Anna Kozak

Dale Smith

Modernisms

December 1, 2015

Sherlock-ed Lips: Homoeroticism and Fan Culture in the BBC’s Sherlock

The BBC’s Sherlock has undoubtedly had a powerful impact on its fans, who transform

what is already an adaptation of Arthur Conan Doyle’s literature into fanart and fanfiction.

Although this significant amount of fan involvement is unprecedented in the Internet age, it is far

from new. Since the canon’s inception, fans have participated in “The Sherlockian Game,” which

is an ongoing attempt to resolve the inconsistencies in Conan Doyle’s stories by pretending that

the characters are real people. This paper examines early essays on the Sherlockian Game and

the fandoms that formed around them the still exist today, such as the Baker Street Irregulars and

the Speckled Band. However, since most Sherlock Holmes scholarship concentrates on the

audience’s reception and artistic contributions, my paper shifts the focus to how Sherlock’s

writers, Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss, promote fan culture through metafictional references

towards their fans and specifically, the queerbaiting phenomenon. A discrepancy occurs when

Moffat and Gatiss dismiss the potential for queer relationships in Sherlock yet permeate the show

with metafictional references to fan culture and homoeroticism, leading fans to compile “clues”

for the queer subtext as a contemporary form of the Sherlockian Game. I examine the queer

subtext in the series through William Wimsatt Jr. & Monroe Beardsley’s theory of “intentional

fallacy” to critically analyze the denial that Moffat and Gatiss display about their show’s

participation in queerbaiting. I argue that Sherlock encourages fans to view the characters in

romantic relationships through its explicit references to fan culture and homoeroticism.
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Following Walter Benjamin’s notion of the “aura,” I suggest that Sherlock’s writers are

unconcerned with authenticity and are aware that they have created an inauthentic adaptation of

Conan Doyle’s work. Moffat and Gatiss not only utilize this self-awareness to differentiate their

work from previous adaptations, but they also solidify their fan base by metafictionally evoking

fans in the series and by feeding their desires for homoeroticism. Exploring the connections

between “intentional fallacy” and Benjamin’s notion of the “aura,” I examine how Sherlock and

its writers negotiate authenticity with the incorporation of fan culture into the series. My paper

focuses on Sherlock’s metafictional awareness of itself as situated in a larger context of the

Sherlock Holmes canon, including the original texts, their adaptations, and the fan culture that

has transformed from the time of Conan Doyle’s first publications to today.

Benjamin’s notion of the “aura” examines the disconnection between an artwork and its

technologically reproduced forms. Benjamin provides “a general formula that the technology of

reproduction detaches the reproduced object from the sphere of tradition. By replicating the work

many times over, it substitutes a mass existence for a unique existence” (104). He links the loss

of the aura in the age of technological reproducibility to various “mass movements” in the early

twentieth century, citing the “most powerful agent [as] film.” The early Sherlock fandoms that

participate in the Sherlockian Game, like the Baker Street Irregulars (BSI), are predominantly

concerned with the “aura” of Conan Doyle’s work, prioritizing authenticity in the original stories

and in subsequent adaptations (Harvard Library Archives). One of BSI’s earliest members, Edgar

W. Smith, states in a 1936 letter to Vincent Starrett, another BSI member, “I read your [essay]

‘Private Life of Sherlock Holmes’ with all the genuine enthusiasm of one who has himself

cherished from boyhood the admirable illusion that our hero really lived” (Lellenberg). The

Sherlockians’ primary hobby includes writing essays that imagine Sherlock and Watson as real
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people. Their fixation on authenticity involves finding and critiquing perceived inconsistencies in

the original stories. These fans imagine Dr. Watson and Sherlock Holmes as real individuals and

believe that Watson deliberately alters his accounts to mislead his readers. Since most Sherlock

Holmes stories are written in the first person perspective through Watson’s point of view, the

Sherlockian Game imagines him as the writer rather than Conan Doyle, whose authorship is

reduced to the “literary agent.” For instance, Frank Sidgwick’s 1902 essay from the Cambridge

Review is an open letter to Watson in which Sidgwick pretends that Watson is a real human

being rather than a fictional character. He begins his essay with “Dear Dr. Watson,” and refers to

Conan Doyle’s novel, The Hound of the Baskervilles, as Watson’s story (Sidgwick). In this

essay, Sidgwick accuses Watson with “charges of inconsistency,” suggesting that Watson

deliberately omits and alters facts in his version of events. This trend that begins in the early

twentieth century continues into the twenty-first century. National Public Radio (NPR) reporter,

Sean Cole, discusses “One of the oldest societies of Sherlock Holmes fans, the all-male Speckled

Band in Boston [which] plays ‘The Great Game’—essentially, pretending that Holmes and Dr.

