The Sherlock Holmes Shop

In this Diamond Jubilee year the Society’s publishing programme strikes out into new territory, with the recent release of a twin-DVD set. The digital technology that has transformed the Annual Film Evening now enables us to offer some of the more important short films from the Society’s archives – some of them unseen for twenty years or more.

Nice quality Parker Rollerball pen - blue with a gold finish - and with the name of the Society on the barrel of the pen. Comes in a special Presentation Box.

Enamelled cufflinks in blue and silver to match the Society’s silk tie. We have a good supply of ties if you want to order both together.

On 30 August 1889, two rising British authors dined at the world-famous Langham Hotel in London. They were Arthur Conan Doyle and Oscar Wilde, brought together by the American publisher and editor J M Stoddart.

By the end of the evening, Stoddart had made two major signings. The results: Conan Doyle brought Sherlock Holmes to the public’s notice for the second time with The Sign of Four and Wilde produced his enduring masterpiece The Picture of Dorian Gray.

The Society produced a celebratory booklet to commemorate the day, Nicholas Utechin writing up the full back story. Gyles Brandreth contributed the Foreword. A Golden Day was published in an edition of 200 and a limited number of copies remain available for purchase by collectors on a first come first serve basis.

The Society’s 2010 expedition visited the landscapes and buildings associated with two Sherlock Holmes tales: following the tyre tracks of Miss Violet Smith in the area of Farnham in The Adventure of the Solitary Cyclist, and investigating the possible sites of The Crooked Man in the military town of Aldershot. Our handbook provides a range of scholarly commentary upon aspects of each tale, with articles ranging from Catherine Cooke on the typography of the Solitary Cyclist to Anna Smyth on the natural history of the mongoose. Highlights include Helen Dorey on the idiosyncratic iconography of the Watts Mausoleum and Jane Arnold Foster on Brooklands and the Raleigh Bicycle Collection. Other content includes Nick Utechin looking back on publication format in The Strand and Collier’s, Oscar Ross on Freeman Wills Crofts, Eva Zenk Iggland on Guildford’s Spike, a little-known survivor of our social history, and Jonathan McCafferty digressing upon the employment of Miss Smith’s father at the Imperial Theatre. Not least amongst the many charms which clamour for the reader’s attention, Dr Auberon Redfearn has contributed a dialogue in dramatic verse on the perils of a canary beset by a mongoose.

This handbook is a debutante publication, for whereas all the Society’s previous handbooks have been published alongside the expedition weekend, this year’s publication follows upon our travels. The delay is deliberate; it allows us to create an especially handsome issue including original photographic material and maps. We have also taken the opportunity to republish, as a convenience to the reader, Cmdr. Geoffrey’s Stavert’s original material on the location of Charlington Hall and Mr Bernard Davies’s work used by the Society in our recent excursion.

On Sunday 20th June, at West Wycombe cricket ground, the Society's cricket team took on the Gold Bats of the P. G. Wodehouse Society in the 10th anniversary match of this famous fixture. During the lunch interval, a commemorative brochure entitled Wycombe Wonders was launched and distributed to players and supporters of both sides. Written by Nick Utechin, with a Foreword by team captain Peter Horrocks, it tells a tale of cricketing adventures, disasters and occasional glories, charting the eight matches played up to 2010 (there was too much rain in 2007), it is a bucolic and not wholly serious additon to the Society's publishing rosta - an item that deserved a wide readership (and you don't need to understand the official cricket rules of 1895 to appreciate the dramas).

It was published under the auspices of Bob Ellis in an edition of 221B unnumbered copies, is beautifully illustrated and the Society has a number available for purchase at £3.00 plus postage.

It could be that if you buy this enticing little booklet, it might impel you to come to West Wycombe next year to enjoy the atmosphere, the sun, the camaraderie and the bottles! If you did, you would see how the Society’s team might improve on what is now a lead in victories over our opponents.