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Sherlock Holmes and Victorian Homosexuality

[This is the final post in my series on Strangers: Homosexual Love in the Nineteenth Century by Graham Robb. Previous posts can be found here.]

Dearest friends. Dear sweet ones. Dear softest lambs. Prepare yourselves.

Robb’s last chapter is on literature and literary references to homosexuality.

And he chooses to talk – at length – about Sherlock Holmes and John Watson.

He writes:

The following observations are not a sly attempt to ensnare the great detective in the elastic web of gay revisionism. Everyone already knows, instinctively, that Holmes is homosexual.

Well then.

If there is one post you read from this series, it should be this one.

First, Robb includes a brief analysis of earlier detective characters, such as Poe’s Dupin, of whom he writes this little nugget:

There is, of course, nothing essentially odd about the passionate, secretive and nocturnal friendship of two strange men in a crime-ridden city, even if one of them is a dandy with a “diseased” mind and the other…finds a muscle-bound sailor…”not altogether unprepossessing.”

and notes that as of the mid-1800s, even fictional references to two men “keeping the shutters closed” while at home together sounded suspicious.

Quite the precursor to johnlock vibes, no?

It gets better.

Robb begins his discussion of Holmes and Watson by examining previous adaptations of ACD’s stories, including whether or not Holmes was coded as homosexual:

Screen adaptations are a good test. The least convincing are always those that provide him with a girlfriend. The most convincing, like Billy Wilder’s The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1970) – promoted as “a love story between two men” – are those that exaggerate his camp behaviour. Without the tense, suppressed passion that binds him to his biographer, Holmes is just a man with an interesting hobby.

(Click on the link to see Martin basically saying that exact same thing.)

Excuse me while I restart my heart.

Arthur Conan Doyle

Robb remarks that “Conan Doyle himself was quietly ambivalent on the subject of homosexuality” but had once requested information on sexual perversion (aka it means what you think it means) from a gay man (Roger Casement) whom ACD later publicly supported when Casement’s own homosexuality was revealed.

ACD was also supportive of Oscar Wilde, and Robb argues that “Holmes himself bears a striking resemblance to Oscar Wilde.” Doyle first met Wilde in August 1889, after which Wilde wrote and published The Picture of Dorian Gray, “a book which is surely upon a high moral plane,” according to Doyle. Other reviewers thought it obviously homoerotic and said it was unsuitable for anyone other than “outlawed noblemen and perverted telegraph boys” – the book was later used as evidence against Wilde in his trial. Likewise, Doyle wrote and published The Sign of Four after their meeting. Even 35 years later, Doyle well remembered “that golden evening” during which Wilde had made an “indelible impression” upon him.

~~doesn’t that sound like John talking about meeting Sherlock in ASiP~~

“Queer”

Robb analyses many character traits that Holmes shares with other aesthetes of his era (who were often homosexual) and also notes the unique qualities of his brother Mycroft Holmes, who spends time at the Diogenes Club, “the queerest club in London, and Mycroft, one of the queerest men.”

Yes, but queer?

According to Robb’s research, in 1894, “queer” had already acquired its modern sense. Oscar Wilde’s prosecutor, the Marquis of Queensberry, had referred that year to “the Snob Queers like Roseberry” [sic]. The words “earnest” and “languid”, used in other stories and applied to Holmes, also had homosexual connotations during that time period.

Relationship with Watson

Robb notes that “the only woman [Holmes] admires is Irene Adler, who dresses as a man” during ACDcanon ASiB. In every other sense, the “softer human emotions” in Holmes are reserved entirely for Watson.

Sorry, need to restart my heart again.

In the stories, Holmes tries to display partner (read: wifely) qualities such as preparing dinner (a meal of grouse and oysters) and showcasing a lovely bedside manner (lulling Watson to sleep by playing violin). Sadly, Watson doesn’t leave Mary and Holmes loses him with “a most dismal groan.”

Robb writes:

Happily, Mrs. Watson never materialises and has the grace to be dead by 1904. “Old times” return, with many moments of fervent intimacy: Watson’s hands are clutched, his knees patted, and his ears brushed by Holmes’s whispering lips. When the trail leads out of London, they sleep in “double-bedded” rooms.

