Sherlock Holmes

Sherlock Holmes refers to the character of Sherlock Holmes and the stories about his detective work that began in 1887 with the first story written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Since then, the stories have expanded into a large collection of literature, film, and television — some authorized by Conan Doyle's estate, some not,The current copyright status of Sherlock Holmes was contested, in part because one collection of Conan Doyle's stories was still under copyright in the United States until 2023. According to Sherlockian.net, all the stories are in the public domain in Canada and the United Kingdom. See Sherlockian.net's Copyright Summary, The New York Times article, and Techdirt's critique of that article. however currently most — if not all canon material by ACD — has entered the public domain in several countries since 2023.
The stories had a huge fan base when they were being published, and have continued to amass new fans in the century since then. This constitutes the oldest fandom as defined under modern-day definitions, and predates organised science fiction fandom by some decades. Several of the well known adaptations of these stories have also sparked their own separate fandoms. 
==Canon==
The 56 short stories and 4 novellas that comprise the Holmesian canon were written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle between 1887 and 1927. During the past century they have been adapted into countless plays, films and TV shows.
===Characters===
* Sherlock Holmes
* Dr. John Watson, Holmes' flatmate. Most of the stories are written in first person by Watson.
* Mary Morstan, a client of Holmes and later Watson's wife.
* Irene Adler, "The Woman."
* Professor James Moriarty, Holmes' arch-enemy.
:See also: :Category: Sherlock Holmes Characters
== Adaptations ==
Many film and television adaptations of Sherlock Holmes have developed fandoms of their own:
*Sherlock Holmes (1939 film series), series of films starring Basil Rathbone (1939-1946)
*The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, a Russian television series (1979-1986)
*Sherlock Holmes (Granada), starring Jeremy Brett (1984-1994)
*Sherlock Hound, aka Meitantei Holmes, an anime TV series, (1984-1985)
*Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd Century, an animated TV series set in the distant future (1999-2001)
*Sherlock Holmes (2009), starring Robert Downey, Jr. (2009, 2011)
*Sherlock (BBC), starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman (2010-2017)
*Elementary, starring Jonny Lee Miller and Lucy Liu (2012-2019)
*Yuukoku no Moriarty/Moriarty the Patriot, a manga series focused on William James Moriarty (2016~)
*Miss Sherlock, J-Drama where Sherlock as a woman (2018)
=== Spinoffs ===
*Enola Holmes, book series by Nancy Springer, and its film adaptations by Netflix starring Millie Bobby Brown as the title character and Henry Cavill as Sherlock, their brother (2020, 2022)
===Inspired Adaptations===
Sherlock Holmes has directly inspired other films and TV shows that aren't explicitly Holmesian:
*The Great Mouse Detective, a very thinly disguised animated film pastiche by Disney (1986)
*Detective Conan, aka Case Closed, an anime TV series. (1994~)
*House, M.D., featuring a Holmes-inspired doctor/detective of medical mysteries. (2004-2012)
==Fandom==
===A New Phenomenon===
Michael Saler discusses the paradoxes within the rise of Sherlock Holmes fandom as a phenomenon of modernity:
This modern phenomenon, which he attributes in part to being a response to pessimism in modern intellectual life, can be seen as a universal phenomenon:
He concludes that modern fandom might be seen as a subversion and extension of other forms of past devotion, and that Sherlock Holmes was the crossover:
===Canon Death and Fan Anger===
At the time they were written, the stories were immensely popular; Conan Doyle famously became tired of his other work being overshadowed by his detective stories and finally killed Holmes off in "The Final Problem" (1893), provoking an intense public outcry. Many people wore black mourning bands, newspapers around the world reported on Holmes' death or ran obituaries, and over 20,000 people cancelled their subscriptions to Strand Magazine, in which the stories had previously been published. It is reported that in the USA, "Keep Holmes Alive" clubs were formed, and whilst on a speaking tour there, Doyle stated, "I assure you, if I had killed a real man, I could not have received more vindictive letters than those which poured in upon me after that event." Christopher Redmond, Welcome to America , Mr. Sherlock Holmes: Victorian America Meets Arthur Conan Doyle (Toronto: Simon and Pierre, 1987), p. 163; quoted in Darren Hudson Hick & Craig Derksen, "Righteous Art Anger", The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Fall 2012, Vol. 70, No. 4, pp. 373-382, (p. 373). (JSTOR) A decade later, the author finally gave in and resurrected the detective for another three volumes' worth of adventures.
