“I can take a joke with the best” [HOUN]
"Dad jokes" are typically punny or corny humor used mainly by fathers (although anyone can tell them). Responses range from mild laughter to eye rolls.
That got us to thinking while there are plenty of fathers and father figures in the Sherlock Holmes stories, what is the state of dad jokes — or more broadly, jokes overall? We find a mixed bag.
Jokes as an Excuse
Let's begin with father figures. Who can you think of that, when brought to justice, claimed they were only joking?
The first is a stepfather, who, in collusion with Mary Sutherland's mother, duped her into believing Hosmer Angel was a real suitor in "A Case of Identity":
“It was only a joke at first,” groaned our visitor.“We never thought that she would have been so carried away.”
In "The Norwood Builder," Jonas Oldacre was smoked out of his hiding place after John Hector McFarlane was accused of his murder:
The wretched creature began to whimper.“I am sure, sir, it was only my practical joke.”
And later, has he was being taken away by Inspector Lestrade:
“It was a joke, my good sir, a practical joke, nothing more,” he whined incessantly. “I assure you, sir, that I simply concealed myself in order to see the effect of my disappearance, and I am sure that you would not be so unjust as to imagine that I would have allowed any harm to befall poor young Mr. McFarlane.”
In order to dismiss any fear her husband might have or keep him from harm, Elsie Cubitt claimed that the dancing men cipher was a joke:
“She answered that it was some senseless practical joke, and that I should not take any notice of it.”
Jokes Eliminated as Motives
There are also instances of jokes being eliminated as a motive in certain dire circumstances.
When he awoke to find the house abandoned in "Wisteria Lodge," John Scott Eccles told Holmes:
“I was furious. My first idea was that I had been the victim of some absurd practical joke.”
Holmes and Lestrade, discussing the motive of the severed ears arriving in "The Cardboard Box":
“You have observed, of course,” said he at last, “that the ears are not a pair.”“Yes, I have noticed that. But if this were the practical joke of some students from the dissecting-rooms, it would be as easy for them to send two odd ears as a pair.”“Precisely. But this is not a practical joke.”
Holmes played things up for Culverton Smith in "The Dying Detective," getting the criminal to admit that he sent Holmes a poisoned booby-trap:
“Yes, yes, I opened it. There was a sharp spring inside it. Some joke—”“It was no joke, as you will find to your cost.”
Mistaken for a Joke
And there are cases where something considered a joke when Sherlock Holmes knew something much more serious was at stake:
After Jabez Wilson discovered he had been duped to be away from his shop, he viewed it as an inconvenience and a monetary loss:
“But I want to find out about them, and who they are, and what their object was in playingthis prank—if it was a prank—upon me. It was a pretty expensive joke for them, for it cost them two and thirty pounds.”
In "The Five Orange Pips," John Openshaw's father was left with the effects of his own brother, Colonel Openshaw. When an envelope arrived and told him to "put the papers on the sundial," the elder Openshaw dismissed the threat and remarked:
“ ‘Some preposterous practical joke,’ said he. ‘What have I to do with sundials and papers? I shall take no notice of such nonsense.’
When the race was over and Colonel Ross wondered where the murderer of John Straker was, Sherlock Holmes claimed that he was "In my company at this moment." Ross didn't take kindly to it:
“I quite recognize that I am under obligations to you, Mr. Holmes,” said he, “but I must regard what you have just said as either a very bad joke or an insult.”
The jokes that fly at Baker Street Elementary are nowhere near as mistakable...
Related:
Baker Street Elementary follows the original adventures of Sherlock Holmes and John Watson, as they and their friends work through the issues of elementary school in Victorian London. An archive of all previous episodes can be viewed at the Baker Street Elementary website.
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