Watson were real, and that Arthur Conan Doyle was merely their literary agent.” This group,

according to Cole, “has been around since 1940.” The participants in the Sherlockian Game, both

old and new, valorize the Sherlock Holmes stories’ “aura,” yet express dissatisfaction with even

the original stories in their search for intricate inconsistencies. Ashley Polasek refers to this work

as “pseudo-scholarship,” noting that “The Game is the cornerstone of these essays, and manifests

itself as aficionados, familiar with the Canon down to the last detail, seek to generate a single

cohesive narrative that slots flawlessly into historical reality” (44). In their attempts to historicize

the Sherlock Holmes tales, Sherlockians imagine an idealized “aura” that is unblemished with

inconsistency and completely based on the reality of Victorian life.

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These fans strongly emphasize fidelity, particularly for Sherlock Holmes adaptations that

shift from the medium of literature to film and television. Polasek notes that “there is a general

sense that an adaptation ought to bring the characters to life, that, for example the movie should

be like the book” (44). For instance, Dan Posnansky, a Speckled Band member, states, “There

are over 150 films alone about Sherlock Holmes. Some of them are very accurate; some of them

are just made up” (Cole). Posnansky divides the film adaptations into the binaries, “accurate”

and “made up.” Valuing accuracy in the realm of fiction is a task riddled with irony as all fiction

is technically not accurate in comparison to non-fiction; however, Posnansky prioritizes the

adaptations that he perceives as retaining the original work’s “aura” through minimal creative

changes. Nevertheless, in the context of the Sherlockian game, even the original stories are open

to critique in comparison to an imaginary real life that Sherlock and Watson occupy. Polasek

suggests, “As a result of The Game, Sherlockians have an even more complicated relationship

with the fidelity of adaptations that does the average critical fandom” (44). This complexity

arises as “[t]he conceit of The Game recasts Conan Doyle’s written characters as real people; in

this context, adaptations may be considered fictionalizations of historical events rather than a

transfer of one fictional representation to another.” The Sherlockian Game carries a paradoxical

absurdity as fans create an imaginary world in which Sherlock and Watson are real and thereby

cast all other adaptations and even the original stories as inauthentic. The Game favors the “aura”

of the original Sherlock Holmes stories while also paradoxically imagining a more accurate and

authentic world in which Sherlock and Watson exist.

Sherlock’s writers, Moffat and Gatiss, are aware of this early Sherlockian criticism and

its strong emphasis on the in-tact “aura.” They acknowledge their own adaptation as existing

within a longstanding canon of original Sherlock Holmes stories and adaptations. In an interview
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with Moffat on the BBC website, Moffat says, “We are the biggest Sherlock Holmes geeks in the

world. This has become such an enormous international hit, it’s sort of preposterous, it’s like our

vanity project, it’s our hobby. And yet everybody has joined in!” Moffat’s comment situates

himself and Gatiss as not simply the writers of the show, but also as fans of the Sherlock Holmes

canon. Correspondingly, their series can be read as a work of fanfiction. During “Sherlocked:

The Official Sherlock Convention,” Moffat discusses fanfiction, stating, “I think fan fiction, or

as it should be called, ‘Fiction,’ is a wonderful thing… You’re actively engaging in the business

of storytelling.” While early Sherlockians who value fidelity denounce fanfiction for deviating

from the original stories, Moffat equates it with “Fiction,” demonstrating an ideological shift

from valuing authenticity and the untouched “aura” to appreciating creativity and storytelling.

While “fidelity is often the most important gauge of quality to a fan,” (Polasek 44) Moffat and

Gatiss give their version of Sherlock Holmes a playful, metafictional quality as they subtly refer

to fans within the series itself.

