Sherlock Holmes of Baker Street By William S. Baring-Gould
I have this 1975 paperback edition of the book, and it is kinda worth it just for the cover-art here by Richard Clifton-Dey
This 1962 biography of Sherlock Holmes by William S. Baring-Gould is a weird book. It is an example of “playing the great game”, with the book being written from an in-universe perspective. Arthur Conan Doyle exists but only as the literary agent of Doctor Watson.
The main problem with this book is that is padded with these long quotes from the canonical cases, all be it re-written in third-person. Certain stories are re-told this way, while others are just mentioned in a sentence or two, and the selection often feels arbitrary. Sometimes there are changes to reflect Baring-Gould’s theories about the story, but most often it is just the canonical text, except in third-person. It is boring and unnecessary, for few would read this book without knowing Conan Doyle’s works. And shorter summaries would have sufficed to provide context for Baring-Gould’s theories, both for new-comers and to refresh the memories of fans. It feels like padding, these borrowings from the canon probably takes up half the book which would be a slim volume without them. I will confess I skimmed them.
What is the actually interesting about the book is Baring-Gould’s theories. It is by necessity mostly his own invention. The canonical information about Holmes’s life is very sparse and the chronology of his cases contradictory. So in order to create a biography Baring-Gould must invent a lot. The book is essentially fan fiction.
Still the book has been very popular in the Sherlock Holmes fandom and Baring-Gould’s theories became accepted as fanon for many. As a source of ideas about the life and chronology of Holmes, it is certainly useful when the actual canon has no information. You can see its ideas reflected in many pastiches. The idea of a third Holmes brother named Sherringford (after a rejected name for Sherlock in Acd’s early drafts) is very popular. The idea that Moriarty was once Sherlock and Mycroft’s mathematics tutor is used in Nicholas Meyer in The Seven-per-cent-Solution. The film Sherlock Holmes in New York is more an adaptation of Baring-Gould than Conan Doyle.
Still the book is definitely fan fiction, and it hasn’t changed that much in the last 60 years. Baring-Gould shipped Irene Adler/Sherlock Holmes. Turns out Godfrey Norton is a bad sort, and Holmes has to rescue Irene from him. They later get together in Montenegro during the great hiatus and have a son, who becomes Nero Wolfe, the detective in a series of books by Rex Stout. Holmes’s decision to retire is motivated by Irene’s death, and when he dies he says her name. It is of course an absolutely ridiculous love story. It is not supported by anything in SCAN and seems to exist mainly to make Holmes straight. The book is perhaps the main wellspring for the Sherlock/Irene ship and that might be the most negative legacy of this book in my opinion. It’s a middle-aged man writing fan fiction, and it is just as ridiculous as the worst of what 15 year-olds on AO3 dream up, except far more heteronormative.
Still there is actually something of value in this book. A lot of this book is similarly absurd as the Irene Adler love story, but in a far more entertaining fashion. I even enjoy the Nero Wolfe connection in that story, just because it is a bonkers cross-over.
It is not the only crossover in the book actually. In an early chapter discussing Holmes’s family, Professor Challenger and Sherlock are said to be cousins. This connection to the hero of The Lost World returns later in the book, which requires some explanation. In The Norwood Builder, Watson explains that not long after Holmes’s return, they dealt with “the shocking affair of the Dutch steamship Friesland, which so nearly cost us both our lives. “ And in The Lost Worldthere is another ship by the same name, “the SS. Friesland, a Dutch-American liner, “ which spots a pterodactyl that Challenger brought to London and who escaped. In Baring-Gould’s book, the two ships are the same. “The shocking affair” involved Holmes and Watson hunting the pterodactyl aboard the ship, and Watson killing it with his revolver, saving Holmes. The book anticipates The Asylum movie by almost 50 years.
Baring-Gould similarly makes the most of Holmes’s Tibetean sojourn during the hiatus, and has him searching and finding the yeti, the abominable snowman. It’s all ridiculous but also fun. And probably deliberately so. Baring-Gould was definitely aware of the humorous aspect of pretending Holmes was an historical person and writing his biography, which we get him having fun writing dinosaurs and yetis like this.
The book’s Tibetean chapter is actually a highlight of the book, also for reasons that are not quite as silly. The chapter touches upon Holmes meeting the Dalai Lama, and puts forth the theory that Holmes became a buddhist. And quotes a bunch of Holmes’s words and actions from the canon to support it. Probably my favourite theory from the book.
The chapter about Holmes hunting Jack the Ripper is also great fun, and features Holmes crossdressing as a sex worker to trap the ripper.
There are some other less interesting theories in the book, like Holmes actually being a touring stage actor for awhile in his youth. Another involves John Watson having a wife before Mary and moving to the US for a few years in the early 1880s. This is mainly so Baring-Gould can solve some continuity issues, and barely registers on the weirdness scale compared to the dinosaurs and yetis.
So this book is a mixed bag, which I can’t really recommend, certainly not unreservedly. It is an important part of fandom history, but it’s definitely heavily flawed. There is a lot of boring padding where Baring-Gould just retells the canon, the Irene/Sherlock shipping is annoying and turned out to be a bad influence. But there is also some outlandish imaginative ideas here that are fun to read. I can’t deny the joy of reading about Holmes crossdressing and going off hunting dinosaurs and yetis.
