Alistair Duncan's Blog, page 77

Facebook - update

The creator of the post that appeared to be from me has come forward. An apology has been made.

Eliminate the Impossible is available from all good bookstores, in many formats worldwide including Amazon USA, Barnes and Noble, Amazon UK, Waterstones UK, Amazon Kindle, Kobo, Nook and iBooks for the iPad/iPhone.

For more information on Arthur Conan Doyle and his time at Undershaw please refer to my book, An Entirely New Country which is available through all good bookstores including Amazon USA, Amazon UK, Classic Specialities, and in all electronic formats including iTunes, Kobo, Nook and Kindle .

Sherlock’s first film appearance – have we come full circle?

The first known appearance of Sherlock Holmes on film was in Sherlock Holmes Baffled which was created in 1900. It was a 30 second silent film in which Holmes attempts to capture a thief raiding what is presumably Baker Street. Every time Holmes gets close the thief vanishes.
Holmes on the right (just in case it wasn't clear)
So Holmes’s first film outing had an emphasis on special-effects and action, no deduction of any note took place and there was very little to link it to the source material apart from the name of the character.
We must consider ourselves lucky that no one does that these days.



Eliminate the Impossible is available from all good bookstores, in many formats worldwide including Amazon USA, Barnes and Noble, Amazon UK, Waterstones UK, Amazon Kindle, Kobo, Nook and iBooks for the iPad/iPhone.
For more information on Arthur Conan Doyle and his time at Undershaw please refer to my book, An Entirely New Country which is available through all good bookstores including Amazon USA, Amazon UK, Classic Specialities, and in all electronic formats including iTunes, Kobo, Nook and Kindle .

Limited Facebook return

I have taken the plunge and returned to Facebook. When I left it about a year ago I had no intention of returning. I just don't trust it as a platform. However, I felt that I was missing out on so much Sherlockian discussion that only seems to take place there.

So I have come up with a compromise. I have a new profile and have joined the relevant groups. However I will upload nothing in the way of pictures, I will accept no friend requests and will say and do nothing that isn't Sherlockian. Thus I deny Facebook anything especially personal or useful.

I am loitering around a few pages now. You can engage with me on the following pages:


SherlockologySherlock Holmes and Arthur Conan Doyle BooksThe Undershaw Preservation TrustMX PublishingThe one upside to rejoining was that I discovered that someone had a made a post that was clearly designed to look like it was coming from me without actually saying that it was and therefore actually engaging in, effectively, identity theft. One lady was clearly confused and believed the comment to be from me.



Eliminate the Impossible is available from all good bookstores, in many formats worldwide including Amazon USA, Barnes and Noble, Amazon UK, Waterstones UK, Amazon Kindle, Kobo, Nook and iBooks for the iPad/iPhone.

For more information on Arthur Conan Doyle and his time at Undershaw please refer to my book, An Entirely New Country which is available through all good bookstores including Amazon USA, Amazon UK, Classic Specialities, and in all electronic formats including iTunes, Kobo, Nook and Kindle .

Undershaw - Fight for its future

I first got involved with Undershaw back in 2009 through an organisation called “Hindhead Together”. A year later, when that organisation’s interest appeared to be on the wane, I became involved with “The Undershaw Preservation Trust”. Since that time there have been highs and lows. The planning permission was granted and challenged, the house fell into disrepair and nothing seemed to be getting done to address the deterioration. The very people whose job it was to guard the building just stood to one side and it was suggested in some circles that the very people who were trying to save the house (i.e. the UPT and those of a like mind) were principally responsible for its decline by standing in the way of the redevelopment that was proposed. The redevelopment was touted as the best (perhaps only) way of guaranteeing any future for the house. Undershaw - Feb 2012
Finally in May 2012 we had the Judicial Review - which was won by the UPT; appealed against by Undershaw's owners; the appeal refused; an appeal made against the rejected appeal and, finally, that appeal rejected.

