I love Victorian fiction because it’s classy, it’s elegant, and there’s something to it that is timeless. Okay, that something may not be the attire, or the etiquette, or the fact that the post came twice a day because of prolific letter-writing. But my love for Victorian fiction includes Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. It's witty, the stories are good, and Sherlock acts like he has a secret from even the reader until the end when he oh-so-casually strolls around his parlor with a pipe and reveals all to John Watson -who, by the way, is not always as stupid as the old movies make him seem. I am a huge fan of Sherlock in general, but especially BBC’s Sherlock, not because it’s contemporary and has omitted obsolete vernacular (though I love it), but because the shows are surprisingly loyal to the stories they’re based on. Benedict Cumberbatch has a name that’s fun to say, and Martin Freeman is not only Bilbo Baggins but a unique Watson that feels so true to Conan Doyle’s vision that sometimes I think he needs a handlebar mustache and a bourgeoisie laugh.
But the best part about BBC’s Sherlock being contemporary is that sometimes I believe he exists
in real life. Why? Because he’s got something that CSI could never pull off,
and because sometimes I actually think Sherlock is teaching me how to navigate
the real world. Here are some lessons I’ve learned just this week.
1. The Science of Deduction.
If you’re writing an essay as, say,
a final, be sure that what you’re using 3-5 pages of Times New Roman
double-spaced to say something that will truly be different –but don’t try too
hard to be different. Use the Science of Deduction (or your brain).
While
grading yesterday, I learned a few things (and, yes, these are all direct
lines):
-Superhero movies bring sadness to
the home.
-American Pie is pretty much the
greatest movie of all time.
-Our country was founded on hemp.
-Women have been having babies
since the beginning of time.
-Justin Beiber is detrimental to
teen ears.
-“A woman, named anonymous, said…”
2. “Smart is the new sexy.”
After reading these, I’ve
never been so enchanted by a well-written paper before.
3. Sherlock-vision
The BBC
show and the Guy Ritche/Robert Downey Jr. versions alike do a fantastic job of
portraying Sherlock as a high-functioning sociopath. Of course, literature's first superhero needs a flaw. He’s rude, socially inept,
and self-absorbed, and someone once described his level of Asperger’s as akin to
being in a room with two TVs and the radio on, listening to them while
participating in a conversation and attempting to compose an essay. Unfathomable.
During the
last week of our Aerobic Kickboxing class, our instructor brought in a police
officer from campus security, a woman taller than my 6’2’’ brother and built
like a viking. Among several tips she had about not attracting any crimes
(locking doors, putting lamps on timers, watching what you put on Facebook
*ahem), she showed us some moves that attackers might attempt and how to defend
yourself.
Her best
advice: “Be observant.” Watch people around you, know where the exits are at
all times, know what you have that you could use defensively, and think about
what if’s before they happen. She, then, exemplified how she was driving, heard
sirens behind her, moved out of the way for the firetruck, and then looked
ahead to a semi that was rounding the corner. She thought, “What if he flips
over? How would I react?” A few minutes later, it did and she knew exactly what to do.
I think
many writers have what-if-vision: that moment when you think, okay, what if
while I’m standing in line at the bank, someone holds it up (and then the
subsequent thoughts unfold like the episode of Castle when the writer becomes the hero. Hah. Take that, James Bond). Or
maybe you’re hanging up Christmas lights, walking on the roof at your house and
a board squeaks. The next think you know, you’re in a scene in your mind and
you’ve lassoed the nearest feature of architecture before everything nearby caved in beneath you, and now you've used that string of
Christmas lights like Tarzan.
Wait- what?
My point is
that Sherlock-vision may, in fact, end up saving your life (if you don’t get too
carried away with saving the people in the bank or swinging from the edge of
your porch). By being observant and by looking at all loiterers as ne’er-do-wells,
you may have just enough time to put your keys between the knuckles of one hand
and be ready with your stiletto in the other just in time for someone to ask…
“Do you
know what time it is?”
Okay, maybe
that sounds more like paranoia than Sherlock-vision. My point is the same
though.
4. “A Scandal in Belgravia”
Sherlock is
taken to Buckingham Palace in a sheet because he refuses to get dressed. Yeah,
um, this may or may not be happening when I’m done administering English
finals. Jus’ sayin.
Also, you
never know when the Queen may be reading your blog.
‘ello, Mum.