Then he quotes Garridebs, which I just literally cannot at this point.

Basically, “the 19th-century man of forensic investigation meets the 19th-century man of medicine in a loving embrace” after the wound is noticed and dear god, save us all from this hell.

Public Perceptions

Robb considers that “a writer who could tease his readers with untold tales like that of the Giant Rat of Sumatra (”for which the world is not yet prepared”), was certainly capable of toying with the subscribers of The Strand Magazine and their amazing infatuation with Holmes.” Um, come again?

~~ARE YOU SAYING ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE DID THE SAME THING WITH THE STRAND PEOPLE AS MOFFTISS HAVE DONE WITH US~~

*shakes fists at the sky*

Sherlock Holmes

TW: implied underage sexual relations in the very next paragraph, skip to second paragraph to avoid

Holmes “trains a gang of little urchins and in The Hound of the Baskervilles (1901) adopts a fourteen-year-old telegraph boy as his valet, which was hardly an innocent act after the Cleveland Street scandal”. This had occurred some years earlier and involved young telegraph boys who worked as prostitutes for older, wealthy men. Robb notes that Holmes’ pack of boys not only help out with errands but also “fill up the gap of loneliness and isolation” which sometimes clouded Holmes – implying perhaps some other relationship beyond casework. This casual reference would not have been missed.

Robb argues that Holmes’ sexuality is “an essential part of his character”. He has a “distinctly homosexual lifestyle” in the stories:

he goes to the Northumberland Avenue Turkish baths with Watson, of which Watson says they both “have a weakness”
he is said to read things which had homosexual connotations at the time, including Horace, Catullus, Hafiz, and Thoreau; anthropology, medicine, scandal sheets and police records
he goes to Chinese opium dens, hangs out with “rough-looking men”, and changes his personality/appearance at will (including dressing as a woman) based on what part of London he is visiting

All of these were things that were attached to real or fictional homosexual men in the late Victorian-era.

Connection to Victorian Laws and Scandals

Holmes first appears in print two months after the Labouchere Amendment which made gross indecency a crime. He also appeared in February 1890, during the fevered publicity of the Cleveland Street scandal. He asks Watson to run away with him to the Continent after nearly losing his life in Vere Street – another name associated with homosexual scandals. Robb also questions what we are to make of Moriarty, given the “dark rumours” that forced him to resign his university job and the “hereditary tendencies of the most diabolical kind” that he supposedly suffers from.

~~maybe because Moriarty is also coded as gay~~

Ultimately, Robb concludes that these too were tales “for which the world was not yet prepared.”

Conclusions

The sexually ambiguous detective and his unusually devoted companion actually appears more often than one might think in literature that came out of this time period. Robb lists several other pairings that follow this same sort of mold, although he acknowledges that it wasn’t “conscious imitation” since no one at the time outed Holmes as being homosexual, except for “casual humourists.”

Robb notes several similarities between the “urban homosexual” of the late Victorian-era and the fictional character of “private detective”:

heightened awareness
the wearing of masks (literally or figuratively)
the street-wise reading of signs
the ability to operate in different milieux
reading the secret configurations of the city
understanding that sexual singularity was key to a hidden world
habit of avoiding detection
ability to identify others who are similar
domestic arrangements open to change
knows how to converse with strangers

He argues that the detective figure – and the success of these stories and characters, including Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes – shows a “direct and positive influence of gay culture on the majority culture.” However, he ends with the acknowledgment that most gay men and women of this time would have been happy to exchange their literary influence for “respectability and affection,” something that was not forthcoming around the turn of the century.

Lucky for us, it’s no longer the 19th century. Here is the chance for Holmes and Watson to love each other openly. After over 100 years of being trapped between the lines, researchers and adapters are finally setting them free.