Hick and Derksen examine the "righteous anger" that fans expressed which led to Sherlock's resurrection, and they raise questions about its utilitarian purpose:
===Canon and Fandom===
Conan Doyle generally wrote the Holmes stories quickly and with a minimal amount of editing, and as a result the canon contains a huge number of mistakes and inconsistencies. It was from these that the practice of "Holmesian speculation" arose, which consists of pointing out discrepancies in the canon and devising (sometimes reasonable, sometimes extremely outlandish) explanations for them. Frequently discussed problems in the canon include the chronology of the stories (Conan Doyle was very often careless about dates, leading to a number of puzzling inconsistencies); the number of times Dr. Watson was married (a topic heavily intertwined with the chronology problem); and the question of Watson's war wound (said to be in his shoulder in A Study in Scarlet and in his leg in The Sign of Four). The earliest recorded examples of this fannish activity are from 1902, but the work that is considered to have really kicked off the fandom is Ronald Knox's 1911 essay, "Studies in the Literature of Sherlock Holmes," in which he satirized modern Biblical criticism by applying those same methods of analysis to Conan Doyle's stories.
As Knox jokingly compared them to the Bible, the early fandom quickly took to referring to the collected works as the "Canon" or the "Sacred Writings" (in fact, Holmes fandom was the first to use the word canon in its fannish sense).
L. N. Rosales observes that Sherlockian literature escalated:
This energised public interest led to the establishment of fandom:
Organized Sherlock Holmes fandom dates from 1934, when the Baker Street Irregulars were founded in New York City and the Sherlock Holmes Society arose in London. Both are active today, although the London organization was disbanded in 1937 and reformed in 1952. These groups expanded Holmesian speculation to create "the Great Game", which assumes that the stories are all accounts of true events written by Dr. Watson, and that Conan Doyle was merely Watson's literary agent. These assumptions, and the resulting scholarship, might be regarded as early manifestations of meta -- speculative or analytical material seeking to resolve apparent contradictions in Doyle's canon. 
In 1941, Rex Stout first proposed his infamous "Watson Was a Woman" theory, in which he pointed to numerous instances of what, today, would probably be considered slashy subtext in order to conclude that Watson was really female and that she and Holmes were married. The Baker Street Irregulars were not amused, although Stout's essay was very obviously tongue-in-cheek. This is notable as an early fannish discussion of genderswap, and the concept has reappeared consistently both in modern fanfic and in television adaptations -- notably the 1987 TV movie The Return of Sherlock Holmes featuring Margaret Colin as Jane Watson, and the 1999 animated series Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd Century, in which Inspector Beth Lestrade is a key character, and more recently in the television series Elementary, where John is changed to Joan Watson. 
In 1947, Jay Finley Christ devised the system of abbreviation that is still in use in the modern fandom: each canon story is represented by the first four letters of the first "significant" word in the title: so "A Scandal in Bohemia" is SCAN, "The Adventure of the Empty House" is EMPT, and so forth.
In 1981, for the 100th anniversary of Holmes and Watson meeting, fans gathered for Sherlockon in Los Angeles.
In recent times, fandom can be found around the world:
Despite the huge numbers of Holmes fans around the world, the fandom's online presence was surprisingly small; small enough, at least, that up through 2011, it remained an approved fandom for the annual Yuletide rare fandoms fic exchange (In 2012, mainstream Holmes was ruled ineligible, but certain specific sub-fandoms continue to be permitted). Nonetheless, Holmes/Watson slash fan fiction has become increasingly popular in recent years, probably influenced heavily by the 2009 movie franchise which was heavy on homoerotic subtext, and the BBC Sherlock TV series which fans also read as having a great deal of subtext.
From 2012 to 2016, The Sherlock Seattle Convention that celebrates all things Sherlock was held in Seattle.
===Vocabulary===
Pastiche was the word for "fanfiction" in traditional Holmes fandom. Today the two terms are sometimes used interchangeably; but fanfic more often refers to works published online, especially those written within the context of the broader media fan community; while pastiche is more often applied to print publications.
The Hiatus is the fannish term for the three-year (or in the real world, ten-year) period between The Final Problem and The Empty House, during which Holmes was presumed dead. Fans have entertained themselves for decades speculating on precisely what he was really up to during this period.
The Master is an old fannish nickname for Holmes himself. It's not used very commonly in the modern Internet-based fandom, possibly to avoid confusion with the arch-villain from Doctor Who.
