Sherlock Holmes Removed from School Reading List

[carld]

Originally Posted by luqmaninbmore

Do you mean left alone as in left unread/forgotten or as in left uncensored?

I meant left uncensored.

[arkietech]

Was Gone With The Wind derogatory toward yankees?

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by arkietech

Was Gone With The Wind derogatory toward yankees?

I believe it only focused on the carpetbagger minority of that particular sect.

[jersysman]

Originally Posted by Harry_Y

PC will be the death of US

Been saying this for years!!

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by Harry_Y

PC will be the death of US

Originally Posted by jersysman

Been saying this for years!!

Needless to say, I agree.
**Points down at his signature quote**

[mikeayers]

there are others?

[wodin]

As long as we're listing books that disparage particular religions/denominations/sects, let's also ban Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy.

[MrsJoseph]

Originally Posted by wodin

As long as we're listing books that disparage particular religions/denominations/sects, let's also ban Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy.

I've never read this series but I've watched many an argument about it. Personally, I try to avoid all mention of this series due to the flame wars I've seen it cause.

[anamardoll]

I re-read Study in Scarlet recently. I found the historical issues less a problem -- there is some evidence of early Mormon murders in Utah not totally unlike in the book, or so "Under The Banner of Heaven" contends -- than the gender issues.

The hero fights for his true love until after her wedding night, and then he leaves town and doesn't come back until she's dead. Once she's dead, he can walk right into the house and take her wedding ring, so PRESUMABLY he could have walked in while she was alive and rescued her, but once she's "married" (i.e., carried off), he's not interested in saving her anymore, just in his revenge on her abductors.

Not my idea of a compelling hero.

As for the school decision, if you were going to teach a single Sherlock Holmes story, SiS is a bad place to start. It's badly paced -- the second half is the villains' monologue. Holmes is under-developed: he openly mocks the Copernican/heliocentric theory and claims that he only learns what is absolutely necessary (i.e., footprints and cigar ash, largely) for his detective work. It's only later that Holmes is expanded into the Renaissance man that everyone remembers.......

Originally Posted by MrsJoseph

I've never read this series but I've watched many an argument about it. Personally, I try to avoid all mention of this series due to the flame wars I've seen it cause.

HDM is a wonderful series, I highly recommend it.

[anamardoll]

Originally Posted by Shimarenda

A slight correction: Holmes's only issue with opium was that it was a drug for lowlifes. He used cocaine, a classier drug at the time. And tobacco, of course.

Just listened to the audio collection, and Watson scolds him for opiate-use in one of the stories right after SiS. Holmes basically says that he has ADD and the opium helps. Not in those words, of course. I'll try to dig up a reference.

EDIT: Found it, "The Sign of Four" -- Holmes is using cocaine in the scene, but Watson notes that he's been also using morphine (an opiate) frequently. Watson's statement could be read as saying that the cocaine and morphine injections are a once-a-day habit -- I have no idea where that falls on the "casual/not-casual" drug scale.

[Shimarenda]

Originally Posted by anamardoll

Just listened to the audio collection, and Watson scolds him for opiate-use in one of the stories right after SiS. Holmes basically says that he has ADD and the opium helps. Not in those words, of course. I'll try to dig up a reference.

EDIT: Found it, "The Sign of Four" -- Holmes is using cocaine in the scene, but Watson notes that he's been also using morphine (an opiate) frequently. Watson's statement could be read as saying that the cocaine and morphine injections are a once-a-day habit -- I have no idea where that falls on the "casual/not-casual" drug scale.

Opiates, yes; opium, no. The difference may not mean much to us, but it was a distinction then, largely for cultural reasons. Opium dens were frequently rife with crime, and men would spend days at a time in them. Try The Man with the Twisted Lip.

Spoiler:

"Upper Swandam-lane is a vile alley lurking behind the high wharves which line the north side of the river to the east of London Bridge. Between a slop shop and a gin shop, approached by a steep flight of steps leading down to a black gap like the mouth of a cave, I found the den of which I was in search.... Through the gloom one could dimly catch a glimpse of bodies lying in strange fantastic poses, bowed shoulders, bent knees, heads thrown back and chins pointing upwards....

'I suppose, Watson,' said he, 'that you imagine I have added opium-smoking to cucaine injections and all the other little weaknesses on which you have favoured me with your medical views.'"

Holmes, who is in disguise on an investigation, goes on to reference the rife criminality and murder in such places.

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by anamardoll

The hero fights for his true love until after her wedding night, and then he leaves town and doesn't come back until she's dead. Once she's dead, he can walk right into the house and take her wedding ring, so PRESUMABLY he could have walked in while she was alive and rescued her, but once she's "married" (i.e., carried off), he's not interested in saving her anymore, just in his revenge on her abductors.

Not my idea of a compelling hero.

He wasn't supposed to be.

Spoiler:

He wasn't the hero, he was the murderer that Sherlock was looking for.
To me the story showed the author's concept that the murders weren't black and white with innocent victims and senseless killers. I think that it makes for a good beginning.

[anamardoll]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

He wasn't supposed to be.

Spoiler:

He wasn't the hero, he was the murderer that Sherlock was looking for.
To me the story showed the author's concept that the murders weren't black and white with innocent victims and senseless killers. I think that it makes for a good beginning.

He's the "hero" of the whole second half of the book, regardless of whether or not he's an anti-hero or a straight-up hero. And no one calls him out for his "oh, she's not a virgin, I don't want her anymore" attitude. Since the entire book hinges around that attitude, I find it silly to the point of parody.

It's not surprising given attitudes towards women throughout the entire series. More than once, Holmes refuses to give the solution to a mystery to a woman client, saying that she wouldn't be able to handle the truth or wouldn't believe him because Women Are Emotional.

Doyle was a product of his time, I'm not going to argue otherwise. But SiS is a particularly bone-headed example of why virgin worship is stupid, to say the least. And since a good half of the book is devoted to the subject, I find it one of the weaker (read: boring) stories in the collection. Not how I'd introduce Holmes to kids -- I'd be afraid they'd never pick up the better stories.

YMMV.

@Shimarenda, fair enough that Opium != Opiates back then. But I think the point of the post referencing Holmes issues with opium/opiates was that anyone approaching Sherlock Holmes (including children) is going to have to deal with that particular problem.

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by anamardoll

He's the "hero" of the whole second half of the book, regardless of whether or not he's an anti-hero or a straight-up hero. And no one calls him out for his "oh, she's not a virgin, I don't want her anymore" attitude. Since the entire book hinges around that attitude, I find it silly to the point of parody.

I guess out attitudes are different because I never saw him as the hero. To me he was a cold blooded murderer, so his attitude towards virginity didn't surprise me.

[anamardoll]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

I guess out attitudes are different because I never saw him as the hero. To me he was a cold blooded murderer, so his attitude towards virginity didn't surprise me.

I think Doyle saw him as a hero, if that makes sense. There's a lot of "poor, tormented soul" overtones in the text as I read it, and implications that any right-thinking man would have done the same thing.

He's one of Doyle's 'honorable' criminals -- everyone treats him with a certain amount of tenderness and respect as his story is told: he vows not to flee, his cuffs are loosened, and his heart condition is remarked upon sadly.

Again, YMMV.

If he's not a "hero", though, that makes his second half of the book even more tedious. The Sign of Four has the same problem -- thank gods Doyle finally realized that condensing the villain monologue to a few lines rather than half-a-book was the smarter option.