Yay for poking into Canonical corners! Thank you so much for working out Watson's income. There's a fair bit of speculation in the Klinger annotated about how much the lodgings at Baker Street must have cost (I think £4 a week for room and board, split between the two of them, was the posited figure), but somehow Mr. Klinger never really dug into where that put Watson on the income spectrum. Now you've got me wanting to compare...
*tries to remember all the monetary references in the whole Canon all at once and falls on face*
One bit on money in the stories that always sticks with me is the discussion in IDEN of Miss Mary Sutherland's income. She says that she had £2500 willed to her and that it brings in 4.5% interest, which works out to £112.5 per annum, plus approximately 1/- per day for typing (another £18 a year). Holmes mentions that a single woman can live very comfortably on £60 a year, and Miss Sutherland replies that she "could do with much less than that." If a single woman of the middle class could make do on £50 a year, Watson is doing fairly well for himself on four times that sum, although presumably he has a few expenses that a young lady wouldn't (most notably alcohol and tobacco). Not so hot compared to Neville St.-Clair, though, who makes £700 a year by begging!
The other numbers that this post brought to the front of my mind were some of the sums that Holmes gets as commissions and rewards. The King of Bohemia throws a thousand pounds on the table, and the reward for the Blue Carbuncle is the same (though whether that's ever claimed and, if so, by whom is unclear), there's another £1000 reward in BERY, and then of course there's the staggering £6000 check from the Duke in PRIO. I mean, I knew that wasn't pocket change, but when compared to Watson's pension it's almost unbelievable-- that's 30 times W's annual income! Even the £500 from Von Bork in LAST is nothing to sneeze at. Our Mr. Holmes comes quite a long way from the man who needs someone to share the rent in STUD in the course of his career, no?
I could clearly go on like this all night, but I won't subject you to that :) But, since you've been looking into it, I don't suppose you have any idea what Mary's six pearls would have been worth (I do always seem to end up back on Mary these days)? She was probably making somewhere between £60 and £90 a year as a governess, if COPP is anything to go by, so hardly an heiress that way, but those pearls are beginning to worry me. The Canon is awfully contradictory on gems. Sir George sells the peerless emeralds in BERY for £200 apiece, and Holmes buys them back at £1000 each, but the equally matchless Blue Carbuncle is worth £20,000...
Definitely have to stop now before I get into Mr. Hatherley's £27 10d takings in two years, followed by 50 guineas for a night's work (almost). And the quarter-million pound robbery in GLOR. And Mycroft's £450 a year for being the British government...
no subject
*tries to remember all the monetary references in the whole Canon all at once and falls on face*
One bit on money in the stories that always sticks with me is the discussion in IDEN of Miss Mary Sutherland's income. She says that she had £2500 willed to her and that it brings in 4.5% interest, which works out to £112.5 per annum, plus approximately 1/- per day for typing (another £18 a year). Holmes mentions that a single woman can live very comfortably on £60 a year, and Miss Sutherland replies that she "could do with much less than that." If a single woman of the middle class could make do on £50 a year, Watson is doing fairly well for himself on four times that sum, although presumably he has a few expenses that a young lady wouldn't (most notably alcohol and tobacco). Not so hot compared to Neville St.-Clair, though, who makes £700 a year by begging!
The other numbers that this post brought to the front of my mind were some of the sums that Holmes gets as commissions and rewards. The King of Bohemia throws a thousand pounds on the table, and the reward for the Blue Carbuncle is the same (though whether that's ever claimed and, if so, by whom is unclear), there's another £1000 reward in BERY, and then of course there's the staggering £6000 check from the Duke in PRIO. I mean, I knew that wasn't pocket change, but when compared to Watson's pension it's almost unbelievable-- that's 30 times W's annual income! Even the £500 from Von Bork in LAST is nothing to sneeze at. Our Mr. Holmes comes quite a long way from the man who needs someone to share the rent in STUD in the course of his career, no?
I could clearly go on like this all night, but I won't subject you to that :) But, since you've been looking into it, I don't suppose you have any idea what Mary's six pearls would have been worth (I do always seem to end up back on Mary these days)? She was probably making somewhere between £60 and £90 a year as a governess, if COPP is anything to go by, so hardly an heiress that way, but those pearls are beginning to worry me. The Canon is awfully contradictory on gems. Sir George sells the peerless emeralds in BERY for £200 apiece, and Holmes buys them back at £1000 each, but the equally matchless Blue Carbuncle is worth £20,000...
Definitely have to stop now before I get into Mr. Hatherley's £27 10d takings in two years, followed by 50 guineas for a night's work (almost). And the quarter-million pound robbery in GLOR. And Mycroft's £450 a year for being the British government...