Looking for a book to while away a few hours on a Sunday afternoon?
Sorry, can’t help you today.
On the other hand, if you’re looking for a book that will stimulate your grey matter and give your critical thinking muscles a workout, then do I ever have a recommendation for you!
Review
You might not have heard of Polly Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Kate Eddows and Mary Jane Kelly, but you have almost certainly heard the name of their infamous murderer: Jack the Ripper.
Over the span of three months in 1888, Jack the Ripper terrorised the desperately poor neighbourhood of Whitechapel, in London’s East End. He was never caught, and over the past 130 or so years has evolved into a kind of galmous (dare I say dashing?) anti-hero. People flock from all over the world to view the streets where he stalked his victims, and hear the gory details of their extensive injuries.
But, until Rubenhold picked up her pen, no one had taken the time to discover who his victims, the five women whose lives he so cruelly snuffed out in 1888, really were.
Rubenhold’s book is part-biography and part-social history. She expertly weaves together the stories of these women, turning them from corpses butchered by a famous killer, to flesh and blood women with lives, hopes, dreams and loved ones. She reveals their stories in heart-breaking detail and puts them firmly within the world they inhabited.
She also refrains from publishing the gory and unnecessary details of the women’s injuries. As she rightly points out, these forensic details are not relevant to the lives, but they also glorify the murderer and his ghastly deeds. Her work is all about the women, about Polly, Annie, Elizabeth, Kate and Mary Jane, and how the social and class prejudices of their time led to their murders. It is also an angry indictment on our society, and the way we have sanctified a killer and besmirched his victims for more than a century.
Finally, Rubenhold also busts one of the longest lasting myths about the Whitechapel victims: they were not all sex workers, and Jack the Ripper was not a “John” who paid his way into their beds and then murdered them.
Want to read it for yourself? You can find The Five where all good books are sold, or purchase it as an e-book through your favourite e-reader platform.