What do women see in Sherlock Holmes?by Mia Stampe 1999Introduction:My point of departure in this informal study is to examine if there is a difference in the way women and men read crime fiction in general and the Sherlock Holmes stories in particular. My curiosity of looking into this arose from the following reasons:Being a Sherlockian I love Arthur Conan Doyle (ACD)’s detective stories about Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, - the Canon. I just as much cherish Laurie R. King (LRK)’s pastiche series featuring Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes, - the Kanon. So do apparently a lot of female readers, but not very many men. How can that be? The questions I want to approach are:
My method is not scientific; for that purpose, there are too many elements of uncertainty involved. The statistical material is far from being extensive enough and it is from the start biased in several ways. Nevertheless, I consider it good enough to help me to draw out some general features. One method of obtaining a smoother statistical basis might have been to interview a suitable large number of people in the library’s department for crime fiction. But this I have not done. Instead I questioned a group of people I knew already read either the Canon or the Kanon or both. I addressed a series of questions to the participants of the two mailing lists, Hounds-L and Russ-L at the Internet, hoping that they might provide me with some interesting answers. In the following I’ll use the term “Russellians” for the fans of the Kanon who are so enthusiastic that they subscribe to Russ-L. About 24 women and 4 men have replied. Here is yet another contribution to the bias of the data, in that those people who join a literary mailing list in general are well-educated, active and - necessarily - users of modern IT. The typical Russellian is, beyond the above mentioned qualities, female, in her early 30s and with about 50 percent probability of being married. Regarding age, the dispersion is however large, ranging from teens to retired people. A query among the Russ-L members in 1998 supports the picture of the typical Russellian. Another bias is the fact that only those who find the subject interesting will spend time on answering (Therefore did more women than men from Hounds-L reply). When I in the following use the form “we” it is because my opinion in those cases is in agreement with the ones of the questioned female readers. The available data here are qualitative statements, not quantitative
and not unambiguous. It is impossible to make a numeric analysis characte
rized by a mean value and a standard mean deviation. There are several ways the readers may approach fictional literature. For example, you can stay in your own universe and solely watch the tale from there. It is highly possible in that way to be entertained and get stuff for reflection. You can also accept the reading as a sort of light escapism (without in any way despising one’s own life and world). A large part of the questioned people confirms this. In this way you allow yourself to enter another realm where other rules are prevailing. You may then either just watch the action that takes place in front of your eyes or your may imagine yourself in one (or more - the omnipotence of the reader) of the parts. The appeal of the KanonA little thought provoking detail, which has nothing to do with gender, is that many of the Russellians actually haven’t read the Canon before the Kanon (or only sparsely or too long ago). However, most of them turn subsequently to the Canon driven by curiosity or “hunger” after learning more about Holmes. These new readers will have Russell’s description of Holmes in their minds, when they start to read the Canon, just like I and other Sherlockians have Watson’s description in our heads when/if we enter the world of the Kanon. But, when all is said and done, this is not different from forming the acquaintance with the Canon as the result of watching a charismatic representation on film or TV.LRK lets - causing real scandal to many Sherlockian Purists - Holmes become attached emotionally and even maritally to a woman. In addition to the actual crime and parallel stories there is a romantic dimension in LRK’s books . It is an important element, but not alone for its own reasons. A large part of the novels is about the exploration of how the person Sherlock Holmes, who has become an institution which everybody thinks they know, possibly could develop and react. As readers of the Kanon we might have different starting points. We may read the stories “for Holmes” or we may read them “for Russell”. From discussions on Russ-L it appears that the participants read the Kanon in the wish of seeing both Holmes and Russell work together. In this sense Russell is not an independent detective; she is part of a detective pair. Without Holmes she would firstly not at all have developed her intellectual power in the direction of detecting, and secondly most of us would not find the story thrilling without Holmes either in the role as sidekick or protagonist. It is the co-operation of the two persons, professionally and private, that make the story interesting. Yet, we turn against LRK if she crosses the mark where the story becomes “romantic twaddle”, and possibly the male readers put the brake on before the female readers. In general the women like the romantic touch as long as LRK is able to do it in a convincing way, an attempt which I think she has succeeded in so far. The romantic aspect of the stories is connected to identity - a discussion to which I shall return later. Some of the Russellians are industrious and gifted writers who have contributed with a series of pastiches to the Russell/Holmes stories. These re-pastiches as we might call them, range from black humor and provocative roguery to serious attempts of finishing dead ends or to fill out holes in the Kanon. The re-pastiches also speak about us, the readers, because they mirror what we want to happen in the partnership of Holmes and Russell. In LRK’s books Holmes is described differently as in ACD’s books. Apparently, this description appeals to many women. A recurrent declaration from new Russellians is that they in Russell’s representation suddenly find a personification of their own, initial conception of the figure. The step to accept LRK and ACD’s Holmes as being the same person is thereafter short and very easy to take. Kristopher J. Preacher, who is an active Sherlockian and Russellian has advanced a short theory of why most Russellians are women. He says:
Even though this analysis is no label to put on all Russellians and also only is part of the truth then Preacher certainly has hit upon some very essential points. Women in classical crime fiction can in general be characterized
either as victims or clients or as femmes fatales. The first ones are
good and virtuous the last ones are dangerous and uncontrollable. Asked if there can be any noticeable differences in style or content when the protagonist is a woman in contrast to a man, almost everyone agree about, that what is important is not the main character per se, but the author. A woman writer produces more easily a convincing female protagonist and does it more often than a man writer. Many readers prefer, by the way, that there are both a female and a male main character, equal in the work. And there are many examples of this in film and literature (Wimsey - Vane, Scully - Mulder .....) The men who have answered find that the accentuated details in the books may differ. Most women do not. Perhaps because the said details (which are not further defined) in their eyes look natural and therefore do not appear accentuated. LRK is herself a theological scholar and feminist. The parallel stories in her novels must reflect something of herself. Maybe many of the male readers retreat because they find “all this theology and feminism filling” a little too much especially together with Sherlock Holmes. If you roughly describe a crime novel as composed of three parts: the plot (the invention of the mystery and the solving of it), the characters (their personality, feelings etc.), and the frame (the atmosphere, the space and other specific elements), respectively and then ask what the most important of the three parts is, the majority answer that they are equally important. Though, there is a tendency to being able to accept a loose plot, if the characters are so strong and well depicted that you can get an experience out of following them. A strong plot with inane characters is on the other hand a sinking ship. We want more than just the mystery and the solution (whodunit). This is a very characteristic element in LRK’s books. Here is, as also described in the article Laurie R. King and the phenomenon Mary Russell more stories woven into the proper crime solving business. Do we read the Canon differently?“Semiotic Identity” by Huong Nguyen is a fine and clear paper about Holmes. Together with the article “A dialogue between Pierce and Holmes” by Anne Marie Dinesen we get a thorough analysis of Holmes as a person and how his contemporaries and we interpret him. However, the two authors have not distinguished between male and female readers.In the Canon Sherlock Holmes is the very soul of power, independence, superiority and drive. He is added some personality in form of strange habits and inclinations, enough to make him remarkable and interesting. Is Holmes a macho man? Many people think so. I presume most men do, but I am out on thin ice here and cannot say for sure, because I have not enough statements from male readers. But one thing is clear. Women Sherlockians do not see him as such - or at least not only. Which is one of the reasons the Kanon, as earlier mentioned, is so warmly accepted by women. From Hounds-L, where all the participants are hard-core Sherlockians (1/3 are women and 2/3 are men) I perceive that women more often than men focus on “the man behind the machine” and less on the actual actions of this machine. We look more, as I discussed in the paper about LRK and Russell, for the human being inside the figure Holmes. It is exciting to see him as a “whole” person with brain and heart. It is possible that men to the same extent as women watch out for exposed feelings and moods at our famous protagonist. If they do so, then most of them don’t tell the honest opinion when they are questioned. But perhaps it is just not comme-il-faut to expose this “weak” attitude? I should like some response, Gentlemen !!!! The Canon includes many pieces to the big Sherlock Holmes personality puzzle. Both the emotional part (as mentioned in the paper about LRK and Russell) and the cold, objective, professional part. The emotional part is very rarely shown directly which make the few cases stand out even stronger. And attract the interest of some Sherlockians - including many women. Other Sherlockians insist that this form of analysis is a tremendous amount of literal dodge which only purpose is, using a lot of quotations out of context and sophistic twists, to demonstrate a “soft man” in Holmes. Nothing could be more wrong. Holmes is “both-and” He is clinically, logic, unsentimental when practicing his art of deduction, but in between he can be sensitive or ebullient or sad or proud etc. When he is working and using his abilities intensely he is the cold and objective machine. It is efficient but rather dull in itself. You cannot care for a machine. (Though I have had a discussion with a male Sherlockian who stubbornly maintained that one object of his true love was a shining, spinning steam engine). On the other side we can admire and respect the man behind the efficient problem solver. Now, to play on with explosives, here is an example of an episode (out of many) which indeed can split up Sherlockians: Many of them hate the scene in NAVA where Holmes contemplates a rose and philosophizes a little. The Macho-Holmes party pleas that Watson either lays improbable poetic words in Holmes’ mouth or that the whole act is a simple trick on Holmes’ part to get the chance to approach the window. No way! It is easy to ague against this. Holmes is a man of science and as many great scientists he possesses the gift of fantasy and the ability to wonder. Qualities which are important to the exploring man. As many great scientists he is also very musically minded, he can identify himself with music as well as art or philosophy or - be moved by a moss rose! Anyway, I think most of us in the course of time will turn in the direction of looking for the man behind the successful shell. This is due to