MASTERPOST – STRANGERS: HOMOSEXUAL LOVE IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY

weeesi:

THE SERIES IS NOW COMPLETE!
Here’s what we learned from Graham Robb and his brilliant book:
1) What ACD said about Oscar Wilde, how do you know if you have homosexual “characteristics”, and why the colour green is gay
2) Turkish bathhouses, the Achilles statue, and my dear boy
3) Lifting the veil, coded meanings, and red neckties/handkerchiefs
4) Gay marriages took place in secret in the 19th century
5) Knee gropes and “crude symptoms of physical sexual sympathy”
6) Homosexuality in Victorian literature, Part 1
7) Homosexuality in Victorian literature, Part 2
8) Sherlock Holmes and Victorian Homosexuality – original post
9) Sherlock Holmes and Victorian Homosexuality – with extended material on ACD, authorial intent, and Hellenic influences on 19th century gay culture
10) Link to purchase the book from amazon.co.uk

deeisace asked:

Hi! I've just seen that post you wrote about Matt Cook's London and the Culture of Homosexuality - the bit about the famous trial, you know there's a book about that? Fiction, from the point of view of the daughter of their landlord, but based on all the archived newspaper articles and records. It's called The Petticoat Men by Barbara Ewing. I'm only a bit the way through, but it's good so far!

Oh brilliant! I didn’t know about that book but I’m adding it to my list now :) Matt Cook doesn’t go into loads of detail about the case (at least so far, in the parts I’ve read), but it sounds so incredible. I’m only moderately familiar with the details of Oscar Wilde’s trials but I’d love to learn more about other famous cases, even fictionalised accounts. Thanks for the rec!
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Question: does this book delve into female homosexuality at all?

weeesi

@justacookieofacumberbatch unfortunately it does not. Cook states in the introduction that the term “homosexual” should of course not automatically refer to men, but that in this book he will focus only on male homosexuality “to avoid collapsing two distinctive sexual subjectivities and relationships to the city.” So this might not be quite as suitable if you’re looking for resources that focus on female homosexuality during this time.

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mostlyanything19 asked:

Hi can I ask you something? That book you're reading - London and the Culture of Homosexuality - can you tell me a bit more about it? That's a topic I'm extremely interested in (especially bc of my passion for the original Holmes stories) and your post made me consider buying it, but it's quite an expensive purchase in my country. I guess you haven't read all of it yet but maybe if you're further into it, could you tell me if you still think it's worth getting? That would be great!

Hi! I think if you’re pretty interested in queer history and particularly this era of (male) homosexual history, you’d like the book. He focuses on cultural geography in a way – how gay men experienced London and how place/space can influence sexual identity. Cook documents homosexual subculture in a time when it was illegal to be gay/engage in gay sex and references a lot of diaries/first hand accounts, which is brilliant. He also talks about homosexuality in the law, the press, literature, popular culture, etc.

I’m in the 2nd chapter now. His writing is a bit academic so my reading pace is slower but it’s well-written and I learn something new in just about every paragraph. There’s also illustrations and pretty lengthy bibliography.

I bought my copy at the Wellcome Collection in London and paid about £20 for it, which was a splurge for me on a book! But I’ll continue to use it in my research so I considered it a treat.

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TJLC IS REAL: Carefully-Chosen” Words and Public Opinion

Or, Another Installment in:

Weeesi Liveblogs “London and the Culture of Homosexuality, 1885-1914″ by Matt Cook and Flails Continuously Because Reasons

(Previous posts here, here, here, and here. I’m also tagging with “london and the culture of homosexuality” but apparently tracked tags are no longer a thing so idk.)

Let’s talk about words.

Mark Gatiss revealed the title of the previously-untitled shspesh at the MCM London Comic Con panel a few weeks ago.

“The. Abominable. Bride.”

Many people quickly realised the connection to “Ricoletti of the club foot and his abominable wife“ in The Adventure of the Musgrave Ritual, the same story in which Watson refers to himself as Bohemian, a word we’ve already explored as being connected to queer culture around the turn of the century in London.

So, who is the abominable bride? What’s so abominable? And why use the word abominable in the first place?

What’s the significance of the word abominable?

The Buggery Act of 1533 “codified sodomy into secular law as “the detestable and abominable vice of buggery”, which remained a capital offence until the Offences Against the Person Act was enacted in 1861.

@skulls-and-tea and @wellthengameover also talked about the use of the word abominable in the Offences Against the Person Act of 1861 and a possible connection to a (gross indecency) trial taking place in TAB.

