Sir Arthur Conan Doyle killed Sherlock Holmes. He had him thrown off of a waterfall because he got sick of writing about him. Originally, Doyle had intended his main character to be Dr. John H. Watson, Holmes' companion. Deplorably, Holmes took over the limelight with consent from neither author nor fellow-character. As a result, Doyle decided to terminate the series. The public wrote letters of protest and Doyle's editor made him resurrect the stories--and the detective. Both Doyle and Watson were vexed about this.
It would ordinarily be necessary to delve into the author's history at this point, but this paper makes the probably erroneous assumption that Watson is a real person and Arthur Conan Doyle is either his literary agent, taking author credit in order to assure Holmes' privacy, or a pen name. Besides which, if he did exist he was an attempted murderer.
The relationship between Sherlock Holmes and John H. Watson is complex and multifaceted. Through the works of Doyle, we learn about the relationship between these men. For the most part, it is a good relationship. But when the text is exposed to closer analysis, it becomes apparent that while Watson likes and respects Holmes, he also resents him.
How can this be, though? Everyone knows about Sherlock Holmes--a hero, and brilliant, and if he's a touch inclined toward arrogance, has he not the right to be? As everyone also knows, however, what 'everyone knows' has a tendency to be not entirely true, and so it would be well to take a look at Mr. Sherlock Holmes.
He seems to have a strong connection to Catholicism. It may be only political, but when the Pope needs him, everything else can go hang. He turns down personal involvement in a case where someone's life is on the line because he's busy with "That little affair of the Vatican cameos ... in my anxiety to oblige the Pope I lost touch with several interesting English cases." (Hound, 16) One could dismiss this as Holmes being flippant, but he does turn down the higher-staked case. He discloses in "The Greek Interpreter" that his ancestors were country squires, but the family fortunes seem to have come down. Although Holmes' humble lodgings can be explained by his status as a younger son, his older brother Mycroft has a job as an auditor, despite being more talented in the analytical area as our hero. Further, Holmes has a thing about oysters, which were a lower-class staple. He eats them ravenously on several occasions and when he's faking a truly horrible illness in "The Dying Detective" he babbles about them, worrying that they will take over the world. He had a good education though, going to Oxford or Cambridge or possibly both. He is boxes and fences and is also talented with the singlestick and the martial art known as 'baritsu,' which doesn't seem to exist outside the canon.
Holmes is, as a rule, quite distant. To describe his physical state, Watson often gives us the impression of a very pale and nervous cricket. The adjectives he uses most often to describe his attitude are 'cold' and 'masterful.' When he's on an interesting case he's hyperfocused and can work for days at an exhausting pace, fueled by nothing but coffee, tobacco, the occasional sandwich, and the lure of a classical concert as a reward for solving the puzzle. When he's not on an interesting case, he gets deeply depressed. He withdraws into himself, uses cocaine, scrapes out the most appalling pieces of noise on his violin, and snarls at everyone. As it was observed in a televisation of "The Solitary Cyclist", "Sherlock Holmes is in a good mood, therefore Sherlock Holmes must have a case." He seems to be a very strong man, having barehandedly straightened a twisted steel poker all by himself, but he deplores regular exercise. It is possible that he entertains the notion that the little walks Mycroft, who is quite overweight, takes every day constitute regular exercise. It is more likely that he, who not only struck out alone but created a new profession rather than join the workaday world, is turned off by anything routine. This doesn't only sound like an impossible and unhealthy life-style to maintain, it is. Holmes periodically has nervous breakdowns, and Watson has to drag him out into the country to recuperate. To the good doctor's eternal exasperation, however, he always manages to find a case to latch on to.
There still seems to be little to resent. Of a certainty he has his flaws, and granted that it might be irritating to have a patient so intractable, but who is Watson to resent The Master? In fact, who is he at all? He is best known as Holmes' shadow, kept around for some obscure reason that Holmes chooses not to disclose. The only things we can know about him are what he chooses to say of himself. He doesn't say much.
Watson honors his readers with a brief burst of autobiography at the beginning of Study In Scarlet. This seems very generous until one gets a little farther along and realizes that he has very little more to say on the subject. This is perfectly in keeping with the character of the stories, for he is writing about Holmes, and not himself. Still, it is nice to have the narrator's background.
He took his MD at the University of London in 1878. He then went to Netley to study to become an army surgeon. He was attached to the 5th Northumberland Fusiliers as an assistant surgeon. He didn't do well there, and was transferred to the Berkshires, with whom he served in the battle of Maiwand, which was a total disaster for the Brits. He himself was hit in the shoulder. He would have been captured, but his orderly slung him over a packhorse, or so they tell him, and got him out of there. Sometime during his service he also seems to have picked up a bullet to the leg, no one quite knows when. He recovered from Maiwand at Peshawar Hospital, but there he caught enteric fever. The doctors despaired of his life for months. He lived, but his health was ruined and his nerve was shattered. He was discharged and sent back to England with permission to improve his health. The government provided him with eleven shillings sixpence regularly for nine months. He went back to London and killed some time, but his pension was not one on which one can lounge indefinitely, so he decided to change his life-style for the healthier. Around this time, he ran into an old school friend, Stamford, to whom he mentioned that he was looking to share rooms with someone, if rooms and someone could be found. Stamford directed him to 221B Baker St. (which, if one goes to London and looks carefully, does not and never did exist), and Mr. Sherlock Holmes. Stamford warned him that Mr. Holmes was a career oddball, but Watson didn't mind, and the two hit it off and moved into their new lodgings. (Study 9).