Sherlockian fandom has also given fandom in general the terms Watsonian vs. Doylist, as labels for different ways to interpret a source text, plus Garrideb Moment, to describe the moment one character's injury reveals the deep feelings of the other as they react.
=== Pairings ===
The slash pairing of Holmes/Watson tends to be overwhelmingly the most popular ship in the original book fandom and almost all of its adaptations. There is also a great deal of gen fanworks focused on Holmes and Watson's platonic relationship, similar to what we see in canon. 
* Holmes/Watson
* Holmes/Adler
* Watson/Morstan
* Holmes/Moriarty
==Fannish Online Discussion==
Comments from Changes in Sherlock Holmes fandom over time, posted by damned colonial to the queering_holmes dreamwidth community on May 14, 2010:
==Published Pastiches==
Extra-canonical Sherlock Holmes literature is unusual, in that it includes both a large body of fan-produced work and a large body of professionally published material, much of the latter written by highly respected authors -- all of it arguably falling under the fanfiction umbrella. Sherlockian journals (the fandom's equivalent of fanzines) have existed for nearly a century, featuring both fiction and scholarly articles; according to some accounts, apocryphal Holmes stories comprise more than half of all English-language literary pastiches.
In one notable example, Dorothy Sayers, author of the Lord Peter Wimsey mysteries, once wrote a crossover in which an eight-year-old Peter Wimsey enlisted the help of Sherlock Holmes to find a lost kitten. – twice crossposted in DW, access DLS does crack When copyright was still in effect some of these derivative works, like Shadows Over Baker Street were approved by the Holmes estate, while others are not.
A sampling of professionally published Holmes-related fiction includes:
* The Final Solution by Michael Chabon 
* The Last Sherlock Holmes Story by Michael Dibdin (about Holmes' involvement with Jack the Ripper's killings)
* The Irene Adler series by Carole Nelson Douglas (beginning with Good Night, Mr. Holmes)
* The Mary Russell series by Laurie R. King (beginning with The Beekeeper's Apprentice)
* The Doctor's Case, by Stephen King
* The Professor Moriarty series by Michael Kurland (beginning with The Infernal Device)
* The Seven-Per-Cent Solution by Nicholas Meyer (a crossover in which Holmes meets Sigmund Freud)
* Shadows Over Baker Street: New Tales of Terror! edited by Michael Reaves and John Pelan, an anthology of crossovers with the Cthulhu Mythos. (Contains A Study in Emerald by Neil Gaiman, which won a Hugo Award for Best Short Story.)
* The Holmes-Dracula File, by Fred Saberhagen (first of several Holmes pastiches in Saberhagen's "Dracula" series)
A sampling of extra-canonical works derived from the Holmes mythos is listed on Wikipedia. See Non-canonical works related and derived from Sherlock Holmes, the Wikipedia Article for more informations. A considerably more complete bibliography is The Universal Sherlock Holmes, hosted by the University of Minnesota Library's Special Collections.
Some pastiches (notably the Mary Russell series and Gaiman's "A Study in Emerald") have spawned their own sub-fandoms, in which fanfic writers create stories that take place in the alternate universe established in the relevant source pastiche. Crossovers are a well-established trope in the fandom; Holmes has apocryphally encountered almost any real person or fictional character of the late 19th century one might care to name. In particular, having Holmes tackle the case of the Jack the Ripper murders is an extremely popular premise which has been used numerous times in books, film and video games. The detective has also been pitted against Count Dracula in multiple pastiches. The crossover tradition stretches back to one of the very earliest works of Sherlockian pastichery, John Kendrick Bangs' Pursuit of the House-Boat (1897), in which the ghosts of various real people, mythological figures and fictional characters mingle in the afterlife. This is also a rare example of a Holmes fic that was actually Jossed, as it was written during the period when Holmes was presumed dead after his battle with Professor Moriarty at the Reichenbach Falls.
==Outside of the English-Speaking World==
Judith May Fathallah has suggested that Sherlock Holmes represents a public discourse of white, British masculinity: "The position of White masculinity in Sherlock, particularly in relation to women and other ethnicities, is primarily one of command and mastery."Judith May Fathallah, The White Man at the Centre of the World: Masculinity in Sherlock, in Elizabeth Carolyn Miller (ed.), Fanfiction and the Author, Amsterdam University Press, 2017, p 59. (JSTOR) She explores how fanfiction and fandom have subverted and played with that template.