As we’ve established, during the late-Victorian era it was clearly against the law to engage in homosexual activity. Various laws and amendments meant any homosexual activity – at all – was illegal in both public and private spaces. The Criminal Law Amendment Act of 1885 recriminalised (male) homosexuality due in part to Section 11, the Labouchere Amendment, which read:

”Any male person who, in public or private, commits, or is party to the commission of, or procures the commission by any male person of, any act of gross indecency with another male person, shall be guilty of a misdemeanour, and being convicted thereof shall be liable at the discretion of the court to be imprisoned for any term not exceeding two years, with or without hard labour.”

(Both Oscar Wilde and Alan Turing were convicted and sentenced under Section 11. It was only repealed in part in 1967 and stayed on the statute books until 2003. That is truly abominable.)

Now the word “male” was explicitly written into the law. Male homosexuality in particular was outlawed. Additional legislation, such as a clause in the Vagrancy Law Amendment Act of 1898, caused one man to despair that “an alleged smile or wink or look may cause an arrest.” Behaviour that was not even explicitly sexual was under suspicion. Being in a certain place at a certain time with a certain person looking a certain way was often cause for interrogation, arrest, and imprisonment. In other words, Cook says, “the police did not arrest because sexual acts had actually been committed but on the basis of a judgment they had made about the propensity of an individual to commit them.” This sent a message to the wider public and the homosexual subculture as to the “expectations of private conduct and public behaviour”, although essentially, even private behaviour was subject to the law.

Statistics on arrests, persecutions, and imprisonments were collected during this time and show fluctuations due to the enactments of these legal provisions. Accordingly, “details of homosexual crime appeared more frequently in the newspapers…significantly increasing exposure” to the public with consistent (often literally daily) reminders of the perils of engaging in homosexual activity. As much as we love a good scandal today, the same could be said for the late 19th century, as newspapers competed to ramp up their coverage of the latest major trial whilst still “communicat[ing] cogent moral messages to a massive readership”.

As a result, the average London newspaper reader was bombarded with conflicting information, a strange combination of “here’s the scoop on these two men who got it on” but also “this stuff is horrible and how dare you be interested in it.”

Except, newspapers didn’t just use “horrible” to describe these cases of homosexuality.

They used the word abominable.

The word abominable was used to describe 1) the physical places that men would have sex and 2) the actual act of homosexual sex itself.

One of the most well-known cases of this time was the 1889 Cleveland Street Scandal, which involved a homosexual male brothel in London. Newspapers such as Reynolds called the Cleveland House an “abominable institution” and referred to the “abominable orgies of Cleveland Street” in its coverage of the case.

The use of the word “abominable” had important implications here, because essentially newspapers couldn’t actually say what the actual sexual acts were. The newspaper reader had to fill in the details based upon how the circumstances were described and readers had to deduce what was meant by reading subtext in the reporting. Cook explains:

“The newspaper reader often had to gather clues from details of place and appearance in order to discern the crime, which was often not made clear. Whilst the courts heard descriptions of sexual acts, the newspapers referred to ‘gross indecency’ or ‘unnatural’, ‘infamous’ or ‘unnameable’ offences.”

Since these same types of descriptors were used repeatedly, readers were gradually able to pick up on these clues. This resulted in an “increasingly clear sense of what in fact was being spoken about” and actually started to engender some sympathy for the homosexual on trial…and sort of…homosexuals, all together.

Wait. What?

A month after Oscar Wilde’s trial and conviction, Reynolds (that same newspaper that loved the word “abominable”) published a more “measured” editorial and a series of letters from readers that expressed support for Wilde. One woman even signed hers “A woman who believes in Oscar Wilde.”

(Remind of you anything?)

Cook explains what happened this way:

“[George] Ives, [a friend of Wilde’s and a gay man] detected ‘a change in the ethical atmosphere’ after the trials and four months later noted that ‘the change in public feeling, if one may judge from the gossip in the clubs etc., is truly wonderful; men very hostile a few months ago, now admit this or that, and seem truly on the road to reason.’ Whilst club gossip is not a sufficient gauge of public opinion, the trials clearly did not simply reaffirm prevailing attitudes about homosexual activity. They also provoked dialogue and, Ives suggested, some change of heart.”

