New Ideas and New Research on the Diary

[rjpalmer]

there wasn't a peep about Anne being anything other than an honest British secretary until she needed to not be ...

I think we must travel in different circles.

Who are you referring to Ike?

The skeptics I know always thought of Anne Graham and her "in the family" nonsense as total malarky so you must be referring to Shirley Harrison, Keith Skinner, etc.

Maybe Shirley still thinks of Anne as an honest British secretary. I haven't heard otherwise. Does anyone know if she endorses the great Battlecrease caper?

It was the diary folk who needed to throw Suzanne and Ron under the bus, and, of course, they did the same with Anne.

[rjpalmer]

How I laughed!

This, my dear dear readers, is why Anne Barrett is occasionally described as having been tricked by her conman husband into writing the Maybrick scrapbook.

This is why I don't enjoy discussing the hoax with you, Ike. You don't act in good faith.

I did not suggest Anne was "tricked" into writing the hoax. This shows the fundamental dishonesty of your approach.

I suggested the hoax could have started out as a fictional diary. One doesn't need to "trick" someone into writing a work of fiction. (Although it is somewhat interesting that Anne herself claims she tried to "manipulate" Mike into doing so).

And it would hardly have been the first or last time a Ripper theory was presented as fiction. Martin Fido appears to have had the same suspicion.

I also suggested that Mike could have come up with the idea of creating a physical diary as a marketing gimmick and Anne--as a codependent to an alcoholic--went along to humor him, even though she would have been suspicious of his intent.

rjpalmer 12-31-2024:

"My suggestion--and that's all it is---but it's a damn good one--is that Barrett could have told his missus that the physical photo album confessional was just a marketing gimmick for their joint novella (and I hate to tell you this, old boy, but back in the 1980s there was a mystery novel marketed along similar lines in the United States)--which allowed her to suspend just enough belief to go along with Barrett's mad scheme.

Of course, the real reason was to humor him and thus keep peace in the house.

Would she have believed him?

Probably not.

But that's where the other angle comes in.

As I've told Caz about a zillion times, look no further than Anne Graham's own words.

I think Anne helped Barrett for the very reason she said she did--she assumed that when Barrett got to London with the ridiculous Diary, the literary agent Doreen Montgomery would "just send Mike packing."

--

She wasn't "tricked" Ike---that's a superficial rendering of what I suggested.

And if this suggestion is wrong, all it means is that Anne was a more willing co-conspirator than I suspect.

[Lombro2]

I didn't use Suzanne's father as a patsy to describe a completely different Verity watch. Obviously, he wasn't coached so probably wasn't in on it.

As for the Sock Drawer Caper, well I'll just leave that to the imagination of those who dream of golden sock drawers and sugar lumps.