Watson

[Reichenbach]

Watson is shown as the loyal friend of Sherlock Holmes, that follows him around with dog-like obedience. He is holmes' chronicler, Holmes often shows dislike for Watson's work because it turns 'what could have been an instructive set of scientific works into a set of novels tinged with fantasy and romance' but I would like to look at how much of Holmes' success is due to Watson's fanciful tales? Would Holmes' have had as much success as he did without Watson?
(I am aware that both Sherlock Holmes and John Watson are fictional inventiond of Sir Arthur Connan Doyle, I'm talking about this hypothetically so there is no need to point it out to me! )

[holmesian]

well, holmes was quite successful before watson came into his life.

[Reichenbach]

But not well known enough to be able to afford lodgings of his own, that's why he was looking for someone to share with.

[holmesian]

But not well known enough to be able to afford lodgings of his own, that's why he was looking for someone to share with.

well, he was just 27 when he met watson. he managed to afford lodgings after watson married miss morstan.

[Red-Headed]

I have always thought that it was a quite odd but comparatively interesting literary device of using Watson to tell us about Holmes. It has a strange alienating effect on the character of Holmes for the reader.

[bounty]

ive not paid intimate attention to that question as ive gone about my sherlock holmes consumption, but offhand (maybe some of this comes from the BBC production) it seems that holmes' popularity grew as a result of being chronicled by Watson, and he was able to take on more interesting and challenging cases---thereby becoming more successful.

as a fun aside, I have an old friend whose last name is "Reichenbach!"