Sherlockian Musings: Thoughts on the Sherlock Holmes Stories

Sherlockian Musings: Thoughts on the Sherlock Holmes Stories is a study of the Sherlock Holmes canon by Sheldon Goldfarb. Presented as a collection of essays, it considers the original sixty stories through a series of close, questioning readings.

Key details

• Author: Sheldon Goldfarb
• ISBN: 9781787054813
• Page count: 304 pages
• Explores all 60 original Sherlock Holmes stories in the canon

Synopsis

Is Holmes as purely rational as he claims, and what should readers make of the recurring, sometimes unexpected images that surface across the canon? Goldfarb approaches the stories as layered texts, asking why certain objects and references appear, from the eggs in “Thor Bridge” to an apparent fixation on Napoleon, and what might sit beneath the familiar detective plots.

Each essay offers a light-hearted “musing” on one of the sixty stories, trying out different perspectives without insisting on a single answer. Along the way, the book raises questions about moments such as Watson smashing a Buddha in The Sign of the Four, the angel in “A Case of Identity”, and Holmes swapping his magnifying glass for binoculars in “Silver Blaze”.

Rackhams Reference : Z61R3D41ZN