Happy Birthday, Sherlock Holmes! (Observed)
I like a good party as much as the next person who doesn't at all like a good party. Birthday parties are the best parties. I also don't wish to trip the light pedantic. "Come, and trip it as ye go, On the light fantastick toe." - Milton. Nor do I wish to be a Debbie Downer. Even Debbie Downers don't wish to be that. So they masquerade as rockstar free-spirits and get face tats and share thoughts like BEING KIND IS PUNK. I digress, what I'm alluding to in that regrettable mini-tirade is of the other focus of this blog.
I suppose you might call me a dissident and I do wish everyone well.
But haven't I already digressed? Sherlock Holmes was born in the year 1854. This we know thanks to "a tall gaunt man of sixty" - His Last Bow. That anchors that and since I wisely trust the maths & chronologies of (certain) others more-so than my own, 'thus it is written' - to borrow briefly from the KJV. How-so-ever, the January 6th part of the remainder of the equation supposedly answering the Holmes DOB question--well, that's less solid, it would seem. Evidence is circumstantial and merely + vaguely two-fold from what I've gathered.
The first bit of hypothesizing comes from the admittingly brilliant Sherlockian mind of one William S. Baring-Gould, for there can never be two, although perhaps it's not his finest work. It follows thusly: in The Valley of Fear, we begin on January 7th and upon that beginning, Holmes appears grumpy-testy (but when doesn't he?). From that, it is surmised that the consulting detective is nursing a hangover from the night before's yearly festivities. This is, I'd imagine, used more as a supporting bit of evidence to what I'll share next (one would imagine.) but it is flawed.
While Holmes does imbibe quite regularly within canonical pages, I do not recall him ever doing-so to any great excess that would lead him into a rough next morning. Although, in fairness, he is a noted practitioner of sleeping in late. Also, the owning of a gasogene shows him to fully adore whisky and sodas. Suffice to say though, I feel this proof alone lacks in proofiness and frankly doesn't hold sparkling water. Not to mention more against it on the immediate heels of my dismissal of it--
but does the image of Holmes drunk at his own middle-aged party scan in your mind whatsoever? If yes, in your conjured flashback sequence is Holmes in a conga line or doing the limbo at a Tiki Bar? You just might be writing fanfic either way. Is he cuddling up to Watson? Yup. Fanfic. [NOT THAT THERE'S ANYTHING WRONG WITH THAT.]
The promised second bit of supposed documentation in support of the 6th of January is the brainchild of none other than Christopher Morley. It's at this point I begin to question any merit I might have in casting doubtful shadowing upon the opining of these great men. I'll forge bravely ahead nonetheless simply because stupid and brave are at times utterly indistinguishable. It's a Shakespeare thing, this idea's root. Namely The Twelfth Night, which Holmes directly quotes not once but twice in canon.
::: very ::: tenuously so much so that I fail to see how--although I may have missed it in my research--this points to the 12th day of Christmas... OK and laces into The Feast of Epiphany... gotcha. But, I do not see how this ties in whatsoever in any direct or otherwise manner, to our 1/6 date; and what I (erroneously?) declared to be the lead to the previous statement's support. We got nada strung-together from there-to-birth. That's it. That's all. A cut cord, if you will. So it's January 6th and Holmes is 168 years-old today and also today, I am still reeling from the unexpected loss of Betty White (99). (h/t Phil Kurut)
Perhaps it's that immeasurable grief which now makes visions of Holmes preparing for tonight's celebrations seem somehow correct. "Here dwell together still two men of note Who never lived and so can never die." - Vincent Starrett. I bet Sherlock Holmes calls it an early evening in any event--the English countryside bees, after all, they wait for no man. Myself, I'll now light a cigar in honor of this great and glorious day, perchance to be followed later by a spiced rum tropical something.
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::: very :::