Way back in 1971, that grand old Sherlockian, John Bennett Shaw, was rejected by The Baker Street Journal for an article titled "To Shelve or Censor," in which he called out some of the more "objectionable" passages of the Sherlockian Canon. "A plumber with a rising business." "He cuddled the misshapen butt." "I went to it on my knees." And, oh, those Watson ejaculations!
It's been a full fifty years since Shaw did his naughty little census of the Canon. He also did it without a search function on a digital Canon, so you have to respect his commitment to reading the entire Canon with as filthy a mind as he could in 1971. Pondering how many things are in our parlance now when it comes to ribald topics, I considered doing a little update on Shaw, grabbing up phrases like "Here you are, doggy!" where Holmes could be appearing to search up classics in the Kama Sutra, but at some point, I realized that whilst certain terms might be common to the fic community, I might not want to go into full blog mode on things like pegging in the Canon.
It's a different world now . . . people aren't hiding their kinks quite so much.
But do we need a blog post titled "Sexual Positions Named After Canonical Characters?" Probably not from me. (You kids have fun, though.)
Sherlockian chronology is a great topic, right? Ain't it great? Nice, safe Sherlockian chronology. Nobody trying to date cases by Mary Morstan's menstrual cycle . . . oh, dammit, next Watson is trying to work out his wife's fertility calendar and putting his three continent's experience to work, and we're back to, yes, topics I was trying to avoid tonight, to keep my reputation as a dignified Sherlockian elder. (Hey, that spit take wasn't necessary!)
But, I'm a blog post behind in my schedule for the month, and I've got to go somewhere with this.
No tea bags in the Canon, have you ever noticed that? The first tea bags were actually patented in 1903, just about the time Holmes was retiring from detection, so it makes perfect sense that there was no tea bagging in the Canon. Not much to fill out a post there.
Did you realize only one person in the Canon is thirsty without being blood-thirsty or about to die of thirst? That person is in Watson's imagination, of course, as he imagines he and Holmes waiting for a figurative "thirsty beast of prey." Okay, that's mildly sexy, without being too embarrassing to the kids. Except for the part about using slang I'm too old for. Man, Shaw threaded a needle back in 1971, but then, he was doing a talk for a smoke-filled room of chortling old boys, not the whole of the internet.
Yeah. I think I'll stop now.
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