A New Ripper Book

[caz]

HI Caz

Firstly, let me say once again, i would not have chosen this photograph myself for the cover of a book; i don't think it is a wise choice however i do believe obscuring it with details of title, author etc etc as it most probably will be, mitigates my own concerns of it being seen by anyone "vulnerable" if you like.

All book covers usually have details of author, title and usually some sort of review by someone in the field or a newspaper reviewer, so to ask

Quote:
"how much point there is if it’s going to be obscured anyway?"


could apply to every other book packaged and marketed in the world...what is the point of having any cover if it is going to be obscured by details of who has produced the books etc? Perhaps covering books in brown paper would eliminate this issue, otherwise it's a moot point i think.

Not really sure of your example of smacking a child being particularly relevant either, to be honest.

I think some of the comments that have been expressed about how only a certain privileged few should be able to view the photograph because they must (by implication) be incapable of corruption, whilst the rest of us are deemed unsuitable to behold it, smacks more of a well-intentioned but misguided parent, to be honest.

tc

Hi bb,

What I meant was that if this particularly strong photo was chosen specifically to hit the casual W.H.Smith browser between the eyes with the promise of an equally strong lesson about the causes of such bodily destruction (which could go some way towards justifying its use on the cover, if the lesson inside is instructive and doesn't dump the reader back in the dark ages) then it will be better if everyone concerned just comes out and says so, and doesn't take the line that it can't hurt because anyone not already familiar with the image won’t recognise it as a mutilated female corpse anyway, especially by the time it's covered with a lot of words.

In short, you don't choose a photo like that one for your book cover 'unadvisedly, lightly, or wantonly' unless you are a complete twit, nor 'to satisfy men's carnal lusts and appetites, like brute beasts that have no understanding' unless you are four and twenty twits rolled into one. So assuming it's a choice you would only arrive at in good faith, for reasons you believe in, what would be the point of toning it down to a level where the wider market it is aimed at has no clue what is being aimed at them or why? That's what I was getting at.

Your final paragraph, just for the record, doesn’t refer to any comment I have posted.

Hi Jeff,

Thanks for the links.

The line being pushed by the MailOnline, last updated on May 1st, is that:

'Dr Cook says streetwalkers Mary Nichols, Catherine Eddowes, Mary Kelly, Elizabeth Stride and Annie Chapman were killed by different men, as were the six other Whitechapel victims often added to the Ripper's toll.'

I suspect liberties are being taken here and Dr Cook may not have meant that the women were each killed by different men, but merely that the five named victims were not all killed by the same man, but by at least three different killers.

But I still say that Mary’s killer did a zillion times more genuine ‘inflating’ of the ripper story (almost certainly his own story) than can be laid at the door of the press, using a pair of wheezy old bellows to apply artificial respiration to an otherwise dull, dull, incredibly dull ripping yarn.

One view is that Mary’s photo provides a tangible warning to everyone - male and female - not to make themselves vulnerable to potentially predatory strangers. Serial killers can’t operate if they can never get you on your own.

At the other extreme would come the frankly dotty advice to women to “Know your place” - because if you put a foot wrong the man in your life, whoever he is, only needs the right sort of encouragement from his daily paper and he’ll turn into a one-off human mincing machine.

I might give the ‘different men’ theory more credence if there is evidence of the Whitechapel victims being subjected to physical abuse from partners or male associates known to have violent tendencies in the run up to the main events.

I just hope for Cook's sake that every man jack of them (ha ha) is not supposed to have been under the thumb and suffering in resentful silence until a Star man crept up behind him and fired a starting pistol in his ear.

Love,

Caz
X

[Jeff Leahy]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1176040/Jack-Ripper-invented-win-tabloid-newspaper-war.html

http://jtrandme.blogspot.com/2009/05/author-believes-ripper-crimes-committed.html

http://blog.taragana.com/n/jack-the-ripper-was-a-fictional-character-invented-by-journalists-47446/

Just to prove that I'm not making this up, heres todays finds including the Daily Mail.

