The Final Solution Sparknotes

The Final Solution Analyzation

Sherlock Holmes, regarded as the greatest fictional detective of all time, legacy lives on in the novella The Final Solution by Michael Chabon. The passage chosen for examination shows several instances that can be seen throughout Sherlock Holmes novels. Action and intelligence are frequently associated with Sherlock Holmes novels and those same traits are shown in the passage from Chabon. The shear amount of detail in the chosen passage reveals the experiences that Holmes has encountered in the past and provides substance to be able to define him as an intelligent, yet, as an arrogant character, who can understand things in a way that other characters are not able by using Holmesian deduction. By examining the

The skill revolving around inference, is used throughout the fictional life of Holmes and is used in the chosen passage from The Final Solution. The assumptions made by Holmes in past texts as well as Chabon’s novella help him solve crimes and are a staple to his legacy. Holmesian Deduction helps Sherlock solve crimes and is a skill that can only be possessed by a mind as powerful as Sherlock Holmes.

The old man, as described in the passage, is searching through a car belonging to the murdered Mr. Shane. While doing so, he discovered evidence that the police dismissed or simply did not find. After the passage, Holmes goes on to explain how the victim was killed in detail, and is able to explain this in great detail because of his talent of Holmesian deduction. To understand how, the now old Sherlock Holmes, can engage in Holmesian deduction, one must be able to understand it. In the article “The Politics of Deduction,” Tony McKenna describes Holmesian deduction. The article states, “We find Holmes reappearing in successive epochs, refined and rearticulated, applying his awesome mental powers to the crises of the day” (McKenna 48). McKenna’s description of the mindpower of Holmes shows the intelligence that can be linked to Holmesian deduction. This mindpower that Holmes possesses leads him to be

The article states, “… Holmes’ style of deductive reasoning, which includes close observation, careful data gathering, sorting and prioritizing data including absent data (e.g. the dog that did not bark), formulating explanations that fit the data, and finally making the diagnosis” (Ramani 787). This shows that Holmesian deduction can lead one creating a well-informed hypothesis about the presented situation. By using Ramani’s description of Holmes’s skill one can understand what is occurring in the text after the passage. Holmes, in the text states, “‘The pattern and frequency of footprints indicates,’ the old man continued, ‘that at the moment the blow fell Mr. Shane was moving in some haste, and carrying something in his left hand I should wager’” (Chabon 32). This statement is a result of Holmesian deductive that is shown through the life of Holmes. Holmesian deduction shown in the passage as the older Holmes talks to the younger inspector. Holmes uses his sheer mindpower to disregard things the police thought were important and find evidence that was relevant to the crime scene, something the inspector was unable to do. The detail of Holmes’s assumption of how the murder occurred even went as far as what was used