Sherlock Data's bookcase

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

@FederationHistorian @Tango @Victoria @Sumire

Aside from these anachronistic books, that is (for a period setting, not Trek)
https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Childcraft
https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Close-Up

 

[Victoria]

Given this is a recreation of the Conan Doyle fiction (with a nod to the screen/stage versions), the books will be those mentioned in Conan Doyle's works.

Offhand, that means there will be: at least one Bradshaw (multiple mentions); "De Jure Inter Gentes" (A Study in Scarlet); various monographs written by Holmes himself; the Medical Directory (Hound of the Baskervilles); Whitaker's Almanac (Valley of Fear). Presumably there's a list somewhere on the Internet.

Actually, as we all know, in RL these are whatever books there were to hand for set dressing and have no connection whatever to Holmes or to Star Trek.

 

[at Quark's]

Actually, as we all know, in RL these are whatever books there were to hand for set dressing and have no connection whatever to Holmes or to Star Trek.

Of course they wouldn't have taken the time and money required to make covers for those books for only a few seconds of of imagery. It's only a TV show with a production schedule after all. It's not as if any fan would be obsessed enough to create high-res and possibly digitally enhanced screenshots 30 or 35 years after the show was made in order to check the actual titles visible in the background, right?

 

[Whizkid]

Of course you had to mention this!

Arthur Conan Doyle and Sherlock! The best 19th C attractions.

1898. Sir ARC writes.

Trek alwa

 

[Sherlock Data]

Oh I adore this thread

 

[Whizkid]

Of course you had to mention this!

Arthur Conan Doyle and Sherlock! The best 19th C attractions.

There is a high possibility, extreme even, that I'll eventually fall in love with Data. Spock was my favourite, but Papa's generation.

Given that, let's talk about the Captains. Pike, umm, (Strange New Worlds has done much to rehabilitate Pike, thank goodness) Kirk! Of course! But then there are Picard, Sisko and Janeway. The 3 best Captains ever. (Of course, all of this is subjective)

Forgive me, but I slightly tilt towards PIC. The only other show should have featured Spock (Ethan Peck is simply beautiful, but still...). Unfortunately for us Nimoy passed.

Sir Patrick Stewart is as wholesome as a warm meal on a cold day.

Engage!


1898. Sir ARC writes.

Trek alwa

Trek always learnd from ACD. Just see Voyager

Oh I adore this thread

 

[Whizkid]

Given this is a recreation of the Conan Doyle fiction (with a nod to the screen/stage versions), the books will be those mentioned in Conan Doyle's works.

Offhand, that means there will be: at least one Bradshaw (multiple mentions); "De Jure Inter Gentes" (A Study in Scarlet); various monographs written by Holmes himself; the Medical Directory (Hound of the Baskervilles); Whitaker's Almanac (Valley of Fear). Presumably there's a list somewhere on the Internet.

Actually, as we all know, in RL these are whatever books there were to hand for set dressing and have no connection whatever to Holmes or to Star Trek.

Heh. You're a friend indeed. I didn't think anyone read ACD anymore. All of these things in my head. Now you say them aloud.

 

[Victoria]

Heh. You're a friend indeed. I didn't think anyone read ACD anymore. All of these things in my head. Now you say them aloud.

The Sherlock Holmes stories have never been out-of-print so there must be somebody apart from you and me reading them!


I have had a thought about the books in the picture. As Data's appearance is that of Gillette from the stage play, perhaps the reproduction of Holmes' study is also taken from the Gillette stage play. Rather than the books being those found in the ACD book, they are the books used as scene dressing in the play. The holodeck has got it right - but wrong at the same time.

 

[Whizkid]

True that.

My father was asking me: which story do you remember? I'm Indian, so I remember Mahabharat and Ramayan and Tulsi Das, more or less comprehensively. These were my introduction to Trek.

As for Data and the Gillette point. Excellent! I'll have to watch it.

Which I'll do now.

As for the holodeck point, you can't have it both ways. Right or wrong? Choose.

I think the holodeck was right. Not just because of Moriarty. But Barclay. Reginald Barclay! Ooof!

 

[Victoria]

I mean: the holodeck correctly reproduced the books used as scene dressing from the Gillette staging. It was "wrong" in that these were not the books that ACD mentioned in his works.

 

[Whizkid]

You took the bait!
Excellent! Otherwise I'd have no reason to Trek BBS.

