Episode 63: Irregular Stain

The Baker Street Irregulars Manuscript Series has another entry, and once again we find ourselves chatting with co-editors Robert Katz, MD, BSI ("Dr. Ainstree") and Andrew Solberg, BSI ("Professor Coram"). Bob and Andy of course were our guests on Episode 50: A Golden Passage, and we're delighted to have them with us again to share the secret as to how lightning strikes twice and these two fine editors regroup to wrangle together scholarship, research and fun for our Sherlockian edification.

This time, the BSI Manuscript Series title is Irregular Stain, and it treats the reader to a full-color reproduction of the manuscript of "The Adventure of the Second Stain" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. What's more, we even get some high-resolution Sidney Paget artwork that gives more detail of Sherlock Holmes than most readers have seen before.

Join us for this chat with Bob and Andy as we discover the origins of Sherlock Holmes and Haverford College, the secret meaning of the code words "apple pie," and the possible contributor whose unfamiliar handwriting is abruptly seen in the middle of the manuscript. And be the first to know what the next entry in the BSI Manuscript Series will be.

The Gas-Lamp this episode is inspired by a letter written by Vincent Starrett to Edgar Smith mentioned in the Preface of Irregular Stain, which appeared as "A Perspective on Scholarship" in the January 1953 Vol. 3, No. 1 (New Series) edition of The Baker Street Journal.

Links:

• The BSI Manuscript Series
• Irregular Stain: A Facsimile of the Original Manuscript of "The Second Stain" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle with Annotations and Commentary on the Story
• An excerpt from Irregular Stain: "Stained Vows: 'The Second Stain' and English Matrimonial Law" by Elizabeth Rosenblatt, BSI, ASH.
• Randall Stock's census of Sherlock Holmes manuscripts

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