Ives later records his joy at a magistrate using the words “senselessness” and “cruelty” to describe sentences given to homosexual men instead of “abominable.”

Clearly, “some change of heart” does not mean “everything was fine”, nor does it imply that all (or even the far majority of) Londoners held these opinions.

But…

Popular newspapers like Reynolds used very particular words – words chosen with care – in their coverage….

They relied heavily on subtext and their readers’ ability to pick up on clues…

They had the power to (and did) publish some readers’ support for homosexual men…

…which, at least in one (gay) man’s view, resulted in a ”change in public feeling” and perhaps even “provoked dialogue.”

What else is currently working against “prevailing attitudes” about the depiction of homosexuality in culture?

Oh.

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6) Sherlock fits a case study of a period-relevant homosexual man

I’m in a part of the book (London and the Culture of Homosexuality, 1885-1914) where Cook is talking about the beginnings of sexology and the study of homosexuality. Many early books published on these topics included detailed sexual case studies. One of the most well-known was Psychopathia Sexualis: eine Klinisch-Forensische Studie (Sexual Psychopathy: A Clinical-Forensic Study) by Richard von Krafft-Ebing. As an example, Cook outlines one of Krafft-Ebing’s case studies of a young (homosexual) man:

“The patient went to university in ‘the city’ at nineteen and began to be dandified…

…He wore striking cravats…

…and shirts that were low cut…

…forced his feet into narrow shoes…

…and curled his hair in a remarkable way…

…He abstained from sex for some time by using cocaine…

…and living in the country…

…before being arrested for having sex with a man just outside the city walls.”

I’ll leave you to your deductions.

(previous posts in this series: here, here, here, here, here)
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7) Anal violins

um

The book (London and the Culture of Homosexuality, 1885-1914 by Matt Cook) is covering the study of “erotic anthropology” and very early versions of sex toys and…

…there’s a thing…

…some men liked to use…

…called…

…an anal violin.

I’ll let you fire up good ol’ Google for some visuals there.

And a description of how it is “played”.

Let’s just say….well, yeah. I think it’s pretty obvious the possibilities for a 19th century gay man who, you know, plays the violin.

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8) Gay graffiti worth writing about in your memoirs

In London and the Culture of Homosexuality, 1885-1914, Matt Cook discusses places in London that were highly associated with homosexual subculture, largely based on locations that various homosexual writers (including Oscar Wilde) referenced in their work during this time. This is essentially like compiling a list of certain spots that were known to be Very Gay.

One of these writers, John Addington Symonds, was working on his Memoirs in about 1889, right around the time of the Cleveland Street Scandal. In one passage, Symonds writes about seeing a “a rude graffito” which he described as:

“an emblematic diagram of phallic meeting, glued together gushing”

and accompanied with the words…

“prick to prick so sweet”

Symonds helpfully notes that this graffiti was “scrawled on a wall ‘in the sordid streets’ just to the west of Regent’s Park”.

Come again?

He further clarifies it was located between his home near Paddington Station and Regent’s Park.

Let’s take a look at a map.

Here’s the area:

Oh, what do I spot in the middle there?

Symonds was a real guy who saw this real graffiti somewhere in this real area during this time and actually wrote about it in his memoirs.

And just two years prior, two very famous fictional bachelors moved in together in this same area…

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9) Cabs were helpful, Gothic romance was queer, literary gay subtext was criminal evidence, the male-on-male gaze was a stand-in for sex, and idealised male nudes were all the rage

Another Update

I’m nearing the end of the book, dear friends. London and the Culture of Homosexuality, 1885-1914 by Matt Cook has served us well, and I have a few long meta/posts planned. In the meantime, here’s more goodies:

1) The homosexual subculture of late-Victorian London flourished when men were able to move quickly and anonymously through the city in order to meet and socialise (and have sex). Men who were the most successful had the money to pay for cabs.

2) Gothic romance was queer; Dracula was undoubtedly very queer. For more on just how queer, check out @heimishtheidealhusband‘s incredible meta Ghost Stories are Gay Stories.

