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Jack The Ripper

Mark Whitehead
Miriam Rivett

Publication: October 2006
Extent: 160 pp
Format: Crown Octavo (186 x 124mm)
Price: 9.99
ISBN: 1904048692
EAN: 9781904048695
13 Digit ISBN: 978-1-904048-69-5
Binding: hardback
Market: history
Rights: World
BIC Code:

  • covers all the major (and many minor) suspects put forward since the murders commenced.
  • Patricia Cornwell's Portrait of a Killer: Jack the Ripper - Case Closed and Uncle Jack by Tony Williams and Humphrey Price have both attracted much publicity and criticism for their 'solutions'.
  • Jack the Ripper's reign of terror is now coming increasingly under academic scrutiny, with the crimes examined in relation to media representation, sociology and Victorian studies
  • UK and US universities now have classes which examine the Ripper through a variety of disciplines, making Pocket Essentials Jack the Ripper an ideal introductory text for students.

So who was Jack the Ripper?

No-one in the annals of crime is capable of arousing such passionate debate as the perpetrator of the Whitechapel Murders in 1888. Was he a demented Royal, a Masonic assassin, a sexually-frustrated artist, a member of the Czarist secret police, a crazed reformist or even an escaped gorilla?

More than a century has passed since this unknown killer murdered East End prostitutes under the very noses of the police and yet we seem no closer to uncovering the Ripper's identity. Countless volumes have been written by warring researchers, seemingly unable to agree even on the number of his victims. Is it possible that we will ever know the truth or is the Ripper destined to remain an enigma, his place in history secured as both an English-heritage crime icon and a universal bogeyman?

This revised and updated edition contains a summary of Jack's crimes, victims and the ill-fated police investigation. It considers many of the Ripper's proposed identities, bringing you up to date with the latest suspects and includes a guide to the Ripper's many fictional outings, from The Lodger to From Hell.


Mark Whitehead is the co-author (with Miriam Rivett) of the Pocket Essential Jack the Ripper and author of Pocket Essentials on Slasher Movies, Roger Corman and Animation.

Miriam Rivett is a lecturer in media and publishing at Middlesex University where she teaches a course on crime.

For a review copy or further information, please contact Chris Burrows PR
on 0161 445 6635 or email chris-burrows@o2.co.uk

Distribution UK: Turnaround, 3 Olympia Trading Estate, Coburg Rd, London N22 6TZ.
Pocket Essentials, PO Box 394, Harpenden, Herts, AL5 1XJ
Tel/Fax 01582 761264         http://www.pocketessentials.co.uk