Watson is not from London. It is unlikely that he is even English. In The Sign of the Four, the second story, he refers to 'my own limited knowledge of London' (122), and in his burst of autobiography he mentions that he has 'neither kith nor kin' in England. From his name we can determine with a fair amount of certainty that he is Scottish. Watson is a Scottish surname. Further, his middle initial is H, and in "The Man with the Twisted Lip" his wife, to whom he became engaged at the end of Sign, refers to him as James (307). Hamish is the Scottish equivalent of James, and many wives called their husbands by their middle names.
He may have been married twice. Of a certainty there are many stories in which he does not mention his wife, and many where he seems to be back at Baker Street. The Victorian social scene, however, permits couples to separate and reattach. Given Watson's tendency to neglect his patients to assist Holmes, this seems the simplest explanation. His wife is capable of holding down a steady job, for she has worked for a Mrs. Cecil Forrester for six years. She worked, however, as a governess, which is not a lucrative profession. Victorians were pragmatists, Watson is practical, and his wife is sensible. If, when Watson isn't working, his wife can't support both of them, it makes the most sense for him to live somewhere else until he can contribute to the bills again. As there is no indication that their relationship was anything other than idyllic, and Watson doesn't hesitate to criticize, although he does it subtly, so there would be indications if it weren't, there would be nothing to keep them separate when Holmes didn't need Watson anymore and let him go home to resume his practice.
Watson is kept around because he is perfect for Holmes, and that is also what gives him the right to resent. He is Holmes' balance. He supplies the detective with practical stability and another pair of eyes, as well as with his not inconsiderable medical skills and his rather unique viewpoint, for his intelligence differs vastly from the Master's. Perhaps most importantly, he also has the patience of a saint.
While Holmes is a trifle childish and, by his own admission, "the most incurably lazy devil that ever stood in shoe leather," (Study, 20) Watson is a very down to earth, practical man, and very action oriented. For example, while they are in Devonshire in Hound, they think that Sir Henry has been killed, and they know who killed the man that died in his place. Watson demands of Holmes, "Why should we not seize him at once?" Holmes explains why not: the case is incomplete, and direct action would be incautious. Watson still insists, "What can we do?" (113) Then they both ask questions. Holmes' is: how did the dead man know the Hound was hunting him? This question, while having it answered would have satisfied Holmes' curiosity, is pointless except as foreshadowing. Watson's question is: why tonight? This question, while easily answered, would be important in front of a judge. The fact that it was loose tonight and no other night, this night being one where Sir Henry had made it quite clear to Holmes' primary suspect and no one else that he would be walking alone across the moor at night, is significant and useful.
Earlier on, when Sir Henry wants to take a potentially dangerous action Watson, although he's itching to get out and do something, he checks Sir Henry's enthusiasm long enough to play devil's advocate and make him consider the practicalities. In Sign, they come across a dead body, locked into the dead guy's study. Holmes makes some deductions, and a police officer shows up. Holmes and Watson go home. Later they read in the papers that the dead man's servants have been arrested. Holmes starts laughing. Watson says soberly, "I think we have had a close shave ourselves of being arrested for the crime." (160) Holmes treats this flippantly but, considering the attitude Scotland Yard has toward him, Watson's fear is more than legitimate.
Holmes has also been known to send him as an extra pair of eyes when the detective himself is otherwise occupied. He does this in "Cyclist". While Watson doesn't do very well on that case, he learns quite thoroughly from his mistakes and, in Hound, where he's on his own for at least half the story, he does much, much better. He has a tendency to catch on fairly rapidly.
The two, in fact, work so well together that a question has arisen as to the nature of their relationship. It should be noted that homosexuality was illegal. Sodomy had been punishable by death since 1563, although no one had been executed for it since 1830. By 1885 that law had been replaced by one making 'the solicitation or commission of any homosexual act in public or private punishable by up to two years in prison (Ate/Knew 190).' That law was strictly enforced as a moral sin. In all of the canon, there is one instance in which the two of them broke the law, and even that was justified ("The Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton"). With his intimate knowledge of crime and criminal history, Holmes would have been aware of the homosexuality statute. Watson, having served in the military, would also have been aware of it. Both of them being good Christians, they would also be aware of the religious prohibitions. Whether all this would, were they so inclined, make them severely uncomfortable or merely raise their sporting instincts is anyone's guess.
Enough of that. We were discussing Watson's competence. In "The Adventure of the Dying Detective" Holmes demands that Watson find him a doctor in whom he has confidence, saying that Watson is only a general practitioner and therefore cannot help him. Watson, although naturally hurt, rightly dismisses this as delirium. For, while general practitioner sounds trifling in this age of podiatrists and optometrists and whatnot, a general practitioner was on the cutting edge of medicine. A GP was a physician and a surgeon and a psychiatrist. They could even prescribe drugs, although that had formerly been a physician's sole privilege. Some were even apothecaries and could make the drugs themselves. The physicians were still the highfalutin doctors that the Quality sought on Harley Street, but GPs practiced medicine. Watson was a sterling example of his breed. For example, in "The Disappearance of Lady Frances Carfax" the lady in question has been smothered with ether and is dying.