3) The gay subtext in Oscar Wilde’s writing was actually used against him in his trials. The Picture of Dorian Gray was perceived by opposing counsel to be “calculated to subvert morality and encourage unnatural vice”. Other literature that was deemed to be questionable was highly scrutinized. This is my personal conjecture, but I feel it entirely reasonable that ACD/his editor/his publisher would be a little worried about his stuff coming off a too gay, hence moustaches (and Mary).

5) While still we’re talking about literature, remember John Addington Symonds? The guy who saw some dick graffiti on his walk home and thought it so memorable that he wrote about it in his Memoirs? He used the male-on-male gaze as a “key erotic modus operandi” in his writing and employed it almost “to stand in for sex”.

Cook notes that “fleeting exchanged glances” were becoming “key to ideas of modern homosexual identity.”

*coughs out a lung*

(It was hard to pick a gif but this is sort of the ultimate. Also: not so fleeting.)

5) Ancient Greece and all things Hellenic were all the rage, as was collecting photography/statues of the idealised male nude. Homosexual men would hang out in the statue gallery of the British Museum to, you know, appreciate the… art.

Like, this kind of art?

[x]
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10) Every Great Cause Has Martyrs - how language used in the TAB trailer mirrors that used by Victorian homosexual men

Every Great Cause Has Martyrs

The trailer for TAB includes some interesting words:

SHERLOCK: Every great cause has martyrs. Every war has suicide missions and make no mistake, this is war.

Words are important. Words tell us everything.

In London and the Culture of Homosexuality, 1885-1914, Cook discusses the perspectives of homosexual men and their personal relationships to homosexual identity. The language in the TAB trailer echoes the language that these men routinely used to describe their struggle for legitimacy.

Some men, like Edward Carpenter, “looked at homosexuality as part of a wider vision of social renewal and reform” and used their writing as a tool to work towards changing the status quo.

Other men, such as George Ives, “developed a much more combative stance in his evolving politics and in the language he used“ in his writing (both private and public) in terms of agitating for change in the way that homosexuality was understood.

What kind of language?

Ives “envisaged a dichotomy” between “them” and “Us”.

Ives referred to:

“the battle”
“the fight”
“traitors”
“the cause”
and “workers for the cause”

Here’s something really interesting:

In the 1890s, Ives formed a private group called the Order of the Chaerona:

“an exclusive and secretive support and pressure group composed of men who drew on Hellenism to understand and legitimise their desires. The affiliation and the ritual that cemented it constituted a protective and quasi-Masonic bond based specifically on sexual preference. It formed an invisible boundary between ‘them’ and ‘Us’ and sustained an exclusive fraternity and virtual safe space in the city for Ives and his fellow members.”

The name of the group came from the Battle of Chaerona in 338BC, after the Theban bands of Greek men who fought “alongside their male lovers and were revered for their bravery” until they fell to the Romans. Ives “imagined his own fight for legitimacy in terms of martial force, persistence and bravery.”

It was extremely ritualistic and used codes and symbols in its ceremonies.

Remind you of anything? [x]

I’m not saying that the Order of the Chaerona used hoods and fire in their rituals; I’ve no idea the specifics of what they did other than what Cook describes in the book and what can be found about the group online. However, we see what appears to be a secret society engaged in a ritualistic activity in the TAB trailer.

Interesting, that.

Many of the gay men who joined this group were rather wealthy and powerful. Ives also wanted to recruit men of the working classes but found this to be difficult. He noted in his diary that the “rich and powerful had the scope to act without the same threat of legal action” that might be held against men without the security of money and connections:

“The helpless and the wage earners dare not, must not, move or speak unless they wish for martyrdoms.”

Another book I’ve been perusing, London in the 1890s: A Cultural History by Karl Beckson, captures additional use of this language.

You might have guessed it.

Oscar Wilde told Ives in March of 1898:

“Yes, I have no doubt we shall win, but the road is long, and red with monstrous martyrdoms.”

Every great cause has martyrs, indeed.

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11) Did Victorian-Era Gay Men Think Sherlock Holmes Was Gay?

Did Victorian-Era Gay Men Think Sherlock Holmes Was Gay?

