The greatest mystery was unwritten by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and certain fans of his Baker Street detective are eager to explicitly explicate about it. The question that has troubled movie makers (and by extrapolation movie goers as well) and writers (and their readers) is: Sherlock Holmes’ penis and where he puts it.
Did people ponder upon this during Doyle’s time? Were they just too polite to bring it up? If you can’t say the word penis without giggling or blushing scarlet, this essay isn’t for you. If you can’t say it at all, you’ll probably soon be suffering from traumatic psychosomatic blindness. That’s commentary enough on sex education in America without the help of silicone enhanced breasts.
Plastic surgery wasn’t in the mind of Doyle or his mentor–not in the Playboy fantasia girl-next door way. There were some things that were actually better in the good old days. The man who served as an inspiration for Holmes, Dr. Joseph Bell, was married (Edith Katherine Erskine Murry) and had a child (Benjamin Bell) who died in 1874. Bell died in 1911 at age 73.
Doyle was married twice. Once in 1885 to a Louisa Hawkins who died in 1906. They had two children. He married Jean Elizabeth Leckie in 1907. They had three children–the last one died in 1997 (Jean Lena Annette). His second wife died in 1940. Doyle died in 1930 at 71. Having a mind that can use deductive reasoning must have informed both Bell and Doyle that married life was a good thing for men, at least.
The fictional character Holmes never married. He did share rooms with Dr. Watson, but Watson married twice. Watson meets Mary Morstan during the story “The Sign of the Four” and becomes engaged. His second wife is mentioned, but never described or given a name. Nothing much has been made of the landlady Mrs. Hudson who must have been daft to put up with a tenant who puts bullet holes in the walls or maybe there was more to her and Holmes.
Described as “bohemian” in habit and having a cat-like love of cleanliness despite his occasional drug use, Holmes was attractive enough to women but he didn’t seem to have a high opinion of women. In “The Sign of Four,” Holmes says, “I assure you that the most winning woman I ever knew was hanged for poisoning three little children for their insurance-money” and he also comments, “Women are never to be entirely trusted—not the best of them.” Don’t you wonder about that persuasive little poisoner? Just who was she?
In “The Adventure of the Devil’s Foot,” Holmes tells Watson that he has never loved. This doesn’t sit well with many people. Holmes did become engaged in “the Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton,” but only to get information about the layout of a house. This was excusable because the woman in question had a jealous beau ready to take Holmes’ place. There was that attractive and intelligent Miss Hunter from “The Adventure of the Copper Beeches” who became a principal at a girls school. Yet most people settle on Irene Adler, the woman who fooled Sherlock Holmes and whose photo he kept.
Introduced in Doyle’s first story, “A Scandal in Bohemia,” Irene Adler is an American opera singer. She’s described as an adventuress which suggests she was a courtesan, having wealthy and influential lovers. She seems to have been modeled after the dancer Lola Montez or Lillie Langtry.
Montez was actually born in Ireland, had an affair with Franz Liszt and later with King Ludwig I of Bavaria who made her Countess of Landsfeld. Montez married several times, but ended up poor and died in New York at age 42.
Lantry was born in Jersey and married at 20 to Edward Langtry. Before she became an actress (she debuted to the London public in 1881), she became one of the mistresses of the Prince of Wales (Albert Edward). Edward was already married and his wife, Princess Alexandra had produced six children. Langtry would become mistress to several other men and marry a few as well before dying in Monaco in 1929.
One seems to forget that Irene Adler married a man, a lawyer named Norton. In Doyle’s story, Adler doesn’t seem to have shown any particular affection for Holmes, yet other authors beg to differ. She becomes his lover and produces Nero Wolfe according to John D. Clark–a stream of consciousness used by William S. Baring-Gould and Nicholas Meyer. Laurie R. King gives Holmes and Adler a son named Damian and provides Holmes with a much younger wife.
Let’s keep in mind that Doyle saw Holmes as a man mystified by women. Not just Irene Adler. There was “The Adventure of the Yellow Face,” a tale well ahead of its time, reminds us that race and love were treated differently in England and the U.S. Holmes completely misjudges Effie Munro, the wife of their suspicious client.
Consider that Holmes might be a genius, an analytical machine, but he wasn’t like the characters of the current TV series, “The Big Bang Theory,” a geek lacking in social skills as far as women are concerned. We know he could charm women.
Perhaps he had an unfortunate childhood experience as suggested as suggested in the 1985 “Young Sherlock Holmes” (although this negates his aforementioned statement from “The Adventure of the Devil’s Foot”) or his relationship with his mother was problematic as is suggested in the current updated BBC series “Sherlock.”
In “Sherlock” and the movie reboot starring Robert Downey Jr., Adler is not a woman seeking love who marries an intelligent professional man named Norton. She is clever, but is now cast as a damsel in distress. Instead of being a woman scorned and striving for a decent life, she’s portrayed as a bit shady. In the 2009 film “Sherlock Holmes” she is a skilled thief and con artist. She also has feelings for Holmes although we find she is working for his enemy Moriarty. Instead of saving Adler (Rachel McAdams) from a train and Snidely Whiplash, Holmes saves her from a bandsaw that she is heading toward, chained up. A bit of bondage or a James Bondian relationship transported back to Victorian England? Has Adler been reduced to little more than a Bond girl? Although Adler and Holmes work together to stop poisoning of Parliament, Holmes tricks Adler again, leaving her tied up awaiting arrest.
In the second installment of Guy Ritchie’s Holmes, “Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows,” Adler is again thwarted by Holmes in her mission to deliver a bomb for Moriarty. Moriarty poisons her and we’re told that she died.
With Holmes supposedly dead (but we know he’s alive) one can assume that Adler is also alive. Holmes in his Bohemian dissipated state as portrayed by Downey is hardly cat-like in his cleanliness, but he’s a lot of fun. Perhaps he’s a wee bit too old for the role though. But my main concern is Adler. Let’s consider a the original equation.
Irene Adler > Sherlock Holmes
Sherlock Holmes > Moriarty
Therefore, Irene Adler > Moriarty
This villification of Adler is part of a trend. Consider the 2007 BBC production “Sherlock Holmes and the Baker Street Irregulars” where Adler is Holmes’ nemesis.
Just as there’s something queasily wrong about the continued objectification of women in “Sports Illustrated” during a time when women have become professional athletes and GQ has increasingly entered the realm of Playboy in its portrayal of women, there is reason to question this trend in depictions of Sherlock Holmes and Irene Adler. By making Adler the damsel to be saved, are men grasping nostalgically for a distant time and era or signaling their hostility toward competent women of today?
If Holmes’ sex life is Doyle’s greatest mystery, then for us today, the greatest mystery may be: Why is Doyle’s portrayal of Adler in 1891 more liberated than the portrayals we’re being served up now?
Masterpiece mystery! premieres Sherlock, season 2, airing in three episodes: A Scandal in Belgravia (May 6, 2012) The Hounds of Baskerville (May 13, 2012) and The Reichenbach Fall (May 20, 2012) at 9pm on PBS (check local listings).
Age of the Geek 