The economics and uses of Sherlockian scholarship

 I own far too many collectibles.

I'm not talking about books on my shelf I bought as a rarity, like a bound set of Strand Magazines. I'm talking about books I bought to read and use, like old Magico reprints. I recently went to look for one that I didn't buy back in the 1980s, thinking I would never be interested in a certain aspect of Sherlockiana, and was kind of amazed at the three-digit prices even a reprint now commands.

That made me realize two things: 1.) Up and coming Sherlockians can't afford this stuff, unless they're the over-sixties folks who are coming to the hobby later in life with their bankroll established, and 2.) The current generation of Sherlockians isn't reading these books. Is that a crisis? Hell, no. But it does indicate that there might be a little difference in Sherlockians coming up than those who gestated three or four decades ago.

One of the big errors that happens in any fandom is the "YOU HAVE TO DO WHAT IT DID!" fallacy, as people are very into their own nostalgic moments of bliss. It's natural. But we can't ever expect folks who came up in a very different world to relate to seeing Young Sherlock Holmes in a theater at age thirteen when it's impossible for them to have done exactly what you did. Books might seem a little different, because we can all read the same book, but even books have a freshness date. In the late eighties I had a book that reknowned collector John Bennett Shaw included in his "basic" library of one hundred Sherlockian books, because, at that time, it was ground-breaking. Now? Not so much, nor not necessary to own. (Also "basic" has some new connotations now, doesn't it?)

There are a ton of classic Sherlockian works that no new Sherlockian really needs to read. The original sixty are our primary data source, and those are almost everywhere. Current Sherlockians might write articles on topics covered by those in the past, but their perspectives are usually different and their writing styles more palatable to a modern reader. (There are the crazies in any generation, of course, who write stuff too weird for any but a few similar minds, but that's another matter.)

Sherlockiana will always be a hobby of collectables, as we are few compared to the population of the world, and we create things in small amounts that later are desired by more people. And we somehow keep going ahead without having read every single thing ever published by our fellow fans, and doing pretty well with our limited background. And how many completist collectors have just filled shelves without contributing knowledge learned to our general populace?

There's more to say on this topic, like "What the heck does one do with all these old books as they lose their personal use?" but that's for another time and another post.