Ratigan's Human Counterpart

Way back when I first saw Disney's The Great Mouse Detective
in theatres, the character of Basil of Baker Street's antagonist left me puzzled. Holmes and Watson had very clear analogues in the humanized mouse characters Basil and Dr. Dawson. There is also an analogue of Mrs. Hudson (okay, I didn't make of that at the time), and Basil's home resided directly beneath that of their human counterparts. When the villain Ratigan was introduced, however, it seemed rather obvious that he, too, was modeled on a character in the Holmes canon. Toby, the dog who belongs to Holmes in the same movie, actually does exist in the canon, in "The Sign of Four," in case you didn't know.
     But Sherlock Holmes had no reoccurring nemesis--did he? I certainly had never heard of one. I'd known about Sherlock Holmes since I was a small child. I'd read "The Red-Headed League" in the eight grade. And my dad read me the whole of The Hound of the Baskervilles at around the same time. There was no so much a hint of any villain that would serve as the Joker to Holmes's Batman. Then, one evening when my dad was watching a Sherlock Holmes movie on PBS, he pointed out Porfessor Moriarty, who was a reoccurring villain in the Holmes canon. I knew at once I'd found Ratigan's counterpart!
    The reason I'd never heard of Moriarty before is not hard to guess. The character is hardly mentioned throughout the entirety of canonical stories. He's well-known to most fans precisely because his role has been blown out of proportion in films and non-canonical tales. Moriarty is present in a major role in only "The Final Problem," and "The Valley of Fear," and only appears in person, and later clashes with Holmes, only in the former tales. Other than that, he's only referenced in scattering of other stories. How did he come to loom so large?
    Moriarty was originally conceived as little more than a plot device to do away with Holmes. Sherlock Holmes was, famously, more wildly successful than his creator ever intended him to be. Doyle grew tired of even being referred to as "the creator of Sherlock Holmes," and would have preferred being referenced as author of, say, The White Company, or other novels barely known today. In inventing Moriarty as a device for ridding himself of Holmes's unwanted popularity, however, Doyle accomplished something else he obviously never anticipated: the prototype of the recurrant bad guy. Without Moriarty, would there be a Joker, a Lex Luthor, and the rest? Probably not. And just like his adversary, Moriarty refuses to stay dead.
     One other thing: while Mouse Detective's Ratigan is a large, flamboyant, swaggering bully, it seems rather doubtful that Moriarty is that way, at least as Conan Doyle conceived of  him. While there is relatively little canonical info on him, Moriarty himself seems like he would be more shadowy, more reserved, even soft-spoken, than Ratigan is. And while Basil indicates that Ratigan would commit any depravity, no matter how low, some authors, such as Anthony Horowitz, as I explained in the earlier post, portrayed the character more as "aberrant," or evil, but still possessing with a code of honor.