Concerning the contemporary fan culture’s interest in homoeroticism, Moffat and Gatiss

paradoxically demonstrate both an awareness and a denial towards perpetuating such ideals on

their show. In a 2013 BAFTA interview, Moffat comments on the “Johnlock ship,” suggesting

that it is mostly an object of the fans’ imagination. He describes his show as “the best portrait

there’s ever been of male friendship.” The interviewer, however, seems unconvinced, noting that

“fans of course sometimes take the friendship undertones a little bit further. The show pokes fun

at that and references that sometimes. Is that something that you’re deliberately hinting at or is it

something that fans are projecting onto the show themselves?” Moffat chooses the latter option

and suggests, “People always make up their own stories when they watch TV shows and so they

should. And people have been doing that with Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson long before we
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took it over. So, in fact, our biggest reference to it was to explicitly deny that it was happening,

but people have their own fantasies and that’s fine, that’s good.” Moffat expresses an awareness

of the fan culture that has permeated the Sherlock canon, suggesting that his show makes explicit

references to its fan culture. However, his insistence that the homoeroticism is merely part of the

fans’ “projections” and “fantasies” calls forth Wimsatt Jr. and Beardsley’s “intentional fallacy”

theory. This notion suggests that “[t]he design or intention of the author is neither available nor

desirable as a standard for judging the success of a work of literary art” (468).Wimsatt Jr. and

Beardsley prioritize the literary work’s content over the authorial intention. The literary critic can

only ever with certainty analyze the text’s content as authorial intent is allusive and potentially

unreliable. Providing an example in which T. S. Eliot’s poem, “The Love Song of J. Alfred

Prufrock,” alludes to John Donne’s work, Wimsatt Jr. and Beardsley imagine a scenario in which

“[t]he critic writes to Eliot and asks what he meant, or if he had Donne in mind” to which “Eliot

would answer that he meant nothing at all, had nothing at all in mind—a sufficiently good

answer to such a question—or in an unguarded moment might furnish a clear and, within its

limit, irrefutable answer” (487). They ultimately suggest that “such an answer to such an inquiry

would have nothing to do with the poem ‘Prufrock;’ it would not be a critical inquiry… Critical

inquiries are not settled by consulting the oracle.” Following this maxim, I avoid diminishing the

presence of queer subtext in Sherlock simply because Moffat and Gatiss deny its existence in the

show. Rather than attempting to reconcile whether the writers’ comments are truthful, I examine

the text itself for instances where homoeroticism and queerbaiting is strongly suggested. In this

paper, include interviews that reveal Moffat’s denial because the invocation of queerness and its

subsequent dismissal are the essential components of queerbaiting.

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While it may never be known whether Moffat and Gatiss incorporate queerbaiting into

Sherlock intentionally, it is difficult to deny that the show makes explicit references to queerness

and homoeroticism, nourishing fans’ desires and imaginations. Judith Fathallah points out that

Moffat and Gatiss have “been heavily criticized in the fandom and the blogosphere for

queerbaiting” (491). She defines the term as “a strategy by which writers and networks attempt

to gain the attention of queer viewers via hints, jokes, gestures, and symbolism suggesting a

queer relationship between two characters, and then emphatically denying and laughing off the

possibility.” While queerbaiting as a marketing technique may not seem inherently problematic,

Fathallah suggests, “Denial and mockery reinstate a heteronormative narrative that poses no

danger of offending mainstream viewers at the expense of queer eyes.” Although Moffat and

Gatiss in their interviews exhibit this denial, their character, Watson, does so too. One example

of queerbaiting occurs during the episode, “The Great Game,” in which Sherlock rips Watson’s

jacket off because Moriarty, Sherlock’s primary antagonist, straps a bomb onto it. Rather than

thanking Sherlock for saving his life, Watson says, “I’m glad no one saw that… You ripping my

clothes off in a darkened swimming pool, people might talk.” One season later, in “The

Reichenbach Fall,” Sherlock tells Watson, “Take my hand,” as they are running. Watson does so

and replies, “Now people will definitely talk,” extending the conversation from the first season.

