The way Watson describes Sherlock Holmes\u2019 relationship with, and emotions towards Irene Adler is very interesting. Specifically, \u201cIt was not that he felt any emotion akin to love for Irene Adler. All emotions, and that one particularly, were abhorrent to his cold, precise, but admirably balanced mind.\u201d (Doyle, 1). These lines serve a dual purpose, first this passage reads as Watson attempting to rationalize Sherlock\u2019s relationship with Irene Adler. He takes great lengths to explain that Holmes could not possibly be in love with Irene, and as such leaves the door open for a potential relationship between the two male protagonists.<\/p>\n
Second, by stating that Holmes find loving generally \u201cabhorrent\u201d it excuses him from not only heterosexual, but also homosexual love. Thus, the author refutes any potential homosexuality between Watson and Holmes and also reenforces the strict rules in which men are allowed to have relationships with one another.<\/p>\n
We might also consider that this description plays into Sherlock\u2019s broader character as generally weird or odd. It is not that Sherlock feels love, or any kind of heterosexual attraction to Irene Adler, but rather that he admires her from a professional perspective. Plainly, he thinks she has game.<\/p>\n
Not only does this passage work to reaffirm, and development the character of Sherlock Holmes as an emotionless and odd but brilliant detective. It also strongly insists on maintaining the traditional bonds of male relationships, and friendships. Holmes and Watson cannot be together because Sherlock does not have the capacity for sexual desire. Not, interestingly, because both the male protagonists are heterosexual, but because one of them finds love, and emotions generally, disgusting. This is perhaps the most fascinating way that traditional bonds of homosocial desire have been enforced in our reading thus far. Not, because it is natural order, as Dracula claims, but rather because Holmes is not capable of feeling love.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The way Watson describes Sherlock Holmes\u2019 relationship with, and emotions towards Irene Adler is very interesting. Specifically, \u201cIt was not that he felt any emotion akin to love for Irene Adler. All emotions, and that one particularly, were abhorrent to his cold, precise, but admirably balanced mind.\u201d (Doyle, 1). These lines serve a dual purpose, … Continue reading Sherlock Holmes and Homosocial Desire<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5366,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[125361],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1213","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2023-blog-post"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1213","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5366"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1213"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1213\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}