Moriarty by Anthony Horowitz

Last summer I finally decided to read this novel, a pastiche by noted British author Anthony Horowitz, one of my very favorite authors when I was young. Back then, AH wrote mostly Dickensian tales of orphans up against supernatural forces--sort of like a cross between Dickens himself and H. P. Lovecraft. The Power of Five series is of note here, and I refer to original 80's series, (which few have probably heard of these days)not the 2000s reboot, which frankly, I just couldn't get into.
     Anyway, A H has been writing for British TV almost as long as he's been writing, for series like Poiret. It's not surprising to learn he's a huge Sherlock Holmes fan, or that, given his his background in the genre, his two Holmes pastiche novels are critically acclaimed, and even "endorsed" (whatever that means) by the Conan Doyle estate. Does that mean, I've wondered, that these stories are part of the Holmes canon? I doubt that, since a pastiche is still a pastiche, but the Holmes estate approves the work, and that's a huge thing for a pastiche writer.
     A H"s first Holmes novel, House of Silk, was a rousing adventure, with incredible twists and turns, and a cameo my Holme's's arch-villain, Moriarty, who is (I won't give away how), introduced to John Watson prior to the events in "The Final Problem." The author had to manipulate things a bit to do this, but it still works. 
    Moriarty, however, though it's sort of a followup to House of Silk, is not a straight Holmes pastiche; in fact, it's difficult to determine exactly what it is. As its title indicates (as does the tiny scene on the cover, framed against a lurid red background), the book focuses on the apparent death of the Napoleon of Crime, after he and Holmes apparently plunged to their deaths at Richenbach Falls in Switzerland. Holmes fans are familiar with the fact that Holmes was later revealed to have survived--thanks to constant clamoring of Doyle's fans. The fate of Holmes's arch-nemesis, however, remains unrevealed in the canon. We may assume his death, as Doyle never wrote otherwise. However, it's far from a closed case. It's something I've often wondered about, and what AH has used as a springboard for this enthralling novel.
    I'm not exaggerating when I say this grabs the reader, pulls him/her in and never and lets go till the final page, almost literally. It's one of the most suspenseful tales AH has written for a while, and he'd an accomplished suspense writer. The story first concentrates on the apparent death of Moriarty at Riechenbach, then shifts in pursuit of a shadowy person who is believed to have inherited the mastermind's criminal empire, a dreaded American crime baron named Clarence Devereux, whom none has ever seen.  Our protagonists are Fred Chase, a New York detective on Devereux's trail, and Athelney Jones from Scotland Yard, a genuine canonical character. While on the case, these two strike up a friendship that closely parallels that of Watson and Holmes, with Chase clearly the Watson analogue, even serving as the narrator. Early on, I half-suspected Inspector Jones of being Holmes in disguise, but this suspicion was discounted after they appear at Scotland Yard, and the parallel between Holmes/Watson and Chase/Jones became just too strikingly obvious. We learn later that Jones has immersed himself in inductive reasoning, and trained himself to think like Holmes does. At one point, they even consider settling down at Baker Street, and filling the shoes left vacant by the former crime-solving duo. As the Holmes is presumed deceased during the time of the events in Moriarty, neither the real Holmes nor the real Watson make an appearance, even as a cameo. Jones and Chase, however, fill their respective roles so effectively that it almost can be read as a genuine Holmes mystery after all.
    However, as the mystery deepens, and plot threads become ever more tangled (there are references and connections to other tales from the canon, such as "The Red-headed League"), it seems more and more about Devereux, and less and less about Moriarty. Indeed, I began to wonder if the author had forgotten the title of the book.  Rest assured, however, that the Napoleon of Crime definitely does play a part in all of this, and probably not what you might expect. There is, indeed, an incredible twist at the end which I definitely did not expect, and which forces one to see most of the events in the Devoruex case in a different light.
     Moriarty is a tale that should more than satisfy Holmes fans, especially those speculating just what became of Holmes's nemesis after that presumably fatal plunge.

Two things of note here: 1)  AH's porptrayal of Moriarty himself, both in this novle and House of Silk appear more or less that of an aberrant character. I am using the term "aberrant" here in the manner that the Palladium roleplaying game uses the term--to describe a character alignment as "evil, but honorable." Such characters are farily rare but they exist throughout fiction. Daniel Day Lewis's Bill the Butcher in Gangs of New York qualifies.The actual bad guys in House of Silk are such a despicable lot that even Moriarty detests and seeks to aide Holmes in bringing them to justice. An abarent character seeks to achieve his goals through (sometimes deadly) force, but refrains from harming chilren and other innocents. Since contact with Moriarty himself in the canon is sparse at best, it is impossible to say just how canonical AH's take on Moriarty actually is, but it's certainly intrigueing.

2) POSSIBLE SPOILERS HERE> DO NOT READ FURTHER IF YOU PLAN ON READEING THE BOOK. 

     The big twist in Moriarty has to do with the identity of the narrator. I suspected that Jones might turn out to be someone else entirely, but not the narrator. Actually the twist is old one, though not that frequently used. This kind of thing has been done before: I've read "Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper," by Robert Bloch, and "Satan Claus" by David Gerald, both horor stories. But somehow, I didn't see it here--maybe because I got a mental picture early on that resembled the rotund versions of Watson, which wouldn't fit his actual appearance at all. In fact, one real question I have about the narrator is: wouldn't his appearance have given him away to Jones and the other characters? He'd have to be six feet tall or more. AND he's have to resemble a certain stiff found early on. That's kind of an elephant standing in the living room. You couldn't make a film version of Moriarty without the big twist being revealed to most of the audience early on. Since Doyle depicted Jones as something of a bumbler, perhaps that's why he couldn't see what was in front of his face the entire time!