The Sherlockian Mystique

I was a bit surprised to see Lawrence Block writing about the enduring — and sometimes obsessive — appeal of Sherlock Holmes in this week’s Village Voice, but then again, who better to write about one of crime fiction’s great characters than one of crime fiction’s great writers?

One needn’t search for a reason why enthusiasts of any stripe would

band together to share their enthusiasm. That noted, it may be said of

the Irregulars and its scion societies that their être is possessed of a singular raison.

Members prioritize the voluntary suspension of disbelief upon which the

enjoyment of fiction is predicated. As far as they’re concerned, Holmes

and Watson were real people, and the sacred canon consists of Watson’s

actual reports. Yes, Sir Arthur’s name appears as a byline, but he was

at once a trusted friend and literary agent, and may indeed have done

some editorial tinkering. And either he or Watson has done some

fictionalizing, changing names and addresses and disguising

circumstances, but surely much of the truth can be ferreted out by

painstaking scholarship.

And some of that scholarship leads to remarkable conclusions.

The great Rex Stout, creator of Nero Wolfe, was an ardent Irregular;

his paper, arguing persuasively that Watson was in fact a woman, is a

landmark effort.

But it was also a real pleasure to read that Block’s especially keen on Mitch Cullin’s soon-to-be-released novel, A SLIGHT TRICK OF THE MIND, that still ranks as one of the best books I’ve read that is published this year:

I don’t know what sort of sales are likely for A Slight Trick of the Mind,

the work I referred to earlier. It’s a new book by Mitch Cullin (out

this month from Doubleday) and it’s quite extraordinary. A Sherlockian

might call it revisionist, in that we learn among other things that

Holmes always called his friend John, never Watson, that he smoked

cigars almost exclusively and didn’t much care for a pipe. More to the

point, Cullin shows us this master of observation, this supreme

rationalist, at a time when age has made great inroads upon his memory

and mental acuity. The narrative moves through time, and our hero—our

eternal hero—has never been more heroic, or more human. Is it the last

word in Sherlockiana? Surely not—Michael Chabon’s recent The Final Solution and Caleb Carr’s forthcoming The Italian Secretary

both revive the sleuth for yet another adventure. I don’t know why this

one character has proved so durable. I don’t think I’ll try keeping

bees. I’m pretty sure the condo bylaws would have something to say

about that. But maybe I’ll give that royal jelly a try. What could it

hurt?

What could it hurt, indeed.