I dont know who this publicist is? but someone get his/her phone number

[Jeff Leahy]

Why did it shift, though, Jeff? It's not as if there aren't enough victim-related threads that discuss "Who's hot and Who's not" in terms of the Canon - a topic which, it's fair to say, is one of those with an alarming tendency to overwhelm any thread on which it's raised.

This is a Books/Non-Fiction discussion, after all... and the book in question hasn't even been widely read yet. Premature speculation is one thing we can all do without

But there was and is plenty to speculate about, given that despite the book has not been released, someone has taken it upon themselves to orchestrate a major press release surrounding it. This press release not only has published the book cover but has also advanced a number of theories beleived to be contained within the book.

Now while I admit that this is odd (especially given a major review of the book in the Times). And made even more odd by the lack of information about the accompanying documentary, which I understand is also due for broadcast in May, the fact remains that someone, for whatever reason, has taken it upon themselves to launch a major press campaign on the subject...Andrew Cook's book. which seems worthy of commenting upon.

As I posted a few threads back, this seems to have dried up, and it probably is best to wait. Jonathon was meant to be doing an interveiw by phone so perhaps new info will reach us soon.

In the mean time I will do another trawl, and see what new info is available...

However if there is any Hyp going on it certainly doesnt emanate from casebook. If there is anything wrong then perhaps this thread should be called 'Andrew Cooks book the Press releases' personally I find that a little pedantic, as in most cases the release of a book and the press hyp tend to go together. Why not with this one?

All best Sam

Pirate

[Sam Flynn]

If you'd been following the thread Sam, then you'd see that conversation had long since shifted to 'speculation' based on what is currently known.

Why did it shift, though, Jeff? It's not as if there aren't enough victim-related threads that discuss "Who's hot and Who's not" in terms of the Canon - a topic which, it's fair to say, is one of those with an alarming tendency to overwhelm any thread on which it's raised.

This is a Books/Non-Fiction discussion, after all... and the book in question hasn't even been widely read yet. Premature speculation is one thing we can all do without

NB: I'm not having a pop at you, Caz - you were only responding.

As was I as it so happens Sam. I didnt open a new can at all.

All the best.

[Jeff Leahy]

I'm more afraid that the vexed topic of our favourite "Canonical" victims seems to be "sneaking in" to a discussion about a book that nobody's yet read! Steady on, folks

NB: I'm not having a pop at you, Caz - you were only responding.

If you'd been following the thread Sam, then you'd see that conversation had long since shifted to 'speculation' based on what is currently known. Noone is disputing that Andrew Cooks book is unpublished and thus no one knows the exact wording or theories the book is purporting.

Re: Your last comments Cap'in; Surely there is something this imagine can tell us that no autopsy report or historical hack can ever communicate.....Perhaps the man in charge had it right all along?

The perpetrator of this crime was clearly off their rocker.

Pirate

[Chris]

The judge and jury, my dear bird, are the police, from whom the image was stolen from in the first place.
I think that theft should be discussed before we dissect a dissected murder victim.
This image should never have come into the public domain.

Well, only one copy - among several - of the photograph was stolen, and it has been in the public domain since 1899, when it was first published, in France, by Lacassagne.

I think it's clear that most of this discussion about the publication of the photograph isn't at all specific to Andrew Cook's book. It has been published more than twenty times over the last 110 years, and is freely available on many websites, including this one.

I think it would be fairer to discuss this issue elsewhere - and I have started a new thread for the purpose - http://forum.casebook.org/showthread.php?t=2694 - rather than singling out one author for reproducing what has been published so many times before.

[Cap'n Jack]

The judge and jury, my dear bird, are the police, from whom the image was stolen from in the first place.
I think that theft should be discussed before we dissect a dissected murder victim.
This image should never have come into the public domain.