The Holmes stories have been quite popular in translation all over the world, and many popular adaptations and published pastiches exist in languages other than English.
*In Brazil, a book and a film were produced with Sherlock and John visiting Rio de Janeiro in order to investigate a mysterious murder, entitled "O Xangô de Baker Street" by Jô Soares in honor of African-based religions and their Orixás (The Xangô)
* The Sherlock Holmes stories were quite popular within Russia, and the later Soviet Union, and spawned a variety of Russian pastiches, one example being Sherlock Holmes in Downing Street a story from 1937.
* Sherlock Holmes has inspired a variety of anime/manga, such as Sherlock Hound, Detective Conan, and various doujinshi.
* There were many French pastiches in the first half of the 20th century, such as La Dernière aventure de Sherlhock Holmès (The Last Adventure of Sherlhock Holmès), which includes a misspelling of Sherlock's name, and a few parody comic strips, like Le Fils de Sherlock Holmes (The Son of Sherlock Holmes).
==Connections to Other Fandoms==
Sherlock Holmes is at least mentioned in an episode of most (if not all) of modern day crime dramas, and is occasionally central to episodes in a variety of other shows:
* CSI episode "Who Shot Sherlock" is about Holmesian cosplaying roleplayers and a mysterious murder among them.
* Doogie Howser episode "The Adventure of Sherlock Howser"
* Star Trek: The Next Generation has a two-episode arc about Moriarty (see below).
* Sesame Street has a muppet spoof character named Sherlock Hemlock.
* Futurama episode "Kif Gets Knocked Up A Notch" - a glitch in the "holoshed" leads to an appearance by Moriarty, a la the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode.
* Wishbone has two Sherlock Holmes episodes: "The Slobbery Hound" (based on The Hound of the Baskervilles) and "A Dogged Expose" (based on A Scandal in Bohemia).
* Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles episode "Elementary, My Dear Turtle" takes the turtles back in time to meet Holmes and help fight Moriarty.
* The Real Ghostbusters episode "Elementary My Dear Winston" features Holmes and Moriarty being made manifest by belief.
* Murdoch Mysteries has two episodes where Murdoch meets Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and a man who believes that he is the real Sherlock Holmes.
For more on Sherlock Holmes' connections to Star Trek, see Sherlock Holmes and Star Trek.
Image:datasherlock.jpg|art from Transwarp, Sha'eena
File:Men10art2.jpg|inside Menagerie #10, Doug Rice
Image:Holmesian1.jpg|Spock as Holmes in The Holmesian Federation
Image:whosblake3back.jpg|Data as Holmes in Who's Blake #3
Image:Bonesstrikes.jpg|Bones as Holmes in The Adventures of Sherlock Bones #2
===Star Trek: The Next Generation===
The Star Trek: The Next Generation episodes "Elementary, Dear Data" and "Ship in a Bottle" feature the character of Professor James Moriarty (introduced in the canonical story "The Final Problem"), as re-created by the holodeck computer on the USS Enterprise-D. The latter episode occurs several seasons after the first; the show's producers had initially assumed that Moriarty's character was in the public domain, but were contacted by the Doyle estate after "Elementary, Dear Data", which believed otherwise and sought payment for Moriarty's appearance.
===House, M.D.===
The character of Dr. Gregory House who solves medical mysteries in the TV show House, M.D., is a conscious echo of, or homage to, Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes. His friend Dr. James Wilson bears some resemblances to Watson in the Sherlock Holmes stories.
== Fanworks ==
===Fanzines and Journals===
:See List of Sherlock Holmes Zines for a complete list of Sherlock Holmes fanzines on Fanlore.
* The SH-sf Fanthology (1967-1972)
* Friend of My Heart (1993-1994)
* Watson's Sketchbook (2024)
See also:
* A list of fanzines is also kept here (last updated in 2002)
* A source for slash Sherlock Holmes zines is at Gay Sherlock Holmes
=== Doujinshi ===
:See List of Sherlock Holmes Doujinshi for a complete list of Sherlock Holmes doujinshi on Fanlore
*Kenja no Okurimono
*Recalling Sherlock Holmes
*The Red River Valley
=== Vids === 
Until the premiere of Sherlock Holmes (2009), the few vids available online were mostly from the Granada series with Jeremy Brett. However, more vids are now being made from a number of different adaptations. See Sherlock Holmes (Granada) and Sherlock Holmes (2009) for examples. Lots of fans are also vidding Sherlock (BBC).