Something I’ve often wondered about is whether or not there is any documentation that any contemporaries of the Sherlock Holmes stories in any way thought them to be gay. What I mean is: did any homosexual men read the stories and understand the characterisation/subtext to imply, if not johnlock vibes, at least homosexuality, not least for the character of Sherlock Holmes himself?

I have come to the end of the book London and the Culture of the Homosexuality, 1885-1914 by Matt Cook and it seems he’s saved a lovely bit for last.

My new fave George Ives (I’ve written about him in other posts) kept meticulous journals, much of which informed Cook’s work. Ives routinely engaged in self-examination against the stereotypes of homosexuals newly outlined by sexologists and found himself similar in some ways and different in others, both of which he carefully recorded in his diaries. He noted his “keen aesthetic sense” and “lack of taut muscle”, among other things.

In March 1901, Ives records in his diary that he considers himself to be:

“the Sherlock Holmes of a 1000 little peculiarities”

Here we have a man who identified as homosexual relating to a character who he may have recognised to be homosexual as well. Ives definitely doesn’t write “yeah I’m gay and I know Holmes is gay too” but I think it’s interesting that he would have included this little comparison in alongside his descriptions of whether or not he matches the “gay profile”.
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12) The closest thing I’ve ever written to a personal TJLC manifesto

I have tried to reblog this 2x now and it won’t take for some reason so I guess I’ll have to do it like this:

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING MY POSTS!!!!! That makes me so happy!!! And also I should say, I totally agree with you. I’m 100% the exact same way – I hate getting my hopes up only to be wrong or disappointed. And that could still happen here, which would be so, so sad @veertjed

But.

It’s been incredible – with every turn of the page, there is something else in this book that “matches”: either with the original ACD stories, or the BBC Sherlock episodes, or the little bits we’ve seen of TAB. The more I read, the more I’m convinced that at least some of these things are in there (in all three) deliberately.

For example, I just can’t believe that ACD would not have known the cultural significance of using the word “Bohemian” to describe a man when “Bohemian” was used repeatedly in the press to describe Oscar Wilde, a man ACD had actually met and who was (extremely) publicly tried for engaging in homosexual behaviour. All these little details…like why have Holmes clean-shaven. Being clean-shaven meant something in late-Victorian sexual culture, and people would have known what being clean-shaven implied. Why not give them both moustaches and be done with it? And yet…

I can’t believe that Mark (at least) would not know these things, given that he’s so clever and well-read and interested in history PLUS so passionate and active about protecting/advancing gay rights and investigating queer figures in history. I can’t believe that he would be cavalier about randomly throwing in cheap gay jokes when the show that HE IS CREATING AND IS WRITING FOR AND RUNNING is incredibly heavily queer coded.

And as for the argument like “well, he’s gay so he knows this stuff” – there are plenty of people who are gay who do not embed period-relevant queer codes into their modern work.

So why are they doing it?

For example, what is the point of stitching red thread around the button hole on Sherlock’s Belstaff? I seem to remember someone on the team saying that “it makes it pop.” So what? Who cares? Who cares about a button hole popping? Why would it even matter? But when you read about the significance of button holes in the 19th century, and men who wore green carnations, and articles about “judging a man by his button hole”, and the ability to possibly identify a man’s sexual orientation by his jacket whilst wandering through the streets of London, then you start to think that maybe there’s a reason for that extra red thread.

Why bother to draw attention to something as insignificant as a button hole, unless it is significant? Unless there’s hidden meaning there, hidden in plain sight. A code to crack if you know what you’re looking for.

So in short, I don’t want to get my hopes up either… ~~but I believe that this is not a coincidence. The universe is rarely so lazy, after all.~~

(Commentary by Crow: I prefer for this blog to stay as strictly focused on ACD meta as possible. Unfortunately that can not be entirely the case as there are many useful metas about the original Canon stories that are also interwoven with bbc commentary. Please forgive their addition, as their notes regarding ACD Canon itself are useful.)