Knowing that the incidence of anesthesia-caused mortality for chloroform is 1 in 2500 as compared to 1 in 10,000 for ether during the early 1900s, what Dr. Watson accomplishes in the half hour that he fought to save the life of Lady Frances can only be described as a tribute to his skill as a medico. Even the questionable technique of injecting ether, another powerful anesthesiac, takes a daring that many would not have exhibited in similar circumstances. Dr. Watson, realizing that the first stage of ether anesthesia produces a period of cardiac stimulation that will allow for other emergency resuscitation efforts to be successful, performs this unorthodox act without a moment of hesitation. His choice of ether as a 'do or die' means to save the life of Lady Frances [fully realizing that ether may fully potentiate the toxic action of chloroform] shows a side of him that has not been presented to the reader in any previous adventure--that of a quick witted and highly competent physician who deserves greater acclaim. (Fourth Cab 38)
To paraphrase, Watson knew that the injection of ether was likely to kill the lady. He also knew, however, that if one injects ether and immediately begins resuscitation, the procedure is much more likely to be successful. So he injected the ether without pause, as many would not have dared, the lady lived, and he got praise from neither his contemporaries nor his readers.
Flashy saves, of course, are hardly all there is to medicine. Watson's quick-witted competence is the least part of what makes him a good doctor. He has common sense, empathy, and a truly astonishing intuition.
His medical instincts are staggering.
Phrenology, or the study of the skull for personality, has been discredited by now, but it was all the rage among physicians back then. If someone had high, wide cheekbones the police might watch him closely as a potential savage, for example. Watson thought it was utter moonshine, but Sir Henry's doctor, Mortimer, the moor's resident archaeologist, made it his life's work. In describing Sir Henry and explaining his devotion to a place he hadn't seen since he was a boy, Dr. Mortimer--what a name for a Neolithic graverobber!--says, "A glance at our friend here reveals the rounded head of the Celt, which carries inside it the Celtic enthusiasm and power of attachment." Watson tactfully doesn't comment, but silently bends his own gaze on the man, reading his character through his face rather than the top of his head.
'There he sat, with his tweed suit and his American accent, in the corner of a prosaic railway carriage, and yet as I looked at his dark and expressive face ... There were pride, valor, and strength in his thick brows, his sensitive nostrils, and his large hazel eyes. If on that forbidding moor a difficult and dangerous quest should lie before us, this was at least a comrade for whom one might venture to take a risk with a certainty that he would bravely share it.' (47-8)
He was right about the danger, he was right about Sir Henry's character and, most notably, he was right about phrenology. Interestingly, the description that he gives of Sir Henry could well pass for a description of himself as drawn by Paget, and if one read his description of Dr. Mortimer, omitting the name, one might think one was reading about Sherlock Holmes. This gives the impression that the two have a similar friendship before them, as indeed they do.
The phrenology is merely a minor aspect of his intuition about things that aren't right. He knows that phrenology is invalid, and he knows that certain drugs are bad. In Sign he made an enormous fuss about Holmes' use of cocaine while all his contemporaries hailed it as a wonder drug. (107) In Hound he calls Holmes' second hand smoke poisonous before people even knew that first hand smoke was toxic. Still, even that is nothing to his nagging doubts about Holmes.
He noticed very early on that Holmes was slightly mad. In Sign he often commented on it.
'He was bright, eager, and in excellent spirits, a mood that in his case alternated with fits of the blackest depression.' (118) "Strange how terms of what in another man I should call laziness alternate with your fits of splendid energy and vigor." (205)
These, if he only knew it, describe one kind of Attention Deficit Disorder. They sound almost like they're describing bipolar disease, but Holmes's terms and fits are triggered by reality.
'He appeared to be in a state of nervous exaltation ... He spoke on a quick succession of subjects--on miracle plays, on medieval pottery, on Stradivarius violins, on the Buddhism of Ceylon, and on the warships of the future--handling each as though he had made a special study of it. His bright humour marked the reaction from his black humour of the preceding days.' (171-2)
This is a very good description of the way the mind of someone with ADD works: thought--new unrelated (?) thought--next unrelated (?) thought, etc. ADD, however was not documented at all until 1904, and then, not only was the documentation not in a form to be taken seriously: a poem called 'The story of Fidgety Phillip'
"Let me see if Phillip can
be a little gentleman
let me see if he is able
to sit still for once at the table."
Thus Papa bade Phil behave
and Mama looked very grave.
But Fidgety Phil,
he won't sit still
he wriggles
and giggles
and then, I declare
swings backwards and forwards
and tilts up his chair,
just like any rocking horse--
"Phillip! I am getting cross!"
See the naughty, restless child
growing still more rude and wild
till the chair falls over quite.
Phillip screams with all his might,
catches at the cloth but then
that makes matters worse again.