Vids featuring clips from multiple adaptations are also emerging, including:
*Whole New Way - by mresundance for Bascon (2010) - This fits Sherlock, Sherlock Holmes (2009), the original stories, and the fandom itself into one slash vid.
*Something Good (Will Come From That) - by sanguinity for Holmestice (summer 2016) - This ambitious - not to say monumental - vid celebrates the full breadth of Holmes fandom, incorporating images from literally dozens of unique Holmesian adaptations. The AO3 archive includes commentary and a full list of sources by timestamp.
*Stranger Things by rachelindeed for Holmestice (summer 2019) - Aptly subtitled "an ode to bonkers Holmesiana" by its creator; includes images of aliens, dogs, dinosaurs, mice, Muppets, ferrets, vegetables, and more
=== Fanart ===
* Fanart/Story Illustrations by Noel Dwyer - includes illustrations for her own stories, non-story-related fanart, and ballpoint-pen studies of three of the actors who played Sherlock Holmes along with one actor who played Watson.
* Sherlock Holmes by JamesTheShark 
* Christmas Sherlock Holmes by kissyushka
* Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective by modigazzi
==Gallery of Sherlock Holmes Fan Art==
File:Shadesofsherlock.jpg|cover of an issue of Shades of Sherlock by J. Jackson (1972)
File:Holms4art1.jpg|interior art from an issue of The Holmesian Federation, artist: Melody Rondeau (1983)
File:Callofthehuntback.jpg|back cover of The Call of the Hunt, artist unknown (approx. mid-1980s)
File:PeruvianBirdBow2-2.jpg|cover of an issue of The Peruvian Bird-Bow (1991)
File:Holmes&Watson.jpg|cover of an issue of No Holds Barred, artist: Caren Parnes (1992)
File:Sherlockhorsefox.jpg|"Sherlock Horse and Fox Watson," art by MJRiddle (1992)
File:Friendof.jpg|cover of Friend of My Heart, art by Sidney Carton (1993)
File:Advenreichenbach.jpg|The Adventure of the Reichenbach Resurrection, written by L.A. Adolf, art by Lorraine Brevig (2010)
File:Holmeschinesedo.jpg|cover of Táo zǒu de zhōng quǎn by Luó Chuān, a Chinese yaoi doujinshi (2010) 
==Meta/Further Reading==
* Watson was a woman?, available in PDF or HTML TEXT by Rex Stout (1946)
* by wisdomeagle at Shipper's Manifesto (2004)
* With Love, S.H.; fan blog with a focus on Holmes/Watson, contains meta, interpretation of the canon from a slash perspective, and reviews of different adaptations. (defunct, archive link)
* Sherlock Holmes: Asexual Icon by David J Bradley (2021)
* by somethingintheforest (2023)
*This Week In Fandom History episode, 'December 1893: Sherlock Holmes Fandom Goes Into Mourning'
*The Gay Elephant META in the Room: Sherlock and the Johnlock Conspiracy by E. J. Neilsen, in "Queerbaiting and Fandom: Teasing Fans through Homoerotic Possibilities", University of Iowa Press, 2019, pp. 82-94. (JSTOR)
== Archives, Communities, and Links ==
=== Fanart links ===
*Sherlock Holmes fanart on DeviantArt
*Sherlock Holmes fanart on Fanpop
===Fanfiction links===
*Lyra's Holmes Watson Slash Links
*Holmesslash, Yahoo group
*Cox and Co. Holmesslash community on LiveJournal
*Sherlock Holmes stories at Yuletide.
*All Holmes-related stories at Archive of Our Own
*Sherlock Holmes Kink Meme once an active kink meme, now an archival community for any Holmesian fandom with many prompt fills preserved
=== Fannish Resources Online ===
*A Layman's Guide To The Holmes/Watson Relationship
*Camden House illustrated text of Doyle's Holmes stories, collection of images and sounds; English-language site based in Germany.
*Yoxley Old Place - Sherlock Holmes on the Web, a huge fan resource
*Foxhound's Sherlockian Page , a defunct Geocities site that included resources, essays, links, and pastiches
*list of Sherlockian fansites on GeoCities.
*WelcomeHolmes - a Holmes mailing list on Yahoo! Groups, 1999-2019.
==Notes==
==References==
 
Category:Sherlock Holmes