London and the Culture of Homosexuality – Masterpost

I’ve finished the book London and the Culture of Homosexuality, 1885-1914 by Matt Cook. We’ve learned a lot along the way and now that it’s finished, I thought I’d compile everything into one post for easier access.
1) Empty train carriages, Molly houses, and moustaches on trial
2) “That’s not a sentence you hear every day” - how modern Sherlock incorporates Victorian-era facial hair code
3) Gay lit is gay, the Criterion bar is gay, Turkish baths are gay, green carnations are gay, button holes are gay
4) Homosexual men loved to liaise at the Criterion Bar
5) TJLC is Real: Carefully-Chosen Words and Public Opinion
6) Sherlock fits a case study of a period-relevant homosexual man
7) Anal violins
8) Gay graffiti worth writing about in your memoirs
9) Cabs were helpful, Gothic romance was queer, literary gay subtext was criminal evidence, the male-on-male gaze was a stand-in for sex, and idealised male nudes were all the rage
10) Every Great Cause Has Martyrs - how language used in the TAB trailer mirrors that used by Victorian homosexual men
11) Did Victorian-Era Gay Men Think Sherlock Holmes Was Gay?
12) The closest thing I’ve ever written to a personal TJLC manifesto
Discussions/asks/misc with other people about the book: here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here
Buy the book online
Thank you to everyone who read/commented/liked/reblogged posts from my little readalong liveblog. I loved doing it and I hope you liked it too.
Up next:
Strangers: Homosexual Love in the Nineteenth Century by Graham Robb

I am reading this book at the moment – London and the Culture of Homosexuality, 1885-1914 by Matt Cook. First off, it’s brilliant and everyone should read it. Identifying as “gay” or “homosexual” was quite complicated during this era and Cook spends a lot of time discussing the idea of sexuality and sexual identity in London during these years. I’m just through the first chapter but have learned many things already:
1) Empty train cars (railway carriages) were quite popular spots for gay men to rendezvous and do the do
2) A gay man was often referred to as a “Molly” and a “Molly House” was a place where gay men could socialise together
3) A famous case involving two men (Ernest Boulton and Frederick Park) who were accused of homosexual activity and charged with “conspiring and inciting persons to commit an unnatural offence” was brought to court to great public spectacle. During their trial, one of the men (Park) GREW A MOUSTACHE to try to conform to the era’s expectations of masculinity (many men who were identified as gay were clean shaven).
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3) Gay lit is gay, the Criterion bar is gay, Turkish baths are gay, green carnations are gay, button holes are gay

I’ve made some more progress on the book I’m currently obsessed with, London and the Culture of Homosexuality, 1885-1914 by Matt Cook, and have made a couple posts about it here and here. Now I have my next longer meta brewing (!!)…but in the meantime, here are some updates:

(if you’re not keen to see more posts like this, I’ll tag everything related to this book “london and the culture of homosexuality” so you can avoid it if you like)

1) The Sins of the Cities of the Plain was a pornographic (homosexual) novel published in 1881. It follows the memoirs of a young male prostitute, ~~John~~ Jack Saul, who is “paid to set down his experiences by a client“, who just happens to provide an address in Baker Street, which was really the address of a friend called William ~~Sherlock Scott Holmes~~ Potter. The book talks about doing the do in Belgravia and picking up men in Regent’s Park, as well as the joys of having sex with guardsmen/soldiers. It did not mess around: one of the chapters is literally called “The Same Old Story: Arses Preferred to C*nts”. So. It was pretty gay.

2) The Criterion Bar on Piccadilly Circus attracted all kinds of men, including guardsmen, for meetings of a more intimate nature. According to Cook’s research, it was considered to have “a subcultural reputation for homosexual activity” and was a “great centre for inverts”, according to some 19th century contemporaries. (“Invert” was another derogatory term for homosexual.) I’m sure there’s no need to remind you that this is where John Watson and Mike Stamford meet up before Stamford introduces Watson to ~~the love of his life~~ Holmes.

3) Turkish baths were considered to be very gay (many other homosocial spaces developed similar reputations).

4) Articles in popular fashion magazines like Modern Man “bemoaned the damage done to the fashion for buttonholes by [Oscar] Wilde’s penchant for green carnations”.

This, in an article titled: “Judging a Man by His Button Hole.”