Down upon the ground they fall
glasses, plates, knives, forks and all.
How Mama did fret and frown
when she saw them tumbling down
and Papa made such a face!
Phillip is in sad disgrace ...
Although this was published in the esteemed medical journal The Lancet, and even if people had been inclined to pay attention and it had been published by 1885, it wouldn't have been any help to Watson. It is about a child with ADHD, which is attention deficit disorder with hyperactivity. ADHD is the most commonly known variant of the disorder. ADD by itself is much subtler, and no one's noticed it until recently. It is difficult to diagnose, because it has many variants and can mask itself with depression, recklessness, hyperactivity, and manic-depressive behavior, to name a few strains. Further, everyone thought it was a children's disease, and while Holmes can be childish at times, no respectable Victorian doctor would have given any credence to the diagnosis. Watson doesn't know the disease, but he diagnoses Holmes with it nonetheless, over and over and over. Holmes would probably have preferred to know about it, if that would have made Watson stop harping about something he couldn't help.
His intuition works in other areas than medicine. It always works well, but it never works normally. Things that would tip any normal person off that something is odd go completely over his head. For example, in Hound he doesn't pick up on the fact that the butterfly collector, Stapleton--who turns out to be the murderer--is an unpleasant person, and he bloody well should have. At one point, a pony on the moor falls into the local equivalent of quicksand. 'Then a long, agonized, writhing neck shot upward and a dreadful cry echoed over the moor. It turned me cold with horror, but my companion's [Stapleton's] nerves seemed to be stronger than mine.' (59) This should have been a dead giveaway. We know that his nerves have recovered from the war by now because Holmes is trusting him to act as bodyguard to Sir Henry, but he is still deeply affected by the pony's death cry. Stapleton doesn't care, and that is peculiar to say the least. That is the main difference between the intelligences of Watson and Holmes. Holmes collects clues and puts them together in a coherent whole. It should be noted that he knew Stapleton for what he was on sight. Watson, on the other hand, has premonitions that operate almost completely independent of reality, and he hasn't been wrong yet. When he's riding out to the moor, Dr. Mortimer is playing eager tour guide and Sir Henry is on the edge of his seat, soaking up everything he can about the countryside. Watson is depressed and uneasy.
'To his [Sir Henry's] eyes all seemed beautiful, but to me a tinge of melancholy lay upon the countryside, which bore so clearly the mark of the waning year ... The rattle of our wheels died away as we drove through drifts of rotting vegetation--sad gifts, as it seemed to me, for Nature to throw before the carriage of the returning heir of the Baskervilles.' (49)
Baskerville's stay in Dartmoor is indeed an unhappy one, and in fact Nature seems determined to wreck it with or without Stapleton's help, for there are storms almost every night, and Sir Henry falls in love with a married woman. All this, of course, aside from the fact that someone is trying to kill Sir Henry, whose safety he has been charged with. Then there is the matter of Barrymore, Sir Henry's butler, who Holmes considers as a likely suspect. Watson agrees with Holmes, for all the scanty evidence they have points to Barrymore. When he meets the butler, however, Watson doesn't regard him with foreboding. His first impression is, "Barrymore... stood in front of us now with the subdued manner of a well trained servant. He was a remarkable looking man, tall, handsome, with a square black beard and pale, distinguished, features.' (51) Hardly the description of a murderer. Barrymore is not, in fact, the murderer, nor is he in any way, shape, or form a bad man.
The most striking intuitive incidents in Hound have to do with Holmes, what a surprise. In his first letter to Holmes, Watson talks about a village of stone huts on the moor and a convict who seemed to be living in it. Holmes, as far as Watson knows, hadn't known of the convict's existence. The convict is highly unlikely to have anything to do with the Hound, as the person behind the Hound is cold-blooded and calculating and the convict, as admitted even by his adoring sister, is a portrait of mindless ferocity when he kills. Yet Watson tells Holmes that the convict was on the moor, in the stone village, and seems to be gone. There's no reason for him to tell this, but it's a good thing he does. This information tells Holmes where on the moor he can stay without being noticed. Holmes does not tell Watson that he has come to Dartmoor, and Watson finds out from someone else that there is a stranger who is not the convict living on the moor. He thinks, 'A stranger then is dogging us... If I could lay my hands upon that man,then at last we might find ourselves at the end of all our difficulties. To this one purpose I must now devote all my energies." (88) Still, there being other things to do, he lays the stranger aside for a time. Then there is a storm, and his doctor's empathy sets him obsessing. He muses, 'It is a wild night indoors, and what must it be in a stone hut upon the moor ... What deep and earnest purpose can he have which calls for such a trial! There, in that hut upon the moor, seems to lie the very center of that problem which has vexed me so sorely. I swear that another day shall not have passed before I have done all that man can do to reach the heart of the mystery.' (95)
His instincts, which say that the man is important and will solve the problem and should be reached right away, are dead on. It is only his interpretation; that the man is a missing puzzle piece and therefore dangerous; that is off. Watson rushes to the stone hut, armed, and waits for the stranger to come. When the stranger does come, Watson gets a pleasant surprise. 'For a moment or two I sat breathless, hardly able to believe ... Then my senses and my voice came back to me, while a crushing weight of responsibility seemed in an instant to be lifted from my soul... "Holmes!" I cried-- "Holmes!"' (106) Watson felt it necessary to 'devote all my energies' to the man because he always wears himself out for Holmes. With Holmes around, Watson doesn't have to wear himself out being analytical as well as synthetic and protective, a task for which he is unfit. Holmes does solve all the problems: Sir Henry's, by acting as the detective he was hired as, and Watson's, by simply being there.
