Hey, John, can we go crime solving?
Or let’s study A Study in Scarlet together
When it comes to reading books, there is no right or wrong way to do it: you just open a book and let your eyes do their job. And yet, for example, Vladimir Nabokov is believed to say, during one of his lectures on literature, that the real process of reading is rereading, for it is physically impossible to perceive the whole picture all at once, and many important details fail to be even noticed.
What to do then? So many books, so little time, you know.
I know. And the only solution I found was to reread some of them. As for reading new books, I read them slowly with a notebook on my lap, dotting down questions and ideas I will think about afterward.
Now, to finish this introduction that can be read only with a preaching intonation — guys, I’m still learning to write and to write on books, which means that my style is all but definitely, once and for all, shaped — let’s make it clear what these important details to notice are.
Again, I’m completely and utterly biased here, for I do believe that a cigar is never just a cigar, so I would say that every detail may be considered important if it leads you to a deeper understanding of the literary piece you indulge yourself in reading. That is to say if it helps you to answer the following questions:
- What is this book about?
- Who are its characters, and what the hell are they doing?
- What are its ideas?
- What is the author’s message?
- What do I feel and what makes me feel it?
Okay, let me just wipe the beads of sweat from my forehead, and we can finally begin talking about the book I’ve just finished reading. While I’m also taking a sip or two of my coffee that grew cold because I had no time to drink it — so absorbed I was in lecturing you — I want to tell you a story.
When I was a kid, there was that one particular film whose opening music lulled us immediately into the hypnotic state of all things coziness. The moment we heard its violin singing, we knew that even if it was a blazing summer day, we needed a blanket and a cup of five-o’clock tea, for the movie itself had that irresistible vibe of rural England, a cold family manor, and mysterious crimes. I’m talking about the Soviet version of Sherlock Holmes. (Sorry, Benedict, no one can beat Vasily Livanov and his pensive look in my heart!)
The thing is, in our childhood, just like Count Dracula,* we learned how to travel without traveling: books and movies were our vicarious way to see the world. (It was and still is an adventure to get a visa and go on a trip from my home country. No one here, in France, where I live now, can really understand how blessed they are to be able to cross countries so easily without any paperwork-induced headaches!).
And the movies about Sherlock Holmes were our tickets to imaginary England. With all this being said, you can understand how happy and thrilled I was when my dear husband gave me as one of his presents Complete Sherlock Holmes! (“It could be an instrument of crime,” I chuckled. “So heavy it is!”)
But let’s finally study the first book in the series that happens to bear the title A Study in Scarlet. What does this title make you think of?
Scarlet.
What is special about this color? Bright red. For me, the first thing that jumps into my mind is that it is the color of blood. Well, it is kind of an obvious thing, right? I mean, we are reading a detective story, after all. So evidently, some blood will be spilled.
And then, of course, I think of another book I haven’t read yet but have a vague idea of what it is about: The Scarlet Letter. The book is about a girl who wears a scarlet letter ‘A’ on her chest as a punishment for her mischief. And if we check this color out — I used Ferber’s A Dictionary of Literary Symbols — we will find out that it is a color of sin in literature (Ferber gives the Bible, Shakespeare, and Wilde as examples). Blood, sin, mischievous girls, not bad for the beginning, right? And mind you, we haven’t even started talking about the book itself.
And then, of course, there is this word “study,” the act of learning something, gaining knowledge, or a drawing that artists make to test their ideas. Both definitions work, for our Sherlock is a man of science, on the one hand, but also an artist par excellence, on the other.
So, all together, we get a story about a detective whose methods of unraveling criminal knots are based on science and artistic creativity. But let’s finally dive into the text and see what interesting things we can fish out of it.
The first thing we learn when we open the book is that our narrator is Dr. Watson and everything that will happen, we will see through his eyes. What does it mean? First of all, it means that we will never know what happens in the head of Sherlock. We are limited by what our narrator sees and says to us.
Second, unfortunately, the most important details to crack the case will always be hidden from us. Since the picture of the crime we get from Watson is limited by his analytical capacities, we shouldn’t expect to be able to find out who the murderer is by ourselves. Our role is to be in the audience and witness Sherlock’s greatness.
And speaking of Sherlock, in the first book, we get a glimpse of his working method and get a taste of his intellectual arrogance. (To Watson’s dislike, the former openly criticized Dupin — Edgar Allan Poe’s creation**– and Lecoq, two favorite literary characters of the doctor.)
Sherlock is a man of science. He believes in science, cherishes it, and will never miss an opportunity to learn more. (Though, he will only keep in mind the facts that will help him solve cases). By the way, that was one of the reasons why the mystery genre appeared: the Enlightenment, an intellectual movement that is also called the Age of Reason, made it possible to believe that the truth was knowable and that using one’s knowledge and science could help to learn it.
Science reigns and is the queen of the order in Sherlock’s England. And geography plays an important role in the book. England and English soil represent civilization, reason, rules, and science. Whereas America is all about feuds, fanatical sects, polygamy, and wild nature.
We, readers, can’t help but feel this strong opposition between the modern and the old, city and nature, reason and wilderness. And, at the end of the story, there is a reminder “to all foreigners that they will do wisely to settle their feuds at home, and not to carry them on to British soil.”
And the last thing that I want to mention here. Just like we gave it a minute and talked about the title of the book, let’s have a look at two names.
The first one is Jefferson Hope, the character whose goal is to avenge the love of his life. All his life, he hoped for revenge and was the embodiment of order and common reason in the wild, chaotic America of Mormons. And accidentally, the name of the first American president, the one who has the regulatory power in the state, is also Jefferson. A coincidence? Don’t think so.
What might be a coincidence and far-fetched, though, is the name of another character, Lucy. Since I’m reading Stoker’s Dracula, I can’t resist the temptation to compare two Lucys that actually happen to have a lot in common. Both are victims of male power. Both attract evil. The name Lucy, derived from the Latin Lucius, means light. The light that attracts moths. But again, it may be just the fruit of my imagination.
Now, you may be asking yourself why I wrote this longish and somehow chaotic piece. The only reason is — no, not to brag! Believe me, there is nothing to brag about! — to inspire myself and you to read books more attentively.
Not to rush. Not to gobble up books. But savor every detail. Think about their words. Let our reading creativity work and interpret each passage. And I can guarantee you, it is an enormous intellectual pleasure.
That’s why if you have an hour or two, pretty please, read A Study in Scarlet and tell me what other details piqued your curiosity.
Thank you for reading this post!
And see you next time!
*Search no more, my dear reader, for I have a perfect example of what vicarious pleasure is. The noble and gobble-up-everyone-you-see Count Dracula, being an avid reader and huge fan of England, indulged himself in reading everything he could about the country of his dreams:
“‘These companions’ — and he laid his hand on some of the books — ‘have been good friends to me, and for some years past, ever since I had the idea of going to London, have given me many, many hours of pleasure. Through them, I have come to know your great England’.”
** It is a pardonable thing — in reality, only a few things can never be forgiven — to believe that it was Arthur Conan Doyle who created the mystery genre.
If not him, who then? You raise your brows in disbelief.
Well, you can get your answer if you reread the first of many books about Sherlock Holmes.
The writer who invented all things mystery was the raven of literature, the sad and macabre Edgar Allan Poe.
