Elementary, my dear!

Monday, September 15, 2008

Today began with the Sherlock Holmes Tour, led by Emma, Ben, Annie, and Sarah V. We started off interestingly enough, though not necessarily due to the subject matter. Right as we all met at the Sherlock Holmes statue outside of the Baker Street Tube station, a woman, followed by cameras, ran up to us and asked, “Which U.S. state is the surname of an actor from The Pelican Brief?” I don’t think any of us had seen The Pelican Brief, but we all guessed Washington for Denzel Washington. Then the woman ran off, cameras following, and a woman with a lot of legal papers and a headset stopped us and had us sign a release form. As it turns out, the woman was on a TV gameshow, and now we’re all going to be on Channel 4. Too bad I don’t have a TV. From the Tube station, we walked to the Sherlock Holmes Museum at 221b Baker Street and took a look around. From there, we took a quick stop at the Sherlock Holmes Hotel, which has no relation to the stories except the name, and then walked to where Sir Arthur Conan Doyle had his unsuccessful medical practice. The next stop was Scotland Yard, and then to the Sherlock Holmes Pub. One thing that each presenter kept stressing was that London, and the U.K. in general, basically treats Sherlock Holmes as if he was a real person, he’s so important. In fact, some ridiculous percentage thought he actually was a real person. It sort of reminds me of the Harry Potter hype, and how Kings Cross Station put a little plaque for Platform 9 ¾. The Sherlock Holmes tradition, though, seems to go beyond that, or maybe Harry Potter just hasn’t been around long enough. In addition to the Sherlock Holmes Hotel and Pub that we saw on the tour, there is obviously the fact that someone thought to buy the correct house on Baker Street and decorate it as if Sherlock Holmes and Watson had lived there. Then there’s the tube station, which is decorated with tiles showing the famous silhouette. There’s also an international Sherlock Holmes Society. In 2002, Holmes was actually inducted as an honorary fellow into the Royal Society of Chemistry.
I can’t think of any fictional character so honored in America. No matter how much a part of the fabric of society they are, there’s no one I can think of who is commonly mistaken for a real person. I wonder if it’s because the British are used to respecting idealized figureheads (that are nearly fictional for their distance), and therefore they are more open to accepting fictional characters. In America, we have pop icons, actors and musicians, but in general we grow attached to people that we can relate to. Sherlock Holmes’s past is so enigmatic and his intelligence so difficult to match, that he really is a distant figure. Perhaps, like the gardens, fiction is even more of an escape for the British than it is for Americans.

After the tour, a much of us got lunch at Sainsbury’s. Then I went back to the Arran House and had a celebratory piece of fudge cake with my Peter Pan group. In the afternoon I went to Camden Market with Lauren Deitz, Zach, Emma, Juli, Meghan, and Tristan. It was really cool, and sort of overwhelming. I bought a jacket, finally, which I think I’ll be using quite a lot. Camden is a great place, full of punk/goth/alternative/new age market shops and stores. It’s crazy, but wonderful.
I ate dinner at a pizza place on Goodge St, then did laundry. About 9 I got a pint with Katie at the Marlborough Arms just a block away. Now time for more work and bed.