to me while I was reading the first two or three stories ... then I starting watching some Jeremy Brett episodes and I found it hard not to imagine him while reading the canon. He's maybe the ultimate impersonation of Sherlock (and believe me, I truly appreciate Ben's acting performance).
Then again, I'm glad there's still a 'third Sherlock Holmes' who exists in my imagination alone. For once, TV failed to destroy my literary imaginings.

Does anyone remember the Rupert Everett Sherlock Holmes? It just came to my mind the other day. I don't know if it was just unmemorable, or if it was that the Cumberbund ones overshadowed it, but I'd nearly forgotten them.

I'll definitely check out the Jeremy Brett renditions.

Just peeked. I remember him. I'm not sure I watched any, but I might have to now.

Jeremy Brett is a fabulous Holmes.

I finished and thought the writing was just great. Happy to have finally learned how Holmes was born.

I just finished too. I liked it alot. This was my first Sherlock and I will definately read more. They are nice for something easy and fun.

Spoiler below
There is one thing that seemed to be left hanging for me...how Sherlock knew that the other pill was different than the first one he tried on the dog. He even said afterward that he should have known before he even saw the box....but why?

Oh, yeah! You're right! And also...if the guy was so bent on killing BOTH men, how was he so sure the guy would take the bad pill? He gave the answer as if fate would make him avenge his own sins, but that's slightly hypocritical in my opinion and it's not really a believable rational. I don't think Holmes would have believed in it.

I can believe Hope really thought that....some people believe stuff like that and logic really has nothing to do with it. But how would Sherlock come up with it and why would he think he should have known all along? Weird.

I'm glad you brought that up, Julie. I thought the same thing. It seemed almost contradictory to me. Hope was so set on seeking revenge, yet he allowed "fate" to be in control when attempting to knock down the first opponent.

Good point. Wouldn't fate take care of the two men without Hope's help at all if fate would control the poison? :-)

Good point indeed. Letting fate decide doesn't really fit his personality. Makes no sense to me at all.

For those of us who live in the USA, the subject of Mormonism is pretty much in the news with Romney who is a Mormon being the Republican candidate for President.

I found it interesting that Doyle chose this religion to focus in on. So does anyone have any thoughts on this?