Transgression in Sherlock Holmes’s Female Characters: From the ‘Angel in the House’ to the New (Criminal) Woman

Abstract

This essay will examine certain female characters from the short stories of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1892) and The Case Book of Sherlock Holmes (1927). It will analyse how these female figures transgress the prototype of the Victorian woman based on the status quo of married women, clinging to domestic life and without the opportunity for academic training. Using the different short stories, the focus will be on characters such as Irene Adler, Violet Hunter or Kitty Winter to analyse how, through their description or actions, these female figures transgress the Victorian woman model through qualitative content and discourse analysis. In order to illustrate how Doyle portrays the female characters in terms of physical terms, gender roles, and degree of intervention, I will examine the focalizer and the implications of these women as a narrator. Additionally, the distinction between round and flat characters proposed by E.M. Forster will be utilized to bring out the feminine transgressions related to their Victorian context. Although Watson serves as the narrator after Holmes, their narrative and physical interaction serves the purpose of portraying these three female characters as intelligent, strong, educated, and round characters who defy gender-social Victorian conventions in their own stories.