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Mycroft Holmes as depicted by Sidney Edward Paget in Strand Magazine
Mycroft Holmes
as depicted by Sidney Edward Paget in Strand Magazine

Mycroft Holmes is a fictional character in the stories written by Arthur Conan Doyle. Sidney Edward Paget ( October 4, 1860 in London - January 28, 1908) was a British Illustrator of the The Strand Magazine was a monthly fiction magazine founded by George Newnes. Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle, DL (22 May 1859 – 7 July 1930 was an Anglo-Scottish Author most noted for his stories about the He is the older brother (by seven years) of the famous detective Sherlock Holmes. Sherlock Holmes is a famous fictional detective of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries who first appeared in Publication in 1887

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Possessing deductive powers exceeding even those of his younger brother, Mycroft is nonetheless incapable of performing detective work similar to that of Sherlock since he is unwilling to put in the physical effort necessary to bring cases to their conclusions.

. . . he has no ambition and no energy. He will not even go out of his way to verify his own solutions, and would rather be considered wrong than take the trouble to prove himself right. Again and again I have taken a problem to him, and have received an explanation which has afterwards proved to be the correct one. And yet he was absolutely incapable of working out the practical points. . .

– Sherlock Holmes, speaking of his brother in "The Adventure of the Greek Interpreter"

While Conan Doyle's stories leave unclear what Mycroft Holmes' exact position is in the British government, Sherlock Holmes says that "Occasionally he is the British government [. " The Adventure of the Greek Interpreter " one of the 56 Sherlock Holmes short stories written by British author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, is one of 12 . . ] the most indispensable man in the country. " He apparently serves as a sort of human computer:

The conclusions of every department are passed to him, and he is the central exchange, the clearinghouse, which makes out the balance. All other men are specialists, but his specialism is omniscience. Omniscience (ɒm'nɪsɪəns (or Omniscient Point-of-View in writing is the capacity to know everything infinitely or at least everything that can be known about a character

– "The Bruce-Partington Plans"

Mycroft has appeared or been mentioned in four stories by Doyle: "The Greek Interpreter", "The Final Problem", "The Empty House" and "The Bruce-Partington Plans". "The Adventure of the Bruce-Partington Plans", one of the 56 Sherlock Holmes short stories written by British author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, is one " The Adventure of the Greek Interpreter " one of the 56 Sherlock Holmes short stories written by British author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, is one of 12 The Adventure of the Final Problem is a short story by Arthur Conan Doyle, featuring his detective character Sherlock Holmes. The Adventure of the Empty House, one of the 56 Sherlock Holmes short stories written by British author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, is one of 13 stories in the cycle "The Adventure of the Bruce-Partington Plans", one of the 56 Sherlock Holmes short stories written by British author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, is one While he does occasionally exert himself in these stories on the behalf of his brother, he on the whole remains a sedentary problem-solver, providing solutions based on seemingly no evidence and trusting Sherlock to handle any of the practical details. In fact, Mycroft's own lack of practicality is a severe handicap despite his deductive talents: in "The Greek Interpreter", his blundering approach to the case nearly costs the client his life.

Mycroft resembles Sherlock, but is described in "The Greek Interpreter" as being "a much larger and stouter man". In "The Bruce-Partington Plans", the following description is given:

Heavily built and massive, there was a suggestion of uncouth physical inertia in the figure, but above this unwieldy frame there was perched a head so masterful in its brow, so alert in its steel-gray, deep-set eyes, so firm in its lips, and so subtle in its play of expression, that after the first glance one forgot the gross body and remembered only the dominant mind.

