Spontaneous ∂erivation

Dear Fans of the new Sherlock Holmes movie:

Let me apologize on the behalf of older Sherlock Holmes fandom for the bits of it that have been generating get-off-my-lawn reboot wank, not five days after the release of the movie. The Sherlock Holmes fandom has thrived for over a hundred years and multiple generations, and every generation has its… special snowflakes.

But fortunately, every generation has also produced creative fandom work (though they may not see it that way), from the solidly analytical to the wondrously fanciful. I may not agree with all of them, or even remotely like some of them, but they all occupy a place in my heart, because there wouldn’t be a Sherlock Holmes fandom without constant re-interpretation of the works. Yes, even the fic pastiche where Moriarty is a vampire who falls madly in love with Holmes.¹

I present to you the more amusing pieces of Holmesiana I’ve gathered throughout the years. I’ve strived for a varied collection here that is at the very least sometimes accessible, even if it knocks out some of my absolute favorites. Too much of the fandom is out of print; I hope that changes one day, so that reading all the ’ship wank doesn’t cost 500£.

[Love and adaptation: that's how legends survive.]

On IMDb there’s a report that one Andrea Plunket, furious over Downey and Law’s interviews playing up possible homoerotic subtext in the Sherlock Holmes canon, is threatening to withdraw sequel permissions if Guy Ritchie keeps this up.

Plunket comments, “It would be drastic, but I would withdraw permission for more films to be made if they feel that is a theme they wish to bring out in the future. I am not hostile to homosexuals, but I am to anyone who is not true to the spirit of the books.”

Dear Ms. Plunket: allow me to introduce you to the concept of shipping wars. Because you’ve just put your foot right into one of the longest ones in unofficial existence—one that is, in fact, over a century old at the time of this writing.

[I mean, just look at the hats!]

I’m still recovering from the weekend. No more foggy mornings of petrified time-misplaced terror, but still a bit discombobulated.

In the meantime, I discovered this jolly little Republic of Tea tin:

It’s called “Little Citizens’ Herb Tea: Strawberry Vanilla Tea”, from the Republic of Tea, which has a lot of neat teas, both in little tea bags, like this one, or full leaf. You can buy refills from their website instead of buying a whole new tin, but you can buy the tins too.

It’s a rooibos-based tea, which I’d not tried before, but it’s a very pleasant change from black and green teas. Rooibos is technically not a tea, actually, but a herb; still, it makes a nice base for sweeter teas. The strawberry vanilla tea is a subtly-flavored tea, with just enough of a hint of strawberry for a shadow of its sweet tang, and just enough vanilla to make you feel mellow but not make the tea washed out.

The other Little Citzens’ teas are also based on rooibos, including Tangerine and Cherry Apple. I’m not fond of cherries, so I tried the tangerine—it’s much more strongly flavored, and very definitely a fruity tangerine taste, in case someone thinks the strawberry vanilla is too weak.

Anyways, I think I will hug my Strawberry Vanilla Tea and read old mysteries—some of which are new to me, actually; for the first time I read a Lord Peter Wimsey book—Whose Body?, which I enjoyed quite a bit. At some point I’ll also read Father Brown, somewhere after the Sherlock Holmes (which I have obviously read).

It is frustrating that there’s no more legal Wimsey available for the Kindle; nothing else in Sayers’ cabinet with regards to the nobleman detective is being sold on the Kindle, nor had its copyright expired.¹ I’d have to move to Canada to read Wimsey legally on my Kindle (or, apparently, simply jaunt up to Victoria if I want to read any Wimsey from Project Gutenberg Canada).

Of course, there are lots of reasons to move to Canada these days.

I’m not sure Sherlock Holmes and Lord Peter Wimsey would have seen eye to eye for a while. Holmes always did bloody hate nobility.

1. I know there’s a couple copies of Clouds of Witness being sold in the Kindle Store, but it’s… not copyright-expired in the States, so unless these are publishers with actual real ties to the Sayers estate, I would avoid them. [↩]

Hello and welcome (and also welcome back if you’ve been here before!).

This site is a bit of a mixed bag at times. At the moment there are days when I post about new SF/F books in the Kindle store, days when I post thoughts about stuff I’ve read, days when I post about personal stuff that I don’t mind people reading because why else would I put them here (lots of it is traumatic, though the heavy has been more light of late), and days when it’s nothing but videos and linkspam.

This site in the past had a lot of articles about blogging, a few of which got stumbled like crazy.

To this day you’ll find that my most popular post is on the Sherlock Holmes sister site, which made it into Wikipedia as a footnote.

I am such a geek at times.

On the Fannish Phenomenon of Sherlock Holmes, or, My Fandom is Crazier Than Your Fandom

Sherlock Holmes: the myth, the legend, the actual 19th century archetype. There’s something about the Great Detective that drives a certain kind of person batty with desire. They want to write fan fiction pastiches. They write long treatises on theories about various oddities in the Canon that were the result of Doyle being a bit loose with his research and his memory. They sometimes worship odd characters in the Canon, like Professor Moriarty, sort of in the way some Harry Potter fans are fond of Draco (and I’m sure that Doyle would go “WTF?” as much as Rowling did).

Really, it would seem as though the Sherlock Holmes fandom were filled with mostly 16-year-old girls and/or a lot of women, considering the amount of slashing that occurs.

But no. Many Sherlock Holmes pastiches are written by men.

Especially the slashing.

Continue reading “On the Fannish Phenomenon of Sherlock Holmes, or, My Fandom is Crazier Than Your Fandom”

(On a secondary note, maybe I should merge my Sherlock Holmes site back into this one.)

The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle
by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Kindle/Mobipocket • Epub

The sole Christmas story in the Sherlock Holmes canon. With several illustrations by Sidney Paget and some notes on the ending of the story, with a summary of the adaptations of the Granada TV series and the BBC Radio series.

It’s little, it’s cute, and it let me test out some epub scripts to ease creation, and they did so considerably (although I’ll need to knock on them some more). And yes, just like Wodehouse, Sherlock Holmes automatically gets a bye here as FSF. You have to admit that a world in which Holmes would get away with the shenanigans in Silver Blaze is surely a fantasy world.

By the way, if you’re in the mood to pay $200+ dollars for a full-remastered version of the entire Granada TV series, please check out Amazon.com. It’s … well, it’s not the Complete Sherlock Holmes Radio Collection, but Jeremy Brett is a pretty, pretty man.

S∂’s full 2008 Advent Calendar.