The Buy-laws thing

 Ever since the virtual dinner of the Baker Street Irregulars this year, I've given an occasional thought to the "Constitution" and "Buy-laws" for that club, originally printed in The Saturday Review of Literature in 1934, since I had to sit through an out-loud reading of that apparently holy text, grown a bit worn with time.

The $35 registration fee for this year's BSI zoom said it included a printed copy of the program and a souvenir, said souvenir turning out to be a four-page newspaper called OUR CONSTITUTION & BUY LAWS, which focussed on said Constitution and Buy-Laws of the Baker Street Irregulars, the one official document of the Baker Street Irregulars. Lincoln's Gettysburg address, it is not.

But let's walk through it, for those of you who have the pleasure of not having had it read to you or sent to you as a souvenir this year.

Article 1: The group studies the "Sacred Writings." The sixty stories. The Canon. Cool.

Article 2: You can be eligible to be a member if you pass a test on those stories decided by the club officers and they think you're okay.

Article 3: The officers are a Gasogene (president), a Tantalus (secretary), and a Commissionaire (who runs hospitality services for the members).

After that come the "Buy-laws," which is basically a drinking game after four toasts to the Woman, Mrs. Hudson, Mycroft, and Watson's second wife, all held at the annual January 6th meeting. The game goes like this: Somebody quotes the Canon, you say what story and context the quote came from or else you buy a round of drinks. Special meetings are allowed for if two of any three members call for a meeting, and a concern is expressed for if the members are of opposite sexes so no one thinks they are fooling around, with a special clause for clients of The Saturday Review of Literature who are apparently allowed to look like they're fooling around, no problem.

The last part I shall quote directly: "All other business shall be left for the monthly meeting. There shall be no monthly meeting."

Nothing in there about paying $35 for a Zoom seminar, so, plainly, things have evolved. And yet that "Constitution" remains unchanged. And much retold.

Does anyone play the drinking game any more? Is there a Gasogene or Tantalus? We know the Commissionaire survives to organize banquets, because those exist. But beyond that?

Well, we know there is business now, as the flyer for BSI books that was inserted in the program this year, as well as all the mentions at the dinner, so there might also be monthly meetings we don't know about. Members are decided by who the officers think is okay, but no test is involved. And that drinking game would definitely be impossible with between one and two hundred people. I'm no BSI historian, but I'm pretty sure the document was never really used as a governing document for the club.

So what really is the BSI Constitution and Buy-laws at this point? Magic words that raise the ghost of Christopher Morley? A church ritual that must be performed with the last line spoken en masse by the congregation? A tradition that's a tradition because it's always been a tradition?

 Unlike Vincent Starrett's revered poem, "221B," there is nothing of Sherlock Holmes in it, so it can be a bit of a puzzle.

Someone out there can write a glorious paean to it that explains what I'm missing, and The Baker Street Journal will surely publish it. You might have to attend the BSI dinner faithfully ever year to do so, and even then, work yourself up a little bit to get to the place of writing such a song of praise, and I've only made it to about the four-timers club when it comes to that attendance. But it would be a good thing, because as the decades pass, new Sherlockians are probably going to more and more find themselves going, "Huh?"

Yeah, I probably shouldn't be such the iconoclast about a document that holds no sexism, racism, or other bad stuff of the past beyond binary gender implications. But, honestly? I was just hoping for a little better souvenir.

A "Curious" book beef

 At some point late last year, in that time between my birthday and Christmas, I was feeling rather generous with myself and Kickstarter-ed a book project, The Curious Book of Sherlock Holmes Characters by Mike Foy. Even with update emails notifying me of its progress, success, and mailing, I was still left wondering when a very large and heavy package arrived from Florida yesterday, just as I was about to go pick up some Asian to-go for dinner. 

I wish I'd have grabbed a pic of it before unwrapped it, as it came much like past Baker Street Almanacs, with a ribbon that tempts you to remove it without destroying it -- this one, however, had a Sherlockian wax seal at the cross-section of the ribbons, so even my practiced ploy of sliding the ribbons did not fully stop its destruction. The ribbons and the cloth map of London that wrapped the book came off, at which point I found I had purchased a coffee table book.

The Curious Book of Sherlock Holmes Characters is the size of a high school textbook, and the ornamental metal corners definitely make it a book for laying out and not shelving with others, lest it rip at them like an evil race car with those spike hubcaps. And if that metaphor seems a bit harsh, look at what the book immediately started doing . . .