[babybird67]

hmmm

have you read the thread on the MJK part of the site by sgh?

If you had you might not be saying what you are saying.

There is important work going on and to begin that work from the only primary material which shows the killer's crime scene is so exciting (and i dont mean sexually exciting).

I object to the inference that those of us who believe the photo may bring some new information to light are engaged in an act of masturbation, quite frankly.

Whether anyone here is "qualified" to look at the photo really isnt your decision to make. As i say, it is like a well-intentioned parent protecting a child from something that they themselves consider unsuitable whilst retaining the privilege of looking at it themselves.

Censorship unfortunately does that...there will have to be someone set up as judge and jury to "protect" those they feel should be protected.

tc

[Cap'n Jack]

'I think some of the comments that have been expressed about how only a certain privileged few should be able to view the photograph because they must (by implication) be incapable of corruption, whilst the rest of us are deemed unsuitable to behold it, smacks more of a well-intentioned but misguided parent, to be honest. '

I talk not of privilege here, but rather qualification, in that I don't believe anyone on these boards is qualified enough to view such an image and then come up with a suitably qualified opinion on that image that may well add crucial evidence in a murder case.
We do see a lot of idle indulgence and pure speculation in regard to this image, and other similar images, but as I said before none of this leads to a useful identity of victim, killer or even motive.
So it is just the delight of manipulating a forbidden image isn't it?
Masturbation in other words.

[babybird67]

Hi bb,

Well that will be a blessing. But if it’s true I’d have to ask not only what message the photo is aiming to convey, but how much point there is if it’s going to be obscured anyway? It sounds a bit like parents who maintain that smacking a child doesn’t actually hurt. Of course it doesn’t hurt the one doing the smacking, but if it didn’t hurt the child either, there’d be no point and no lesson learned. And of course, the more effort that goes into obscuring or playing down the nature of the photo, the more it suggests an awareness of its potential to offend the public.

Love,

Caz
X

HI Caz

Firstly, let me say once again, i would not have chosen this photograph myself for the cover of a book; i don't think it is a wise choice however i do believe obscuring it with details of title, author etc etc as it most probably will be, mitigates my own concerns of it being seen by anyone "vulnerable" if you like.

All book covers usually have details of author, title and usually some sort of review by someone in the field or a newspaper reviewer, so to ask

"how much point there is if it’s going to be obscured anyway?"

could apply to every other book packaged and marketed in the world...what is the point of having any cover if it is going to be obscured by details of who has produced the books etc? Perhaps covering books in brown paper would eliminate this issue, otherwise it's a moot point i think.

Not really sure of your example of smacking a child being particularly relevant either, to be honest.

I think some of the comments that have been expressed about how only a certain privileged few should be able to view the photograph because they must (by implication) be incapable of corruption, whilst the rest of us are deemed unsuitable to behold it, smacks more of a well-intentioned but misguided parent, to be honest.

tc

[Sam Flynn]

Hi PM,

Why would anyone be afraid of Liz ‘sneaking in’ unless it was where they didn’t personally want her?

I'm more afraid that the vexed topic of our favourite "Canonical" victims seems to be "sneaking in" to a discussion about a book that nobody's yet read! Steady on, folks

NB: I'm not having a pop at you, Caz - you were only responding.

[c.d.]

Medical opinion not medical fact.

c.d.

[caz]

The thing with "leaving the door open' is that almost anything can sneak in.....in the Canonical Group I think that would have to be Liz Stride....and whenever we assign a death to him,.....his potential profile changes. By the inclusion of Liz Stride we are to believe that the man who killed Polly and Annie would just slit a womans throat for his next kill....or get caught without sufficient time to even start to do his dirty work..... and return to his prior character 35-40 minutes later. In Liz Strides case, the medical opinion onsite as to the time of her throat cut virtually eliminates Diemshutz as an "interruption", and if he had 5 minutes alone with Liz, we should have seen 5/6ths of what was done to Kate.

