Patricia Cornwell

[claire]

Its a good piece of fiction, the only kind of literature [emphasis mine] she engages in, if Im not mistaken.

Literature?!! You're a more generous person than I am, Michael

[Elias]

Hi all,

Could someone help me refresh memory. Was is Patricia Cornwell who presented a programme about the Ripper a few years ago? From what I remember it centered around old paintings I think, and she seemed pretty sure that she had found the Ripper. It was probably Sickert who was the subject. Does anyone know the programme I'm referring to? Sorry it's a bit vague - I didn't take much notice of it at the time and my memory is a bit hazy!

[Elias]

Just looked on YouTube, someone put a programme up just recently that must be what I was thinking of.

Here's the first part:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXSheBgPO4w

[GordonH]

I read the Cornwell book and then I read it again.
I still could not work out how she was coming to such comclusions as this:

1. Sickert was infertile or impotent.
NO he had at least one child and a succession of women.

2. Sickert had been treated for an abnormality of the penis.
NO the surgeon who he was sent to specialised in fistulas of the anus.

3. Sickert could have got back from France to commit the murders.
NO evidence for this was presented in the book.

4. Sickert was obsessed with JTR and did a painting about it.
Well.... lots of people are and in his case he was told by his landlady that the ripper used to rent the rooms he was living in. Its hardly surprising he took an interest in it. I only got really interested in it when I started working in an office that overlooks the site of 28 hanbury street and saw the various ripper tours outside the window...

5. Sickert wrote all or some of the letters using disguised handwriting and some of the pictures on one of them look like his sketches.
NO they look like anyones stick men drawings. The letters are clearly all hoaxes apart from possibly the Lusk one, but thats a long shot in my opinion.

6. Sickert disguised himself as a soldier.
NO evidence at all of this. He owned military uniforms for sittings of his clients, not for his own use.

7. The DNA evidence does not exclude Sickert from being the murderer.
NO the DNA evidence shows that whoever licked the envelope or touched it in the hundred plus years since can't be ruled out, along with several million others.

So, in all there is not much to go on here:

No motive
No opportunity

Anything is possible, but there are far more likely candidates.

[anna]

Thought someone was missing....It was P.C.!!!!!

Hi GordonH

Welcome to Casebook,

Patricial Cornwell....anyone ever heard of her...new author,perhaps????

Seriosly,I agree with you Gordon,she has picked an unlikely suspect...but for reasons best known to PC,the old girl has sunk some dosh into making a case in his favour.

Consequently,every time we have a Ripper related programme on the box,
his name crops up,rather as if he's the main suspect,which is very annoying to people who know better.

Best Regards,
ANNA.

[GordonH]

Thanks anna,
For some reason I find the whole Sickert thing very annoying.
Just too many conclusions jumped to from very little evidence and then evidence to the contrary skipped over.

[anna]

Hi GordonH,

Yep!...I'd agree with that.


Regards,

ANNA.

[Convert]

I dont like to use generalisations but Cornwall really puts herself forward for that old one concerning Americans:
Very confident but not much talent.
This exercise of hers in self promotion is tedious at best. It would be interesting to see if her overall book sales started waning and then she came up with the idea of solving the most infamous who dunnit...............

[Voyeur]

Didn't Cornwell spend millions of her own money buying Sickert paintings and such in order to find evidence supporting her theory that he's the Ripper? That kinda puts you in a corner, one might think.

[prowling cat]

I read the book, and really, it is so badly written that one would discount even the most probable theory, which this isn't.
No references, and a style to make Sun reporters blush with shame!
Methinks man hatred has gone a little bit far. Angry perhaps, that the public has gone off her Kay Scarpetta and all her neurosis?

[Celesta]

Hi Prowler,

I couldn't figure out if she was writing a novel or a Ripper book. The thing did not flow well. It just wasn't organized well. Still, I got a sense of what the Ripper could be like---an habitual night rover.

[Celesta]

I dont like to use generalisations but Cornwall really puts herself forward for that old one concerning Americans:
Very confident but not much talent.

If you don't like generalizations, then why use them?

[prowling cat]

Hi Celeste,
the fact is, the book was badly written, but I get your point, yes, of course the R. must have been a night prowler, and this comes well out, but her prose was so bad. Even S. Knight, who wrote like a Rita Skeeter, in my opinion, was more gripping. Just my literary impression.
Of course, I have to admit, I read Knight at 16, and Cornwell... well, rather later. The age details are irrelevant!
All the best
Cat

[Celesta]

She was behind my getting more involved in reading about the Ripper and the LVP, as well. My sense is that she had never written a non-fiction book, or at least one on this scale, and she tried to make it a gripping story. Some authors can do that but she didn't pull it off.

I wish we knew more about that mysterious ledger at the inn, though.

[prowling cat]

Yea, I see your point, but since I read all of her books at the time, I noticed her writing was getting really worse, and most of her readers agreed. Although I am a woman, and live in a very sexist society, she was way over the top, even in her novels. I can tell you, it was getting embarassing.
Have you ever read her fiction? The first books were quite good.
Yes, the ledger sounds tantalising!