Yes, it started creeping up on the smaller paperback edition of Jack Tracy's The Encyclopaedia Sherlockiana. Now, I'm not in favor of books that bully other books, but I knew from the start that these two books were going to be at odds with one another. They immediately pulled out their entries on Paul Kratides and started to go at it.

Curious Book immediately pointed out Encyclopaedia's lack of pictures, and the sexism in the latter not giving Paul's sister Sophy her own entry.  Encyclopaedia mocked Curious Book's great amounts of white space and using the same picture twice on the same page just to highlight different characters. After that, things turned nasty, and in my head, I could hear Curious Book calling Encyclopaedia's author a mother-killer and I had to separate them before Encyclopaedia could retort or pull a knife.

Even then, the back and forth kept going. "You're out of print!" "Ever hear of a bookstore?" The hardcover of the Tracy book tried to step in, and Orlando Park's double-dustjacketed Sherlock Holmes, Esq. and John H. Watson, M.D.: An Encyclopaedia of Their Affairs tried to jump in on the side of The Curious Book of Sherlock Holmes Characters, as it has had a grudge against Encylopaedia since that book first insulted it in its introduction. Who's Who in Sherlock Holmes and the Bunson Encyclopedia Sherlockiana, both paperback and hardcover, moved in and suddenly things started to turn into a prison-yard brawl, the klaxons went off, and the whole library went into lockdown.

It would be nice to simply be able to review a book without all this conflict, but these old Sherlockian book-prisons are just full of trouble. I envy newer wardens who can bring a brand new book in like this and just let it be what it is: A useful result of hard labor that one can get some work out of, without some other book knocking its ornamental metal corners off just for spite, as has happened twice.

And despite all of the above, I'm pleased with this new addition to the library, bit of a luxury item that it is, and I think I've found a spot for it where Tracy won't bother it for now. I'm hoping that thinking it's being held up by even larger books will keep it in line.

Elementary revisited 2021

 Well, I was feeling grumpy about something else entirely tonight, and a bit disappointed that the new episode of Prodigal Son doesn't air on Hulu until 2 AM, when something else on that streaming service caught my eye: our old friend Elementary from CBS. Since I was feeling so crabby about an entirely different thing, why not try watching that seven-season thorn in my Sherlockian paw and see what the first episode looks like in 2021.

A lot has happened since September 27, 2012, when it was near-directly competing with Cumberbatch and Freeman for modern Sherlock of the planet. And since that time, I've spent much time delineating the worst of that show, picked apart its nits, irritated a fan or two, and generally learned to accept, if not love Jonny Lee Miller's version of Mr. Sherlock Holmes. 

Ironically, I give BBC Sherlock a lot of credit for that acceptance. Sherlock spawned a million universes of fanfic and a con that celebrated them. The Elementary panels at 221B Con never won me over, but the growing appreciation for a thousand varieties of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson opened up my mind past the "like/don't like" binary system of fanning Holmes. The Baker Street Babes came up with "All Sherlock is good Sherlock" to put that into words, but I wasn't even one hundred percent on board then. There are definitely bad Sherlocks out there, in all our heads. Doyle's Rotary Coffin then made their motto "No Holmes barred" and everything clicked into place, just in time for me to find my Sherlock Holmes adaptation true love, "Holmes and Watson."

So here I am, back at Elementary.

Johnny Lee Miller is much more palatable now. His accent isn't as bothersome, and I actually like his quick line delivery. The weird pull of Holmes's retirement beekeeping as a character bit for the first episode is still weird, but okay. Lucy Liu's Watson is awfully American. (And I just watched Kill Bill last week, so I can't get her exposed brain out of my head.) But she still gets a free pass, as she did the first time around, because I just like Lucy Liu. 

Lestrade reminds me a wee bit of my brother now, as we've aged a bit in the last nine years.

I like that Sherlock's turning point in the episode is from seeing TV wrestling, which makes a nice counterpoint to him busting into the opera in the next scene to get Watson. They spent a lot more money on the first episode than so many later ones -- look at all those extras! 

And Detective Javier Abreu . . . where did he go? I like how he calls Holmes "Prince Charles." Bell just wasn't sassy enough with Sherlock.