Despite the above, and maddening though it is, there is no guarantee that the legal process has come to an end.
What was a relatively modest movement, in terms of the number of people involved, has grown, especially during the last year, into something much more significant. Through the power of social media the word has spread. Several books (starting with my biography of Conan Doyle’s time at Undershaw) have been produced where some or all of the proceeds have been placed at the UPT’s disposal and there have been many events that have promoted the cause. The supporters of Undershaw can possibly be accused of many things but sitting on their collective hands cannot be one of them.
Local press interest from The Haslemere Herald Feb 2012However, the situation now is no less perilous for Undershaw. The legal (and other) victories will be hollow unless the house can be taken in hand. Our biggest enemies now are time and nature. Every year that passes brings more weather damage to the house. Given their distinct lack of action to date, it seems unlikely that the council will do anything further to look after the building (unless they are compelled to).
Lunch during break in the Judicial Review proceedings May 23rd 2012So what do we do? The bottom line is that the house needs to be bought by those sympathetic to its history. This requires two things in order to come about. The present owners need to come round to the idea of selling at a sensible price and money needs to be found.
If you want to do more than voice an opinion you can start by making a pledge which you can do here http://www.saveundershaw.com/pledge-page.html.

This allows you to state how much money you would be prepared to donate to the cause. It is not legally binding but helps to give the UPT a good idea of the money it could reasonably expect to raise. It is not the only revenue stream, you can visit the Undershaw shop at http://www.saveundershawshop.com/index.html and you can buy my book by using the links at the foot of this post.
£1 or $1 it doesn’t matter. Every penny (or cent) counts. Get to it. Then we can hopefully move from Undershaw Preservation to Undershaw Restoration.



For more information on Arthur Conan Doyle and his time at Undershaw please refer to my book, An Entirely New Country which is available through all good bookstores including Amazon USA, Amazon UK, Classic Specialities, and in all electronic formats including iTunes, Kobo, Nook and Kindle .

Ross K Reads from Eliminate the Impossible

In this video, Ross K reads a small excerpt from my first book Eliminate the Impossible



Eliminate the Impossible is available from all good bookstores, in many formats worldwide including Amazon USA,  Barnes and Noble,  Amazon UK,  Waterstones UK,  Amazon Kindle,  Kobo,  Nook  and iBooks for the iPad/iPhone.

For more information on Arthur Conan Doyle and his time at Undershaw please refer to my book, An Entirely New Country which is available through all good bookstores including Amazon USA, Amazon UK, Classic Specialities, and in all electronic formats including iTunes, Kobo, Nook and Kindle .

Themes in the Canon

Warning: Some minor plot spoilers. If you've not read the entire canon - be warned.

For the first time I've sat down and had a look at the underlying motives in each of the sixty canonical Sherlock Holmes stories.
I eventually managed to divide them into the following groups: Self-defenceRelationships (positive/noble ones rather than ones that have fallen apart)EspionageAccidentGreedRevenge/jealousy

Now of course, some stories cut across more than one category but I’ve placed them under the heading that I consider to have been the greatest influence.
So let’s look at the smaller counts.
Self-defence
The Abbey Grange – The murder of Sir Eustace is deemed to be self-defenceThe Three Gables – Isadora Klein seeks a manuscript in order to defend or preserve her (pretty battered) reputation.
Relationships
The Noble Bachelor – Bride leaves Lord St Simon when she discovers her first husband is alive.The Yellow Face – The hiding of a child of a former relationship
The Yellow Face
The Three Students – Student sees exam papers early but his father’s former butler convinces him not to benefit from his advanced knowledgeThe Missing Three-quarter – Man goes missing to be with the (dying) wife he has hidden from his uncle.The Creeping Man – Man experiments with drugs to improve his vitality and impress a younger womanThe Blanched Soldier – James Dodd goes in search of his missing friend Godfrey.
The Blanched SoldierEspionage
His Last Bow – Holmes’s pre WW1 service
Accident
The Lion’s Mane – death caused by jellyfish
The Lion's ManeThis accounts for ten of the sixty stories. All of the others (50) fall into the revenge/jealousy or greed categories (by my count - 21 and 29 respectively). An example of revenge would be The Sign of Four. Even though the treasure means that it touches on greed, the motivation for events is revenge against Major Sholto. An example of greed would be Charles Augustus Milvertonwhere the proceeds of blackmail are the main motivation.
Charles Augustus Milverton
Try going through the stories yourself and see how closely (or not) your assessment tallies with mine.

