A literary geography of the sinthome: the case of Sherlock Holmes and The Stormy Petrels of British Columbia

Abstract

ABSTRACT Although literary geography has become an established subfield, to date, there are no in-depth geographical studies on literary groups that gather to celebrate a specific author and/or genre. To address this lacuna, my paper investigates Vancouver’s official Sherlock Holmes society, The Stormy Petrels of British Columbia (hereafter Petrels). Drawing on the methods of participant observation and semi-structured interviews, as well as Jacques Lacan’s concept of ‘le sinthome’ (hereafter sinthome), which defines how creative modes of (un)conscious enjoyment knot together psychical and social space, I explore three ways through which the Petrels’ enjoyment of Sherlock Holmes gives consistency to their individual and collective lives: first, through ‘nomination’ wherein the Petrels identify with Sherlockian characters and make names for themselves; second, through what Lacan refers to as ‘lalangue,’ that is, enigmatic meanings produced by the musical flows and babbles of speech; and third, through the surplus accumulation of memorabilia, what I call ‘sintholmes,’ which hold a powerful attraction as sublime objects of Sherlockiana. The article concludes by considering the political dimensions of the sinthome in terms of the changes in the Petrels’ demographics and the wider context of Sherlock Holmes fandom.