I suspect one of the things that set me off about this Sherlock back in 2012 was the fact that he's such a freakin' mess from square one. He doesn't get to impress Watson and us with how cool he is before we find out the mess that lays behind that cool. He's even physically damaged goods already after wrecking Watson's car in a dramatic moment, running around with bright red cuts on his face.

Oooo, so much depends upon that whole thing about rice making a laundered cell phone work. Have we given up on that yet? Feels like it. And that final pop tune sure doesn't hold up. 

This being streaming, it rolls into episode two, and Sherlock is being a complete weirdo, claiming he had hypnotized himself and that's why he suddenly shots "amygdala" in the middle of his recovery group meeting, then declares the time and walks out. Yeah, suddenly I'm back to my old feeling of "Oh, this is a show for people who think really smart people are deeply flawed to be that smart, so they can feel better about not being smart." And there, once again, I've insulted every fan of that show . . . and in 2012, I didn't realize for a while that Elementary had fans. (Also didn't think America would elect a . . . well, we won't go there.)

Later, when the show would focus on neurodiversity a little more, I think Holmes didn't act quite so goofy. But here at the outset, he's a little random in his abnormal behaviors in a way that . . . well, let me ask you this: Did you ever find Big Bang Theory a little offensive? Ever get seriously bothered by a friend deciding their party theme should be "nerds" and what people costumed like? Well, if you've ever had either of those feelings, you probably have an idea why Elementary got on my nerves early on. 

I almost made it through the pilot episode thinking only happy thoughts about Elementary. And maybe I was even okay until it rolled into episode two. But then it all came flooding back.

This may be one of those blog posts that I just add to the batch without posting a link on social media. Good to have on record, but maybe not making overmuch of it. "No Holmes barred," and that that.

Cheerio.

Here's to the editors! Which isn't me!

"Editors" seems to be my theme of the day today.

Later on, I'm having the meeting that will mark the official hand-off of editorial duties for The Watsonian to Sandra Little. The good Carter, professional editor that she is, has been doing a little work for me on a project that's coming very soon. There's something I need to look at for another editor's project I'm in. And in cleaning up my basement warehouse, I've hit the boxes that represent my time publishing The Holmes & Watson Report.

I say "publishing" because even though I was listed as "editor-in-chief," I am just not an editor. The good Carter and Bob Burr, who edited our local scion journal Wheelwrightings and was once offered editorship of The Baker Street Journal, did the actual work of proofreading and beating up the manuscripts that came in for The Holmes & Watson Report. I just accepted everything that came our way . . . and really didn't do much else for it.

That point was driven home in going through the piles of corrected articles, all printed out for proofing even if they were sent to my at-the-time AOL e-mail address, when I came to a little hand-written note from Bob attached to an article from a rather well-known Sherlockian.

"Brad, I ran out of patience with this. I'm sure I've missed some stuff. Please have Kathy give it a look. How the heck can anyone submit something in this form?!"

And how could the editor-in-chief pass something to a proof-reader in that form? Well, because I had two meticulous proofreaders behind me. Some day a book that Bob Burr owned might find it's way into your collection, and you might recognize it by the highlighting and correction of typos that he made while reading any book. 

A really good editor isn't something one just decides to be, I think. A really good editor is something someone is, then just finally finds something they can edit. And it isn't just proofreading. A good editor can do developmental edits, helping a writer mold their work into its best form, its best chance to communicate the ideas within to a reader. It's a skillset that involves a little of what makes a good writer, a touch of the obsessive-compulsive, and a focussed eye for detail -- and all those qualities applied on a consistent, reliable basis. Some of us might have those things at a given moment, but consistently over a long-term project?

Not everybody has that.

Some day, if I have reason to write a full autobiography, I think I'd title it "A One Draft Life," because I don't even have the patience to edit my own work for a second draft -- too busy heading on to the next thing. It's the kind of thing that makes for a blogger or a hack writer, and I'm okay with that at this point. At some point in life, one hopefully learns to be happy with who one is. And life itself is a first draft, really. (If you figure out a way to go back and edit it, let me know!)

So here's to the editors, who are much in my thoughts today!

One more Sherlockian thing before I go

A conversation with a Sherlockian friend got a little existential yesterday afternoon.

We were discussing Sherlockians of the past, and how, in addition to their works and how familiar they could feel even though we never met them, how they made us very aware of our limited time on the planet. It was the second discussion that I'd had in the last few days about Sherlockians who are no longer with us, and it's not hard to come up with a list of those whom I'd have liked to have heard more from before their untimely departures. Add to that the list of Sherlockians whom you'd like to just share current developments in the hobby with to see the joy in their eyes, and the numbers start adding up.