the fact that we don’t get the same experience when we re-read the Canon (or any other book) as we got in the first presentation. Try for yourself to remember when you read the stories for the very first time. I clearly remember getting tears in the eyes when I understood the actual meaning of Watson’s words in FINA. At that time I was unaware of, that Holmes would reappear. And in DYIN, I got really frightened just reading the title and I proceeded into the text with a bleeding heart. However, when we re-read we know the story and the plot, the very excitement over the suspense and the mystery is not gone, but is at least less important as in the first reading, and therefore the characters and the scene in which the story is laid become more important. “A Case of Identity”The majority of the women who replied to my query say that it is not important whether the main character is a man or a woman, but many of them admit finding it easier to mirror themselves in a female character than in a male character.Mary Russell is a strong, complex person. She seems to us to be visionary in the time she describes (just like Holmes in some areas was ahead of his time). She is in a way a female Holmes. She has a lot of special qualities which are exposed to us during the stories (for instance she is an excellent pitcher, masters the dogs, plays the tin-whistle, plus a series of skills taught to her by Holmes) and like him she has special interests which don’t concern the art of detecting directly. (Holmes: music, Cornish language, bee-keeping etc, Russell: theology, chemistry, mathematics etc.). She is - like him - self-willed, smarter than most people and not afraid of showing it. Furthermore she has no patience if people around her are slower to grasp her deductive conclusions. She stands out as an independent woman with a series of qualities, sympathetic as well as unpleasant, that we would like to possess ourselves. She is a feminist, self-assured, extremely intelligent and then she is stinking rich let alone - married to Holmes. You are easily left with just one feeling: Jealousy. Fortunately it is Russell who tells the story which makes it easy for the female reader to imagine herself in Russell’s place. Watson describes in the Canon women in the role of those who must be rescued, protected and loved. La femme fatale, as we hardly can call Irene Adler, scares him or leaves him in ignorance. But in the compact short story style of his the women are mostly just there as clients in distress, an element to initiate the true action of the detective adventure. In spite of the fact, that many of the women characters in the Canon are far from weak, they don’t appeal to me, well presumably not to independent women in general (who I hereby count myself amongst). The exception is of course Irene Adler and a few more characters. I speculate upon how the picture would have been a hundred years ago. It is very clear, that the stories were written to be read by a mixed host of readers. They were published in relatively cheap magazines and could be read by the whole still better educated middle class family. I have been told, that a big fraction of the readers, who made the publisher persuade Doyle to resume/revive his stories about Holmes, was women. My bid is that women at that time as well as now had an ambivalent relationship to the famous detective. In this query the readers were asked if they would like to be good friends with Holmes (or LRK’s Russell). All men and most of the women replied “yes”. Doing so, we put our selves in the place of Watson. He is the only one we know of who had Holmes’ full confidence (Stackhurst was a friend, too, but has not known Holmes as long as Watson has). When the Granada Studios shot its Sherlock Holmes series Jeremy Brett and the producer Michael Cox daily received several hundreds of fan letters from woman admirers. This indicates that Holmes (at least in Brett’s figure) apparently also is very attractive. I asked the female readers, if they found Holmes an attractive man and again the majority replies with a resounding “yes”!!! And they point out, that it isn’t because he is unattainable (as a person, that is - not as fictive character as some claims he is). Well that does play a little role, of course. It is always interesting to desire what you cannot have. But to put it short and clear: Holmes has humor, intelligence and wit - what more can one possibly wish for?! In the Canon both woman and men identify with Holmes. Women most often identified with Holmes, very rarely with Watson and never with the clients cf. earlier discussion. Now, there is an important element of the ambivalence to focus on when we look at the differences between female and male readers of the Canon:
What happens then in LRK’s books, where we are introduced to a female protagonist with a personal magnetism of the dimension of Holmes’ ? Almost all the female readers project themselves from Holmes onto Russell. And looking at this from a distance it really is an optimized composition because now we are allowed to be the strong women, the first person, the heroine, the conqueror and explorer of everything we normally can’t explore etc. and at the same time we can, as Russell, keep the love for Holmes and be the object of his admiration ! Actually, a more distinguished and ingenious construction is hard to imagine ! But one thing is the realm of the book, another thing is our own world (reality is, I think, a too big and hazardous word to use). It appears from other discussions at Russ-L, that even though the women find Holmes exciting and extremely attractive, they do marry a Canonical Watson: A devoted, reliable, intelligent man with a good sense of humor. (It certainly is no coincidence that Watson was very successful when it came to the so-called weaker sex). This means, that even though it is funny to imagine filling out Russell’s shoes, most of us would break if we were to live with a genius, unpredictable and moody individual as Holmes. But of course only the very few of us also possess Russell’s qualities (which are important in this balance). Finally, but not less important is the fact, that the world fortunately is populated with several more men of Watson’s kind than of Holmes’. References:
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