Eliminate the Impossible is available from all good bookstores, in many formats worldwide including Amazon USA, Barnes and Noble, Amazon UK, Waterstones UK, Amazon Kindle, Kobo, Nook and iBooks for the iPad/iPhone.

A better claim for Undershaw

As readers of this blog will know, I am a big supporter of the movement to save Undershaw (Arthur Conan Doyle’s former Surreyhome) from redevelopment. It therefore irks me a little when others who also support this aim make inaccurate claims for the house.
The most persistent of these is that Conan Doyle wrote The Hound of the Baskervilles at Undershaw. This is only partially true and should therefore not be used as a major literary reason for saving the house.
The story was first serialised in The Strand Magazine and began publication just prior to the opening of William Gillette’s Sherlock Holmes play at the Lyceum Theatre. Conan Doyle wrote the story in chunks and sent it piecemeal to the magazine as he went along. Consequently, parts were written in Dartmoor, parts in central London and some, no doubt, at Undershaw.
A better literary claim for Undershaw is that it was the site of Holmes’s formal rebirth with many, but not all, of the stories making up The Return of Sherlock Holmes having been penned there.
Surely…
Undershaw - the site of Sherlock Holmes’s rebirth
…is better than…
Undershaw – where some of The Hound of the Baskervilles was written.

For more information on Arthur Conan Doyle and his time at Undershaw please refer to my book, An Entirely New Country which is available through all good bookstores including Amazon USA, Amazon UK, Classic Specialities, and in all electronic formats including iTunes, Kobo, Nook and Kindle .

To what extent does technology fuel “fandom”?

I was only just into double-figures when Jeremy Brett made his first appearance as Sherlock Holmes in 1984 so I feel positively ancient compared to the new generation of Holmes fans. For me, in the pantheon of great Holmes actors Brett occupies the throne but I acknowledge that it is a generational thing. For the generation before me Douglas Wilmer was number one and for the generation before them it was probably Basil Rathbone.
For the younger generation it is very much a certain Mr Cumberbatch. Why him and not RDJ? Well, I think you need to make a minimum number of appearances before you can be the Holmes of a generation and it is for this reason that Robert Downey Jr will not enter the pantheon (although his appearances will be remembered). A certain Mr Miller might manage it in the eyes of some if Elementary runs for a decent time but I honestly think that Benedict Cumberbatch’s claim on the throne is pretty secure (at least in the eyes of anyone under 30).
Rathbone, Wilmer, Brett & Cumberbatch - some of the pantheon's finest
But how famous would BC be without today’s social media and how famous would Brett and Wilmer have been if Twitter and Facebook (or indeed the internet itself) had been around to not only celebrate them but to also unite fans in their appreciation?
People have told me that there was a significant Brett fan movement in the 1980s and 90s but it managed to pass me by. He has a huge following now but, at the time, I considered myself to be alone in my appreciation of him. In 1994, when Brett last appeared as Holmes, the internet was only just really coming into being and fans probably communicated though good old-fashioned post/mail (aka snail mail) and the letters pages of magazines.
In some respects the lack of technology may have been a bonus to Brett and those before him. It may have been a comfort to know that there was a certain amount of clear blue water between them and their fans. Perhaps this is why Cumberbatch keeps away from social media (at least as far as we all know). Perhaps he wants to maintain a certain amount of distance, a certain amount of mystery, a certain amount of sanity?
I find it especially amusing to speculate what it would have been like for Basil Rathbone had he and Twitter been able to encounter each other. He made no secret of how he came to dislike the character and people’s inability to see him as anyone other than Holmes. How on earth would he have coped with immediate (and sometimes ill-thought out) critiques of his performances on the internet? How would he have coped with knowing that if he ever lost his temper with a fan the news would be global in minutes?
I suspect, not well…..

Repost of NBC video

The NBC story from an earlier post will no longer work from within the blog. You have to follow the link now. Also features Roger Johnson and BSB Kristina Manente @curlyfoureyes  http://www.wthr.com/story/19241155/sherlock-holmes-englands-super-hero

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http://www.kindlegraph.com/authors/alistaird221b

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