But we dont. We see a single cut and an untouched woman postmortem. We see a long skirt still covering her legs...we see her on her side, and she appears to have died where she fell by bleeding to death.

She should'nt be skewing Jacks profile, IMHO.

Best regards baby bird....cheers.

Hi PM,

Why would anyone be afraid of Liz ‘sneaking in’ unless it was where they didn’t personally want her?

Jack’s ‘potential’ profile changes with the weather, according to where theorists want him to sneak in or want him to stay away. Do you honestly believe that no mutilating serial killer would be able to ‘just slit a woman’s throat’ under any circumstances, or that you can define this one’s ‘character’ by the circumstances that allowed him to slit the throats of three women and inflict more damage after death? The medical opinion in no way ‘virtually eliminates’ a potential interruption by pony and cart, since it allows for death to have taken place at any point between 12.45 - when Schwartz may or may not have seen the killer manhandling her but definitely witnessed no act of murder - and the discovery of her lifeless body.

Please don’t keep saying what we ‘should have seen’ if the ripper had the time you insist he had alone with Liz. In any one of a hundred and one perfectly plausible circumstances, the ripper would have had infinitely better reasons for cutting and running than you have ever given him to stay and mutilate - or not go there in the first place.

Don’t kid yourself - Liz is only skewing Jack’s profile because you are giving him an unrealistically precise one, in a teeming world where no man could expect everything to go his way every time, all of the time.

...there are many history books that cover equally shocking stories with highly disturbing images..I think in particular of photos from trenches in the First World War, decaying bodies, and in particular the second world war concentration camps...Is schindlers List pornagraphic? I think not, its a message people must know and be faced with.

Hi again Jeff,

Indeed so, and I think only AP has classed Mary’s photo as pornographic in any context. But I see your examples as being taken from the entirely admirable ‘Lest we forget’ cupboard. The question is: what message will Mary’s photo on the book cover be telling its readers not to forget? That occasionally a man will brutally murder a series of relative strangers who are easy to get on their own, either for no discernible reason or just for jolly because he can? Or that the press has the power and influence to wind up any man in any woman’s life to rip her to buggery and beyond if she dares to give him any grief?

Presumably the cover of this book will not have a bare photograph; at present i am imagining it over the face of the book, but overlaid on that will surely be the title, author's name, perhaps some reviews etc etc. The photo will therefore be obscured to some extent, and seeing as it is already very difficult to distinguish exactly what it is a photograph of, this will make it much more difficult, thus lessening my worries of children coming across it.

Hi bb,

Well that will be a blessing. But if it’s true I’d have to ask not only what message the photo is aiming to convey, but how much point there is if it’s going to be obscured anyway? It sounds a bit like parents who maintain that smacking a child doesn’t actually hurt. Of course it doesn’t hurt the one doing the smacking, but if it didn’t hurt the child either, there’d be no point and no lesson learned. And of course, the more effort that goes into obscuring or playing down the nature of the photo, the more it suggests an awareness of its potential to offend the public.

While I composed this one, a few new posts have appeared which I have not yet read, so I hope you will all bear with me. Must dash!

Love,

Caz
X

[Cap'n Jack]

Cracking good post, Caz, but I expect nothing else.
This study has evolved over the years in a most positive manner and fashion, especially with the addition of forthright and well read female contributors such as your good self, Debs, Natalie and many others.
This adds an essential balance to what was a seriously out of whack world in the 1990's, dominated as it was by blathering male wannabe academics who thought Freud was a god and couldn't tell the difference between a blunt penis and a sharp knife.
Cook's cover is a step backwards to those bad old days, and is perhaps the last thrash of a dying tail to re-establish the age of the blinkered Rippersaur where Wilson was king and all sat at his knee and blathered complete and utter nonsense to compensate for a lack of knowledge that we now all possess.