As I understand it, whereas periodicals like The Strand Magazine had previously published either single short stories or serialized novels, Sherlock Holmes was the first periodical series, described by Conan Doyle as a new kind of serial in which each installment is a complete story so that the reader need neither have read the previous installment nor look out for the next installment but will nevertheless come to recognize and appreciate continuing characters and settings. Thus, Holmes is the precursor of all other series characters and, furthermore, he meets Everard in "Time Patrol," the first story in Time Patrol.
Edgar Allan Poe's Dupin is a precursor of Holmes in two ways:
a fictional detective;
the central character of three stories, thus of an earlier "series."
However, (I think that) Holmes was the hero of the first periodically published series to be conceived as such. Poul Anderson brilliantly incorporates this first series character into the opening story of the Time Patrol series.
7 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
That was interesting, THE STRAND MAGAZINE pioneering related but independent series stories with continuing characters.
And of course Anderson gives us non human "Holmes" characters. In, e.g., "The Martian Crown Jewels" and "The Adventure of the Misplaced Hound" (with Gordon Dickson). And we see a human "Holmes" character in "The Queen of Air and Darkness."
Sean
Sean,
I think that "Time Patrol" is by far the best of Anderson's Holmesian stories.
Holmes and Watson appear in the Old Phoenix, thus a tenuous connection between the Time Patrol and the Old Phoenix.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I should have mentioned Holmes and Watson's unnamed appearance in "House Rule" or the Old Phoenix interludes in A MIDSUMMER TEMPEST.
But we don't really SEE Holmes at his work in "Time Patrol." So I would lean more to favoring either "Crown Jewels" or "Misplaced Hound."
Sean
Well, we see Holmes making deductions in "Time Patrol". They're comically wrong, but Holmes has already figured out that the man the police have fingered for it didn't do it -- Lestrade is there too, and screwing up as usual.
Incidentally, there's a class element in the original Holmes stories and their attitude towards Scotland Yard. The London police were originally set up with only the very top positions held by direct appointment, by "gentlemen". Everyone else, including quite senior officers, was promoted from the ranks, and for the whole 19th century initial entry to the police was generally from very modest working-class backgrounds; the pay of a entry-level roundsman was only about a guinea a week, semi-skilled wokiman's pay, though with the advantage of being steady.
So Lestrade and the other detectives Holmes meets would be from a much lower social level than Holmes -- or Conan Doyle.
Dear Mr. Stirling,
Again, very interesting remarks! I had hitherto thought of Inspector Lestrade as being merely a figure of fun giving us comedy when contrasted to Holmes' sober competence. And we do see mention, I think, of Holmes and his brother Mycroft coming from a gentry family.
I think it was beginning with Dorothy L. Sayers' Lord Peter Wimsey books that we see really competent police officers, like Charles Parker. Altho Parker had to put up with a bumbling Lestrade of his own.
Sean
Holmes was very much a gentleman amateur. This was both a reality -- much Victorian science was done by people like that -- and a trope about gentleman amateurs. It's equivalent to the distinction between "gentlemen" and "players" in British cricket at the time.
Dear Mr. Stirling,
And your remarks reminded me of William Parsons, 3rd Earl of Rosse (d. 1867). He was an enthusiastic amateur astronomer who used his wealth to build the Great Telescope of Birr, which was for many years the largest telescope on Earth. And his son the fourth Earl also shared his father's astronomical interests. And one of his other sons was a noted engineer. These men are good examples of Victorian amateur (or not so amateur) scientists.
I first read about the Great Telescope of Birr in Asimov's book THE UNIVERSE.
Sean
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