Basil of Baker Street
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Basil: Elementary, my dear Dawson. |
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A long since out-of-print children's book series written by Eve Titus and illustrated by Paul Galdone about Basil of Baker Street, the Sherlock Holmes of the Mouse World, and his personal biographer, Dr. David Q. Dawson. Not as well known as its Animated Adaptation, The Great Mouse Detective.
The following tropes are common to many or all entries in the Basil of Baker Street franchise.
For tropes specific to individual installments, visit their respective work pages.
For tropes specific to individual installments, visit their respective work pages.
Series-wide:
- Adaptation Displacement
- Badass Bookworm: Basil is quite able to hold his own in a fight against multiple opponents.
- Barefoot Cartoon Animals: While mostly averted in The Great Mouse Detective, Galdone's illustrations show a lack of shoes for any of the characters.
- Cats Are Mean: Throughout the series but averted in Basil and the Pygmy Cats since, you know, the cats are the same size as the mice.
- Dreadful Musician: Sort of. While Basil can't play the violin like his mentor to save his life, he is quite good at playing the flute.
- Evil Counterpart: Ratigan
- Great Detective: Basil
- Loads and Loads of Characters: Each book has a Cast of Characters section in the front.
- Master of Disguise: Basil
- Narrator: Dawson throughout the series but the role is taken over temporarily for one chapter of Basil in Mexico by Basil since at the time Dawson was kidnapped by Ratigan.
- Police Are Useless
- Private Detective: Basil
- Sherlock Scan
- Shout-Out: Plenty of shoutouts throughout the series to Titus' other mouse-related series, Anatole and of course, to The Canon itself.
- Sidekick: Dawson
- The Watson: Dawson
- Tuckerization: Titus has a habit of naming fictional characters after real life Sherlockians, including Vincent Starrett and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's son, Adrian.
- Victorian London
Basil of Baker Street
- Alliterative Name: Harry Hawkins, Sam Stilton
- Beam Me Up, Scotty: Averted. Titus quotes the often missaid line in Robert Burns' "To a Mouse" correctly.
- GPS Evidence: How Basil and Dawson manage to find The Terrible Three.
- Location Theme Naming: Basil and Dawson sign the Greymouse Inn registry as "Captain Baker" and "Mr. Street".
- The Magnificent: Barney the Bank Robber, Clarence the Crook, Freddie the Forger, Percy the Pickpocket
- Theme Twin Naming: Angela and Agatha Proudfoot
Basil and the Lost Colony
- Bigfoot, Sasquatch, and Yeti: The Adorable Snowmouse
- Theme Twin Naming: Flora and Fauna Faversham
- Noodle Incident: The Sealed Mousehole Mystery
Basil and the Pygmy Cats
- Doppelganger: The characters note Basil's uncanny resemblance to the deceased Prince Semloh. (Whether this is a case of Identical Grandson or Famous Ancestor isn't explained.)
- Sdrawkcab Name: This book loves this trope. Elyod, Nairda, Semloh, Relda.
- The Magnificent: Elyod the Good, Semloh the Poet Prince