I don't know if it's the pandemic, crossing the sixty year mark, or both, but I've started thinking of projects in terms of "I'd really like to accomplish this before I die." Nothing earth-shattering, nothing that will make me famous or leave my heirs wealthy, just things that would make my last breath a satisfied sigh. 

I always think of Columbo, the TV detective who would be about to leave any room and then go, "Oh, one more thing . . ."

Because with Sherlockiana, it always seems there is just one more thing. It might be a silly thing. It might only have meaning to me myself. But, oh . . . one more thing. Which is good for some of us who like to keep our brains occupied. (Keeping brains occupied is probably the reason the entire field of Sherlockian chronology exists, I suspect.)

By the end of this week, I'm hoping that two more boxes on my to-do list will be checked off, but . . . what's that odd twinge in my back? (Don't be a problem, don't be a problem, don't be a problem.)

Riding where Basil and Nigel rode

 Sherlock Holmes has been to Washington. I have not.

But in the age of marvels in which we now live, I decided tonight to take that drive up Pennsylvania Avenue that Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson took in the movie Sherlock Holmes in Washington, via Google Maps streetview mode. Movie geography has always been a fascination to me, ever since I saw an airplane make what had to be a right turn by what I knew of Las Vegas as I watched the movie Con Air. So I wanted to see how Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce's classic ride would go. 

In the movie, they were last at the Senate Office Building, except you could probably walk over to the Capitol from there, without driving like you were coming from the White House. Here's where our Baker Street Boys started:

As you can quickly see, our views of the trip were a little different.

That big building they are about to pass on the left doesn't seem to be there in our current world. And actually, it wasn't even there in the Rathbone movie's version of Washington, as a few moments later, here's what is on Holmes's left.

It's street with shops, and something called "APEX."

I got what looked like newer developments. But it's been almost eighty years, so that makes sense.

Rathbone Sherlock's final look at the Capitol building looks something like this.

I wound up in a parking lot.

It would be quite a video for some modern Sherlockians to attempt to recreate Rathbone's speech in a convertible driving up Pennsylvania Avenue toward the Capitol. Of course, they might want to wait a while after recent events. 

Being a Sherlockian has so many fun little aspects to it, and taking a trip into the world of an old movie on a Friday night is not all that unusual. And you just never know how it will all turn out.

Even if you just wind up in a parking lot.

The puzzle after the puzzle

Jigsaw puzzles have become a new fancy during the pandemic, and Baskerville Productions came out with one just in time for mid-winter distraction. (My verbiage seems to be a bit tainted by watching Bridgerton at the moment, so forgive me if I get a bit courtly.)

After a week or so of work, I finished the first side of "Piecing Together the Canon," a lovely picture of what is either 221B if Sherlock Holmes was a trophy collector or the room of his greatest fan, populating it with items to remind themselves of his sixty cases. But are all sixty represented? The titles around the edges, yes, but in the artwork itself?

Having finished the puzzle, I printed out a list of the full sixty and began to tick them off.

At lunch today, I found thirty-nine of the stories in the picture, and have to admire the work it takes to visually represent some of the tales. You find yourself going, "Why is that lamp so smokey? OH!"

When I get back to it, I think I'll have to bring a magnifying glass, as there's a letter with writing so small that I can't quite read it with my normal vision. And I swear some stories get referred to more than once, so I might have to go back to the Canon to double-check those second, less-obvious references to see if they don't point to a different story. (Detailed knowledge can sometimes be as much a hindrance as a help.) 

And if this second puzzle-after-the-puzzle wasn't enough, there's still the other side of the puzzle to do once I've finally decided to take this one apart. (Of course, I did solve some of it already -- the benefit of a two-sided puzzle was that if the all-black parts with no pattern were a little hard, you could always flip those areas and solve them with the easier side, then flip them back.)

Sherlock Holmes did like his puzzles, but even though jigsaw sorts of puzzles were invented in the 1760s, and "jigsaw" puzzles became a thing in the 1880s, Holmes was probably too busy with detection to waste time with one until his retirement. And even then, they didn't really hit their stride until the Great Depression in the 1930s, so maybe he never got to them.

But their mysteries can still be a good thing for the student of Sherlock Holmes, having done two about him in the last few months.