WHAT is this Gillette staging?

 

[Victoria]

William Gillette was the first stage Holmes in a play that he had written using ACD's stories as a basis. He made the deerstalker and cape synonymous with Sherlock Holmes and introduced the curly pipe. I have no idea what the staging was but, no doubt, the holodeck does.

 

[Whizkid]

William Gillette was the first stage Holmes in a play that he had written using ACD's stories as a basis. He made the deerstalker and cape synonymous with Sherlock Holmes and introduced the curly pipe. I have no idea what the staging was but, no doubt, the holodeck does.

Oh. I see!

I'm clearly much too young. But thanks for this Victoria. Thank you.

 

[Christopher]

I'm clearly much too young.

Everyone is. The Gillette play debuted in 1899. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherlock_Holmes_(play)

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

I love the room in general. All that dark wood furniture.

Can anyone make out any of the other book titles (besides the two MA notes)?

 

[Qonundrum]

Of course they wouldn't have taken the time and money required to make covers for those books for only a few seconds of of imagery. It's only a TV show with a production schedule after all. It's not as if any fan would be obsessed enough to create high-res and possibly digitally enhanced screenshots 30 or 35 years after the show was made in order to check the actual titles visible in the background, right?

They did build the entire ancient-London set from scratch... might have ran out of money. Even I have to admit that it's minutiae. But good minutiae, certainly and is a great detail... and, per SD television sets in 1988, it would be a moot point in the context of that time period, and the main sets created more than compensate for sure. Nowadays, it is admittedly cool to know that level of detail...

 

[Christopher]

They did build the entire ancient-London set from scratch... might have ran out of money.

Well, the above-pattern spending on "Elementary, Dear Data" and "Q Who" was the reason the studio insisted they do "Shades of Gray" as a money-saving clip show to balance the budget.

Still, I doubt that had anything to do with the books. As you say, that level of detail would've been unnecessary back then.

 

[JesterFace]

Well, the above-pattern spending on "Elementary, Dear Data" and "Q Who" was the reason the studio insisted they do "Shades of Gray" as a money-saving clip show to balance the budget.

I thought 'Shades of Gray' was made because of the writers strike that also cut that season short.

 

[Christopher]

I thought 'Shades of Gray' was made because of the writers strike that also cut that season short.

No, no, no. The strike was the previous year. It required the climax of "We'll Always Have Paris" to be improvised (through some borderline strikebreaking consultation with the writer over the phone) and the season 1 finale "The Neutral Zone" to be shot from a first-draft script (which was why it was so bad). It also caused the start of season 2 to be delayed a month. But the strike was long since over by the time "Shades of Gray" was made.

I'll never understand why anyone would think a clip show would be the result of a writers' strike. It makes absolutely no sense. Clip shows are routine things -- they used to happen all the time in TV, and sometimes still do. Countless shows did clip episodes at least once a year like clockwork, sometimes more than once. So it makes no sense to think that something so routine would have anything to do with something as rare as a writer's strike. Not to mention that clip shows still need writers to come up with the frame stories that set up the clips. You couldn't do a clip show during a strike any more than any other kind of episode. Not unless it were 100 percent clips with no setup or added narration of any kind, but obviously that's not how clip shows work.

The sole reason that clip shows are done is to save money by making an episode quickly and cheaply. There's no reason that cutting season 2 short by 4 episodes would've made less money available per episode; if anything, it should've freed up more.

 

[Mojochi]

I'll never understand why anyone would think a clip show would be the result of a writers' strike. It makes absolutely no sense. Clip shows are routine things -- they used to happen all the time in TV, and sometimes still do. Countless shows did clip episodes at least once a year like clockwork, sometimes more than once.

Yup. Clip shows are about money management, when you have nearly 2 dozen shows to pump out, & want to save somewhere, just as much as bottle episodes. In TNG's case, it was poor money management, or maybe it was good money management for the 2 episodes they spent it on, because they're so good, but poor management in thinking that they'd get a pass at the end of the season.

They certainly didn't plan to have to scramble Shades of Grey together like that. Personally, I'm not sure I'd trade away the quality of Q-Who for a better episode later on, but I do think there is a better way to make a TNG clip show than what they did. I even think there's a better way to do nearly the same episode they did do, considering how little they had to mine for clips after only 2 seasons.