Hanover Browsing
HAVING MENTIONED Sherlock Holmes in the April issue I must add a footnote here.
Recently there has been as you know a rebirth of interest, always in fact perennial, about Holmes. Christopher Morley, an old Holmesian, has edited with learned footnotes "A Study in Scarlet," "The Sign of the Four," "The Final Problem," and two other stories in his volume SherlockHolmes and Doctor Watson (Harcourt, 1944). Edgar W. Smith, a business man devoted to Holmes, has edited Profile by Gaslight (S & S, 1944) which contains forty intimate revelations concerning Holmes, Watson, 221 B Baker Street (really 109 Baker Street), Mrs. Hudson, questions concerning Holmes' teeth, his coat of arms, his lack of skill with firearms, etc., etc. A wonderful book for the Holmes lover and there are millions of such. Ellery Queen has edited thirty-three parodies and stories about Holmes in his The Misadventures ofSherlock Holmes (Little, Brown, 1944). Curiously enough the worst of these is by Mark Twain, and it is very, very bad. Logan Clendining's "The Case of the Missing Patriarchs" will be remembered, as may be E. W. Homing's pun, "Though he might be more humble, there's no police like Holmes."
With these I have recently read Hesketh Pearson's Conan Doyle (Methuen, 1943) which contains a chapter on Sherlock Holmes and is, to boot, an admirable sketch of Doyle's life.
Dyed in the wool fans will want to go back to two other books published in this country, Vincent Starrett's The PrivateLife of Sherlock Holmes (1934) and 221 B, studies in Sherlock Holmes (1940). There are also S. C. Watson's life of Watson printed in London in 1931, T. S. Blakeney's Sherlock Holmes, and H. W. Bell's admirable Sherlock Holmes and DoctorWatson, London, 1932.
Altogether one can collect a rather large library on Holmes and the collector will have great difficulty to secure all the items. Try and find, for instance, the pamphlets printed by Edwin B. Hill, of Ysleta, Texas, on Holmes for the delight and edification of Vincent Starrett and his friends.
I am about to finish the rereading for the umpteenth time of the "Complete Adventures" and I will swear allegiance to Holmes until I die. However I will give you respite from this enthusiasm of mine for some time to come, but I shall come back to it sometime.
A friend has kindly sent me Leigh White's The Long Balkan Night (Scribners, 1944) and I have found this book a most revealing picture of the Balkans about which I suspect most of us are entirely ignorant.
One will have a much better realization of the difficulties of the Peace if you read this book about the deep enmities, the bitter anti-Semitism, the corruption, and so on, of these countries. (Rumania, Hungary, Yugoslavia in particular.)
I am glad to know that Leigh White is now doing research work in Washington on problems that will influence the forth-coming peace. At least I hope they will influence. One wonders, but hopes.
Robert Sherrod's Tarawa is the best book I have read about this war so far as description of actual fighting is concerned. It is magnificently done as Milburn McCarty, Marine War Combat Correspondent, recently told me. When a Marine correspondent admits this about a Civilian correspondent it has weight, though actually they cooperate very well in the field.
Lippincott has just published a sea story, more in the Tomlinson than the Conrad tradition, written by F. R. Buckley and called Davy Jones, I Love You. It describes one voyage of a Liberty ship from a United States port to a foreign port. The author illustrates his own book, and is particularly good at recording ship conversation. Recommended.
Garden lovers will be amused and delighted with Robert Lawson's CountryColic (Little, Brown, 1944).
Those who have bought The Rivers of America Series might well buy also The American Lake Series (Bobbs Merrill). It begins with Fred Landon's comprehensive account (popular version) of Lake Huron. Others will follow.
