We’ve asked some Victorianists to reflect on Ripper Street. You can read their comments below and don’t forget that you can also join in conversation by leaving a comment in the box below. Damian Michael Barcroft The article has been reproduced with the kind permission of ‘The Whitechapel Society’ (London’s premier society for the study of Jack the Ripper). You can read it in full here “As the sun sets over the Olympics, darkness rises on Ripper Street” On Thursday,
Read moreTag: Ripper Street
‘CSI: Whitechapel’: Ripper Street and the evidential body
By Jessica Hindes (Royal Holloway) Though I understand the desire to dissect a period drama on the basis of its historical authenticity, I’ve never thought it a particularly profitable approach. Guy Woolnough may be right to criticise Ripper Street for condemning a 14 year old to an implausibly expedited hanging; but cataloguing this kind of historical inaccuracy contributes little to a critical understanding of the show. In this article, therefore, I set such questions aside in order to think more
Read moreRipper Street: The Historian’s Dilemma
Guy Woolnough (Keele University) I have watched Ripper Street with interest. There is an unpleasant interest in ‘Ripperology’ which distorts the popular view of Victorian crime and policing, and I feared that a series with this title might be focussed too narrowly. There are stories far more worthy of investigation by historians and programme makers than the unsolved Whitechapel murders. The first episode dispelled my fears, for although ‘The Ripper’ was the hook to catch the audience, the message to
Read more