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Book

The invention of murder : how the Victorians revelled in death and detection and created modern crime

Call Number

  • 364.1523 F584 (CEN)

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Edition

First U.S. edition.

Publication Information

New York : Thomas Dunne Books/St. Martin's Press, 2013.

Physical Description

xi, 556 pages ; illustrations ; 25 cm

Summary

In this exploration of murder in the nineteenth century, Judith Flanders explores some of the most gripping cases that fascinated the Victorians and gave rise to the first detective fiction. She retells the gruesome stories of many different types of murder--both famous and obscure--from the crimes (and myths) of Sweeney Todd and Jack the Ripper to the tragedies of the murdered Marr family in London's East End; Burke and Hare and their bodysnatching business in Edinburgh; and Greenacre, who transported his dismembered fiancee around town by omnibus.

Notes

Originally published: 2011.

Contents

  • Imagining murder
  • Trial by newspaper
  • Entertaining murder
  • Policing murder
  • Panic
  • Middle-class poisoners
  • Science, technology and the law
  • Violence
  • Modernity.

Subjects