Mycroft spends most of his time at the Diogenes Club, which he co-founded. The Diogenes Club is a fictional Gentleman's club created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and featured in several Sherlock Holmes stories most notably "

A resemblance has been noted between Mycroft Holmes and another brilliant but sedentary fictional detective, Nero Wolfe; it has been suggested, with varying degrees of seriousness, that they may have been related. Nero Wolfe is a fictional detective created by the American Mystery writer Rex Stout, who made his debut in 1934 The best-known form of this hypothesis — popularized by William S. Baring-Gould, who wrote "biographies" of both Sherlock Holmes and Nero Wolfe — holds that Wolfe is the offspring of Sherlock and Irene Adler. William Stuart Baring-Gould (1913&ndash1967 was a noted Sherlock Holmes scholar best known as the author of the influential 1962 fictional biography Sherlock Holmes Irene Adler is a Fictional character featured in the Sherlock Holmes story " A Scandal in Bohemia " by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, published

Another parallel can be observed in the TV series Monk in the connection between fictional obsessive-compulsive detective Adrian Monk and his even more intelligent, though even more neurotic and agoraphobic, brother Ambrose. Monk is an American Dramedy series created by Andy Breckman and starring Tony Shalhoub as the title character Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD is a Chronic Anxiety disorder most commonly characterized by obsessive Distressing Intrusive thoughts Adrian Monk is a Fictional character, and the protagonist of television series Monk, portrayed by Tony Shalhoub. Agoraphobia is an Anxiety disorder, often precipitated by the fear of having a Panic attack in a setting from which there is no easy means of escape In a similar vein, the television show Numb3rs features a mathematician who frequently aids his FBI agent brother. NUMB3RS (pronounced Numbers) is an American Television show produced by brothers Ridley and Tony Scott.

Mycroft was parodied in the Solar Pons series with a character named Bancroft Stoneham Pons, who was also seven years older than the leading protagonist. Solar Pons is a Fictional Detective created by August Derleth as a Pastiche of Arthur Conan Doyle 's Sherlock Holmes.

References in popular culture

Mycroft Holmes has been portrayed many times in film, television, and radio adaptations of the Holmes stories. Television ( TV) is a widely used Telecommunication medium for sending ( Broadcasting) and receiving moving Images, either monochromatic Radio is the transmission of signals by Modulation of electromagnetic waves with frequencies below those of visible Light. In the 1950s radio series starring John Gielgud as Sherlock Holmes, Gielgud's own brother, Val Gielgud, played the part. Sir Arthur John Gielgud, OM, CH ( 14 April, 1904 – 21 May 2000) known as Sir John Gielgud, was an Val Henry Gielgud ( 28 April 1900 in &ndash 30 November 1981) was an English Actor, Writer, director In the Billy Wilder-directed film The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1970), which starred Robert Stephens as Sherlock, Mycroft was played by Christopher Lee (who also played Sherlock Holmes in other productions before and since). Billy Wilder ( June 22, 1906 – March 27, 2002) was an Austrian born Jewish - American Journalist The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes is a 1970 Film directed and produced by Billy Wilder; he also shared writing credit with his longtime Sir Robert Stephens ( 14 July 1931 &ndash 12 November 1995) was a leading actor in the early years of England's Royal National Theatre Christopher Frank Carandini Lee CBE, CStJ (born 27 May 1922 is a two-time Screen Actors Guild Award-nominated Saturn Award-winning English Actor In this film, which purports to show the 'real' people behind Watson's dramatized accounts, Mycroft is nearly unrecognizable: whippet-thin, not notably indolent, and (judging by several serious misjudgements in the course of events) not the mental powerhouse Watson describes him as. Charles Gray assumed the character in both the 1976 film The Seven-Per-Cent Solution and four episodes of Granada Television's The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes series in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Charles Gray ( August 29 1928 - March 7 2000) was an English Actor. The Seven-Per-Cent Solution is the title of a 1974 novel by Nicholas Meyer. Granada Television is the United Kingdom ITV contractor for North West England. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes is the name given to the TV series of Sherlock Holmes adaptations produced by British Television company

The character has been used many times in works that are not adaptations of Holmes stories:

Mycroft is also sometimes referred to less directly in popular culture:

See also

External links

Dictionary

Mycroft Holmes

-proper noun

  1. A fictional character, the brother of Sherlock Holmes in the books by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
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