![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stonepicnicking_okapiThis Sunday, we'll look at two stories, published in October and November of 1891.
You can be permitted for forgetting about The Boscombe Valley Mystery. It's a rather forgettable story. The one about the Australians. So, with Mary's blessing, Watson is dragged away from his home and office (and poor Anstruther is left with his caseload at short notice) and goes off to join Holmes.
However, we do get mention of the silhouette of Holmes and the outfit which would become iconic:
Sherlock Holmes was pacing up and down the platform, his tall, gaunt figure made even gaunter and taller by his long grey travelling-cloak and close-fitting cloth cap.
So there is a small deduction of Watson's shaving routine. And we get close scrutiny of footprints. And there's a convenient amount of bigamy at the end. And it's the opposite of fair play because you would have to have a detailed knowledge of Australia to figure out the dying man's last words. And Agatha Christie used this device too but made it South Africa and Kenya, too, I believe, partners doing other partners out of their fair share of a mine or swindling in the colonies which follows them back to the mother land.
Oh, and Lestrade is there.
"The Five Orange Pips" is about the Klan. It's a sad testament that the Klan no longer have to threaten their enemies with dried seeds, they can put on business suits and get elected to high political office and do what they will. I did feel a kind of empathy for Watson. So, the storm blows over, and the morning is clear, and he find in the newspaper a report of Openshaw's murder. It sort of parallels our own feeling every day when you open up your news feed and find the White Supremacists in Power have pissed on another of our freedoms.
I do think Holmes is rather reckless to let Openshaw go that evening. And ACD employs his favorite way of dispatching villains: drowning at sea.
You can be permitted for forgetting about The Boscombe Valley Mystery. It's a rather forgettable story. The one about the Australians. So, with Mary's blessing, Watson is dragged away from his home and office (and poor Anstruther is left with his caseload at short notice) and goes off to join Holmes.
However, we do get mention of the silhouette of Holmes and the outfit which would become iconic:
Sherlock Holmes was pacing up and down the platform, his tall, gaunt figure made even gaunter and taller by his long grey travelling-cloak and close-fitting cloth cap.
So there is a small deduction of Watson's shaving routine. And we get close scrutiny of footprints. And there's a convenient amount of bigamy at the end. And it's the opposite of fair play because you would have to have a detailed knowledge of Australia to figure out the dying man's last words. And Agatha Christie used this device too but made it South Africa and Kenya, too, I believe, partners doing other partners out of their fair share of a mine or swindling in the colonies which follows them back to the mother land.
Oh, and Lestrade is there.
"The Five Orange Pips" is about the Klan. It's a sad testament that the Klan no longer have to threaten their enemies with dried seeds, they can put on business suits and get elected to high political office and do what they will. I did feel a kind of empathy for Watson. So, the storm blows over, and the morning is clear, and he find in the newspaper a report of Openshaw's murder. It sort of parallels our own feeling every day when you open up your news feed and find the White Supremacists in Power have pissed on another of our freedoms.
I do think Holmes is rather reckless to let Openshaw go that evening. And ACD employs his favorite way of dispatching villains: drowning at sea.
no subject
Date: 2025-02-23 02:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-02-23 03:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-02-25 07:44 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-02-25 07:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-02-26 11:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-02-26 12:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-02-27 07:14 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-02-27 12:34 pm (UTC)