Nor is all of his intelligence in his intuition. It is true that he isn't of Holmes' caliber--but then, how many are, and does Holmes himself have the right to treat all those who are not his equal or superior with contempt? Also, it was an integral part of their relationship that Holmes do the thinking, and so he may have gotten out of the habit and stopped trying. When he set his mind to it, though, he was observant, practical,intuitive, a subtle, humorous diplomat, and an excellent writer.
When, in Study, Watson first hears about Sherlock Holmes from Stamford, he is puzzled because Stamford's description of the man is beyond his ken. He calls Holmes a mystery and says that he will enjoy the unraveling of it. Stamford wagers that Holmes will learn more about him than vice versa. Certainly, Holmes comes to know Watson very well, but the reverse is also true. Watson sets to observing Holmes, and methodically draws up a reasonably accurate list of his abilities and shortcomings. He gives up in despair because of the irregularities in Holmes' knowledge: he knows,for example, where one walked from by the dirt on one's shoe, but he doesn't know that the earth revolves around the sun. Nor does he care. He also notices the seesawing of Holmes' mood. Holmes can detect what he likes about Watson, but Watson has figured out Holmes' brain chemistry. Watson also considers the possibility of narcotic addiction, but he dismisses it as unlikely due to Holmes' overall temperance and cleanliness. He is right on both counts. Holmes indulges in a seven percent solution of cocaine occasionally, and morphine less often, but he isn't addicted to either. He uses them because Ritalin and its like aren't available to him and he's self-medicating. Many people with his particular chemistry find that cocaine, rather than delivering the high it gives to normal people, bestows upon them a restfully sharp clarity of mind. Holmes can enter this state on his own when he has something to think about. When he's not in it he gets depressed, hence the drugs, but when he's not using them there is no withdrawal and no craving. Watson was correct all around: Holmes uses narcotics, but he is not an addict.
Watson deplores cocaine and the like, because he considers it highly impractical. He is, despite the wisdom of his colleagues, convinced that it will do something nasty to Holmes' mind eventually. That is the way he thinks: is the game worth the candle? Will the candle be useful? Does the game have rules that will ensure safety? Can the rules be followed? Can the game be played without the rules? Can we afford not to play? Oh, well, forget it then ...
He is certainly competent enough to earn the right to resentment, and Holmes gives him plenty of excuse. Why, then, does he stick around? For the same reason that he decided to room with Holmes: tolerance. For it cannot be said that he wasn't given fair warning. When Stamford spoke of introducing him to Holmes, he got quite nervous and refused to accept responsibility if they didn't get along. He spoke of eccentricity, introvertiveness, irregularity, and cold-bloodedness. This last was particularly stressed. He said,
"I could imagine his giving a friend a little pinch of the latest vegetable alkaloid, not out of malevolence, you understand, but simply out of a spirit of inquiry in order to have an accurate idea of the effects ... He appears to have a passion for definite and exact knowledge ... but it may be pushed to excess. When it comes to beating the subjects in the dissecting room with a stick, it is certainly taking a rather bizarre shape." "Beating the subjects!" "Yes, to verify how far bruises may be produced after death. I saw him at it with my own eyes." (Study 6)
Watson refused to be dissuaded. When he actually met Holmes, he was subjected to the man crowing about a new form of detecting bloodstains, which Holmes had invented and intended to name after himself, and yet he persevered. Holmes decided that they should tell each other their faults, and told Watson that he smoked strong tobacco, stunk up apartments with chemical experiments, played the violin, and had fits of depression. Watson also noticed indications of a large ego. Despite all that, they promptly moved into Baker Street.
That tolerance served him well. In Hound he was volunteered to go to Dartmoor on his own, and the last time he'd been sent out solo he'd come back to a tongue-lashing ("Cyclist", 734). He cheerfully submitted, remarking to himself with a shrug that his host to be, Sir Henry Baskerville, was a very likeable fellow. That was the least of what he had to put up with, though. At one point Holmes asks him to analyze a walking stick that someone had left in their flat. He does so and receives a barrage of compliments, which is most unusual. He is 'proud, to think that I had so far mastered his system as to apply it in a way that earned his approval. "Has anything escaped me," I asked with some self-importance. "I trust there is nothing of consequence which I have overlooked?" "I am afraid, my dear Watson, that most of your conclusions were erroneous..." (4)'
Watson has no reaction to this, except to fall back on his 'you are the Master and I am a screwup' attitude. He behaves as though the incident had never happened and the stick was just another object Holmes was right about.