These explicit references to homoeroticism along with Watson’s refrain, “people might talk,” are

sites in which queerbaiting becomes apparent. Since there is no one in the pool area aside from

Sherlock and Watson and the only people who observe the scene (aside from the television crew)

are the show’s audience, this phrase implies that the term “people” metafictionally refers to the

fans, who do indeed talk about the scenes as prominent sites of queerbaiting. Fans even go as far

as collecting video evidence for the “Johnlock ship.” YouTube user, “Make Me Believe,” has an
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ongoing video series called “Johnlock Evidence,” which compiles snippets of “gay subtext” from

Sherlock. The word “Johnlock” combines the names “John” and “Sherlock,” to form a couples’

name. This linguistic process is called blending, while the term “ship” is the clipped form of the

word “relationship” (DiGirolamo 2). Fans like “Make Me Believe” deliberately disregard the

claims that Moffat and Gatiss make in which they deny the queer subtext in Sherlock. The two

scenes that I have presented illustrate this queer subtext and metafictionally blur the boundaries

between the audience and the show. Therefore, there is reasonable justification within the show’s

content for the widespread claims that Moffat and Gatiss participate in queerbaiting by creating a

show that metafictionally refers to its fans’ desires for homoeroticism.

Moffat and Gatiss additionally insert metafictional fan characters into Sherlock to show

two distinct types of fandoms: 1) contemporary Internet-based fandoms that produce creative

fanart and fanfiction and fetishize homoeroticism and 2) fandoms that mimic Sherlockian Game

ideals of accuracy over imagination. The first character, Laura, appears briefly in “The Empty

Hearse” and symbolizes the fangirl archetype that fetishizes homoeroticism. The other character,

Anderson, creates a fan group called the Empty Hearse—after which the episode is titled—for

members discuss their differing theories on how Sherlock fakes his death. In Laura’s proposed

scenario, she imagines Moriarty and Sherlock leaning in for a kiss. However, her fantasy is shut

down abruptly as Anderson screams, “What? Are you out of your mind?” Laura replies, “I don’t

see why not. It’s just as plausible as some of your theories,” attempting to defend her invocation

of queerness against charges of inaccuracy. Anderson accuses her of not taking their discussion

seriously, but Laura insists, “I do take it seriously.” This exchange mimics the conflict between

Sherlockians who are invested in accuracy and take themselves “seriously,” like Anderson, and

the contemporary fans that abandon authenticity for imaginative homoeroticism, like Laura.
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Anderson reprimands Laura for straying from a realistic hypothesis even though his own is just

as imaginative and uncertain because only Sherlock knows the truth. Laura teases the fans with a

glimpse of homoeroticism while Anderson shuts down the possibility of queerness, which results

in a queerbaiting scenario. This clip exposes how Sherlock teases its fans with the fetishized

fantasy of queerness while simultaneously denouncing homoerotic possibilities through these

two archetypical fan characters. These metafictional references to fans, regardless of Moffat and

Gatiss’s authorial intentions, strongly suggest that the show itself partakes in queerbaiting.

In conclusion, I present the notion of “intentional fallacy” to critically approach Moffat and

Gatiss’s denial of queerbaiting. The BBC’s Sherlock includes various metafictional references to

its fandoms, using its self-awareness to perpetuate the fandoms’ interests in homoeroticism and

simultaneously denying the possibility of queer relationships. The queer subtext in Sherlock has

led fans to compile video evidence for the homoeroticism within the show. This act of gathering

evidence resembles the Sherlockian Game, in which fans examine the intricate details of the

original stories for inconsistencies and rank the adaptations along a hierarchy of fidelity, valuing

the pure aura. However, the fans that point out the evidence of queerbaiting in Sherlock have a

different goal in mind—to validate queerness in the heteronormative realm of popular television

that perpetually denies it. These fans, like Moffat and Gatiss, disregard the value of the aura and

prioritize the imagination over a strict adherence to the original stories. The discrepancy between

the writers’ denial of homoeroticism in Sherlock and the show’s content, which is permeated

with queer subtext and metafictional references to fans, illustrates the queerbaiting phenomenon.
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University, 8 June 2015. Web. 28 Nov. 2015.

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Cole, Sean. “Sherlock Holmes Fans Play ‘Great Game’” National Public Radio. NPR, 1 Dec.

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