Later, Watson and Sir Henry are out at night on the Dartmoor moor looking for a criminal. Holmes is supposed to be in London. Watson sees the silhouette of a tall, thin man in an attitude of contemplation against the moon, briefly. A few days later, having waited as long as he could bear and gotten all the information he could out of the town folk, he follows a messenger-boy with a basket of food up to a Neolithic village that sits in the middle of the moor, abandoned except for the local archeologist. Guess who he finds. This mysterious person assumes that Watson found him by looking in all the stone huts until he found one that was occupied. This implies that Watson was either lazy enough to wait a long time before following up the moon incident, or crazy/dumb enough to comb, hut by hut, through a village that must, if this implication be well reasoned out,be large enough to take several days to comb through. Watson tells him what happened, and makes no comment, and the peace is preserved. This isn't the only insulting suggestion Holmes makes at that time, either. He gets condescending and assumes that Watson had thought he was the criminal. Watson, who had seen the criminal and had thought no such thing,patiently responded that he hadn't known who Holmes was, but had been determined to find out. Holmes praises him.
This tolerance didn't come to him instantaneously, but only in the moment when he decided to wholeheartedly respect Holmes. At the beginning of "Sign", Watson devises a test for Holmes. He gives him a watch, which he had just acquired, to study. This watch had a very particular history, and it had just been cleaned. Watson wanted to prove to himself that Holmes isn't always right, as it's disturbing when someone is. Holmes, however, is correct in every detail, and Watson gets very angry, thinking Holmes followed the previous owner around. Holmes apologizes for causing him distress, but insists on his authenticity. He goes through his reasoning step by step. Watson is convinced, and rightly so. He then, however, and this was where the majority of his self respect transfers irrevocably to his roommate, apologizes for not having had more faith.
What could drive someone with no self-respect to resent someone he admires? Perhaps nothing. An intelligent, thinking man who has lost self respect only in comparison to the object of his admiration, however, might think along these lines: I never doubted my self-worth before I met this man. What gives him the right to steal my good opinion from me? How did he do that? Is he aware that he's done it? How dares he? Does he care? If he is aware, and still he dares, and does not care, then is he truly worthy of my admiration? Is he worth the respect that I used to give myself, worthy to be my hero? In a word, why should I sit here and take this? And what can I do about it?
Holmes may not, in fact, be aware that he has become a black hole for Watson's ego. He is notoriously high-handed in his dealings with other people, and Watson calls him 'masterful' at least once every three stories. If he were aware, however, he would claim the right through superior intellect and force of personality, for he recognizes no kind of intelligence but his own. More he does not merely take Watson's self respect and make Watson respect him; he takes Watson's respect for him and adds it to his own self respect. It is highly unlikely that he knows he is doing this. It is highly probable that if he did know then he would care, for his affection for Watson is admirably demonstrated in "The Adventure of the Three Garridebs" when Watson is shot in the leg:
Then my friend's arms were round me, and he was leading me to a chair. "You're not hurt, Watson? For God's sake, say that you are not hurt!" It was worth a wound--it was worth many wounds--to know the depth of loyalty and love which lay behind that cold mask. The clear, hard eyes were dimmed for a moment, and the firm lips were shaking ... I caught a glimpse of a great heart as well as of a great brain ... "It's nothing, Holmes, it's a mere scratch." "You are right," he cried with an immense sigh of relief. "It is quite superficial." His face set like flint as he glared at the prisoner... "By the Lord, it is well for you. If you had killed Watson, you would not have got out of this room alive." (562)
Although Holmes may be as dense emotionally as Watson is logically, once he perceives a situation he reacts appropriately to it. He does care for Watson, a great deal, and whenever he realizes that a wrong has been done him he does everything in his power to set it right--although sometimes that merely means drawing Watson's attention away from it.
Watson's answer to the question of 'does this man deserve to be my hero' is mixed. On the one hand, Holmes is unquestionably a genius. He is a man with 'a great brain' and a 'great heart.' More, he gives Watson, if not quite as much as Watson gives him, more than nothing. In Hound, when he's away from home and things get eerie, he reminds himself, 'Holmes would not listen to such fancies, and I am his agent.' (88) He uses his conception of Holmes to keep him tied to reality and rational in the face of all the superstitious nonsense flying about. On the other hand, it takes a saint to deal with such a man. No one could expect anyone to live with him for any length of time and come out unscathed. Watson certainly doesn't. When with Holmes, he gives up easily on puzzles. He grasps the slightest word of praise like a lifeline. He seems to think himself a slave. For example, at one point in Sign Holmes casually takes off his boots and stockings and tells Watson to carry them downstairs for him. Watson makes no reply, out loud or in description, and we are left to assume that he has obeyed. This is not a healthy way to live.
He has several answers to the question of 'what can I do about this', 'this' being his resentment of a man he loves and admires. The first is manipulation. The second is distance. The third is revenge.
It took him a while to work out his campaign of manipulation. When he first latched on to Holmes, he was capable of the most astonishingly useless bull-headed stubbornness, although it didn't last. When he started rapturing about Morstan, as folk in love will, Holmes cautioned him against her, simply on principle. Holmes said that appearances were quite deceptive. He said, "I assure you that the most winning woman I ever knew was hanged for poisoning three little children for their insurance money." That would have been bad enough, but then Holmes starts changing the subject!
"The most repellant man of my acquaintance is a philanthropist who has spent nearly a quarter of a million upon the London poor." "In this case, however--" "I never make exceptions. An exception disproves the rule..." (117-8)
Watson keeps on trying to win Holmes over, but Holmes is being didactic and won't be swayed. All Watson can make him do is change the subject. Watson, being a little smarter than most people give him credit for, quickly realizes that Holmes is capable of being a spoiled brat, and that when he gets into those moods he has to be cozened out of them and that, in fact, the surest way to get him into such a mood is to let him know that someone is trying to force him into something. Being an excellent psychologist, Watson decided that the passive role everyone knows him for is the only one that Holmes finds persuasive, or even tolerable. Although he is more accustomed to everyone being blunt about their expectations and desires, he quickly realizes that Sherlock Holmes is not the military and has to be manipulated. So when Holmes tries to duck out of a case because he's feeling lazy, Watson protests, "But he [Gregson] begs you to help him!"(20) This is very nice phrasing. The 'begs' appeals to Holmes' vanity as well as his sense of duty, setting him to think of the incompetence of the Yarders and the fun he'll have laughing at them.
Unfortunately, he is no more immune to subtle manipulation than is his roommate. Holmes, like him, picks up on that and exploits it shamelessly. He falls for it every time. For example, in The Hound of the Baskervilles, Holmes deceived him in a major way, on the grounds that he would have given the game away if he'd known what it was. He is quite naturally bitter that Holmes doesn't trust him, as they have by this point been together for some years. Holmes, whose social skills are excellent when utilized, starts appeasing him with a set of the compliments Holmes keeps in reserve for just such occasions.
So that's less effective than it might have been with someone of Holmes's personality but lesser intellect. He next tries distance: he gets married and moves out. His wife, who he meets in Sign, is a wonderful woman and good for him in many ways. He still, however, has to deal with Holmes, so although that works better than manipulation, it does not completely get rid of the problem.
Having tried to change the situation and walk away from it, all he can do is react. Not only does he respect Holmes and feel himself unable to take him down, but he loves him and would not see him hurt. He really has no options left save criticism. Feeling the way he does about Holmes, he wants to accomplish ___ things: to get his ill feeling out of his system and out in public, to do so quietly and without seriously hurting anyone, and to not turn himself into a small mindedly bitter sort of person who harps on the least little injury to the disgusted amusement of society and the degradation of his own soul. He manages to accomplish this by being humorous when possible and subtle when not.
For Watson, subtlety is the key to sanity. His jokes, for example, are often overlooked because one has to assume that he is reasonably intelligent to catch them. He is a remarkable tease, but his jokes are so dry that his deadpan is often mistaken for dead earnest. For example, when he comments,
'I am certainly developing the wisdom of the serpent, for when Mortimer pressed his questions to an inconvenient extend I asked him casually to what type Frankland's skull belonged, and so heard nothing but craniology for the rest of our drive. I have not lived for years with Sherlock Holmes for nothing." (93)
he is teasing Mortimer and Holmes as well as poking fun at his own modesty, but if a stupid person had said that it would have sounded like pitiable insufferable pride. On page 68 he writes Holmes, in what would sound like stupid concern from a duller man, 'By the way, your instructions never to allow Sir Henry to go out alone will become very much more onerous if a love affair were to be added to our other difficulties. My popularity would soon suffer if I were to follow your instructions to the letter.' This was unnecessary. Going out with another person, regardless of gender, is not going out alone, and therefore doesn't violate the letter of the instructions. Nor, really, does it violate the spirit, since the Hound only attacks Baskervilles who are literally alone. This passage has no purpose, save to share a gentle chuckle with Holmes at the expense of the impetuous young American. At the beginning of that same letter, after a beautiful evocation of the moor which will be very helpful to Holmes, he writes, 'All this, however, is foreign to the mission on which you sent me, and will probably be very uninteresting to your severely practical mind.' This could be taken for a mere apology, but then he continues, "I can still remember your complete indifference as to whether the sun moved round the earth or the earth round the sun. Let me, therefore, return to the facts concerning Sir Henry...' (66) If he was being sober, he would have apologized for being irrelevant and moved on. He was not being sober, though, for Holmes' reaction to Copernicus was so extreme ['What the deuce is it to me?... If we went round the moon it would not make a pennyworth of difference to me or to my work.' (Study, 12)] that this cannot be anything but a reference to an old joke. He also learned to appreciate windfalls. The first time he saw Holmes baffled he could hardly keep a straight face.
Windfalls, however, are unusual, and Watson must release his frustration somehow. He does so in subtly malicious comments to his readers. These comments are difficult to detect, as they consist of twisted truth, and Watson puts them forth as though he were in dead earnest. For example, in Hound, he says of Holmes, 'I have not heard him laugh often, and it has always boded ill to somebody.' (121) This sounds straightforward and even accurate, considering Holmes' snappish demeanor. However, Holmes laughs more often than Watson does, by a long shot. What truth there is in the statement is misapplied and misinterpreted. Holmes laughs when he's in a good mood. He is in a good mood when he has something to think hard about. It is true that when Holmes thinks hard about something someone usually ends up in the clink, but this is neither relevant nor inevitable. Another thing he does is to catch Holmes saying something truly typical and not comment on it. On page 29, Holmes says, out of the blue, "Once, when I was very young, I confused the Leeds Mercury with the Western Morning News." This was intended to be proof of his own fallibility, and everyone takes it as such. No one so much as cracks a smile at the man's incredible arrogance.
This is all very well when he wants to tease someone, but he occasionally becomes less good humored about his criticism. When he does that, he is very careful not to be obvious about it. In Hound, he starts a paragraph by saying that Holmes can detach his mind from a case at will, and goes onto describe how. Buried in the rhetoric, however, is the complaint, 'He would talk about nothing but art, of which he had the crudest ideas...' (36). At whatever time Hound happened, for Watson's dates are utterly unreliable, it was not one of the first stories to be published. Faithful readers know that nothing useful will come out of this paragraph, and will probably skim to the next.
Holmes is much less subtle about criticizing Watson, and much more casual about it. At one point, he goes so far as to come right out and says,"You really have done remarkably badly." ("Cyclist", 734) Later in Hound he brings up art again. He tells Sir Henry, "Watson won't allow that I know anything of art, but that is mere jealousy because our views upon the subject differ." (120) He then goes on to assign artists to a series of paintings and draw conclusions from them. This looks very impressive, but is in fact one of the few occasions where Watson makes a move to defend himself. When Watson wants us to notice something odd, he uses unhelpful adjectives to describe it, and the fewer the better. This passage is conspicuously devoid of adjectives, so it would be well to look at it closely. First, the paintings are all portraits and Holmes notices things about faces and clothes that even policemen don't. Second, he needs Sir Henry to tell him who the people in the portraits were, and he's excellent at soliciting information. Third, Sir Henry only knows about the people in the portraits because they are his ancestors and he's been drilled in them. He knows nothing about art and has less interest in it. If Holmes isn't bluffing, Watson wants us to think he is.
Although Watson doesn't defend himself often, this isn't the first time he does it. At the beginning of Hound he's less subtle, but he has more cause.
Holmes has handed him a walking stick and told him to analyze it. During his analysis, he is rewarded by comments like, "Excellent!" and "Perfectly sound!" Then, when Watson has finished, Holmes compliments him--or so Watson thinks, until Holmes spells it out for him. Watson, humbled, slips back into his role as Witness and encourages Holmes to analyze the stick himself.
Holmes says, "You know my methods. Apply them!" (3-5) As though that wasn't what Watson was trying to do! Superficially, this reads like, 'oh, Watson's being an idiot again.' On closer examination, however, Watson has been set up. He doesn't draw attention to the set up by getting indignant, but his lack of adjectives is significant. He also allows Holmes to make a mistake, and doesn't allow him to notice and joke about it.
So Watson has mixed feelings about Holmes, so what? What does it matter that this one fictional character has a love-hate relationship with another?
Very little, of course, unless one happens to be one of those two characters--or one of those that study them. For consider the implications! Here is a man who his widely considered to be a nice guy, just competent enough at medicine that he doesn't get his shirt sued off, with an identity all wrapped up in somebody else--and 'widely' is an appropriate term, for there are very few English-speaking people who aren't at least vaguely aware that Sherlock Holmes is a smart detective who has a dumb companion in Dr. Watson. In fact, the phrase most associated with Holmes is 'Elementary, my dear Watson,' which implies that either the good doctor is an utter moron who can't think or that the great detective's thoughts push the limits of human conception--and was in fact never said. Yet, despite this common conception, Holmes is no hero and Watson is no want wit. Holmes is an intrinsically flawed human being and Watson is a bright, competent, and witty fellow who has repressed his selfness to the point where he is in agony. Holmes can't see what's in front of his eyes, if it affects him personally, and Watson is very good at keeping the Master under control. Who'd have thought it? Which leads to another question: why has no one noticed? Why are the only people who do notice those who are so interested in the stories and characters that they have gotten themselves labeled fanatics and lumped together under the label 'Sherlockian?' Is it Watson's fault--or Doyle's--for being too subtle? Did he emphasize his love so strongly that his resentment got throttled and buried so deeply that it needs to be searched for with a magnifying glass? Or is it the fault of the classical tales, which give us fairly straightforward views on whom to sympathize with? Can this be blamed on the Victorian style of writing, which seems both so stifled and melodramatic that it is too embarrassing to read deeply? Or on modern readers, for daring to skim great literature? Wherever the blame belongs, it is quite clear that we as readers need to take another look at Holmes, and Watson, and quite possibly a great many other seemingly straightforward characters. For if Holmes is imperfect and Watson is smart, then who's to say that Ophelia and Horatio aren't in league with Claudius to drive Hamlet insane? With both Holmes and Hamlet, we're getting the stories mainly secondhand. We get Hamlet from Shakespeare and Holmes from televisations and movies, like Disney's outrageous film The Great Mouse Detective and the series starring Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce on which it was based, and secondhand information is insufficient data.
What we need to do, as a society, is to go back to the original sources of the stories we think we know and read them over, carefully. For if Holmes is imperfect and Watson is smart, then (your Deity of choice here) only knows what else we've missed!