LONDON, JACK THE RIPPER AND ANCIENT MYTHS

The atoms of Democritus
And Newtons particles of light
Are sands on the Red Sea shore
Where Israels tents do shine so bright.

William Blake

The story is not documentary, but the characters and plot in the litearary universe is based on actual cases. Everything is just moved to one city, and several hundred years are compressed to one lifespan.

All letters and notes on the walls are authentic. The police got letters from hundreds of people claiming to be the murderer. The letter with the kidney is the only letter that with certainty can be traced to the unknown perpetrator. The letter signed Jack the Ripper was probably falsified by a journalist that needed a tabloid angle to the murders. But the name stuck. (The Complete Jack the Ripper, by Donald Rumbelow (Penguin Books: London 1988), is a conscise and neutral treatment of facts and speculations around these unsolved murders.)

Very few of the characters are invented. All have either a historic or a mythic background, and in most cases both. My starting point has been old newspaper articles and the well known descriptions of London’s East End, from Charles Dickens and Gustave Doré to Jack Londons People of the Abyss. Sixty Famous Trials, edited by Richard Hudson, Daily Express: London 1938 is a collection of true-crime stories that disturbed Brittain in the eighteenth and ninetenth century. Mythology, folklore and etymology is not invented. For instance is Saint Secare’s Mass thoroughly described in The Golden Bough by J.G. Frazier, even if I myself have found the etymological explanation of the name.

Jack the Ripper’s rituals are explained through biblical, apocryphal or classical texts. One of the most important women of the new testament was Mary Magdalene, she who witnessed both the savior's death and his resurrection. Jack the Rippers first victim was named Mary Nicholls.

In catholic tradition and in the apocryphe evangelies the Virgin Mary’s mother is named Anna. (See f.i. Jacobus de Voragine: The Golden Legend, Readings on the Saints, from the last part of the thirteenth century, Princeton University Press: New Jersey 1993.) Jack the Rippers second victim was named Annie Chapmann.

Another of the most important women in the New Testament was Elizabeth, mother of John the Babtist. Jack the Rippers third victim was named Elizabeth Stride. (And since he was disturbed carrying out his ritual mutilations, he found another victoim the same night.)

But the most important woman of the new testament was the Virgin Mary. the final victim of Jack the Rippers was named Mary Jane Kelly, and she lived with a man named Joseph Barnes. The autopsy showed that she was three months pregnant.

A large part of the plot in the book takes place at Bedlam, which was real enough. The former monastery St. Mary of Betlehem became the first insane asylum of Europe., and after a while the name Bedlam became synonomous with madness. A good share of Bedlams income came from selling tickets to tourists who wanted a peek at mad men and women, and the place became a well-known place for whores to meet customers.

The mutilations are not invented, even if I took the liberty of reducing the amount of dead bodies from five to four. The mutilations became worse and worse, and the autopsies showed that the murderer had removed bits and pieces of the victims intestines. What function had these pieces?

"FBI profilers distinguish between souvenirs and ‘trophies.’ (...) On one hand, it is found that the disorganized offender keps items belonging to the victim as a remembrance of the event (the murder) and perhaps as fuel for fantasies of such acts. On the other hand, an organized offender tends to keep personal items belonging to the victim as a type of trophy or prize commemorating a successful endeavor. For him, the item is much like a mounted animal head is to the big game hunter -- proof of his skill. [Page 64 of Sexual Homicide, Patterns and Motives, red. Burgess, Douglas & Ressler (Lexington Books: New York 1988)].

Even if "trophy" is only a word, not an explanation, it leads one’s thoughts towards ancient rituals. "The core of the offenders ritual will never change. Unlike the MO [modus operandi], it remains a constant and enduring part of the offender. However, signature aspects may evolve (e.g., the lust murderer, who performs greater postmortem mutilation as he progresses from crime to crime). Elements of the original ritual may become more fully developed. [Page 261 of Crime Classification Manual, red. Douglas, Burgess, Burgess & Ressler (Lexington Books: New York 1992).]"

A lot is written about sacrifices, especially in the bible. The third book of Moses (Leviticus) is nothing but a list of when and how one should sacrifice. Slaughtered animals got their intestines thoroughly inspected before the sacrifice was carried to the altar and burned. This is the meaning behind the strange sentence in the Revelation 2.23: "I am he which searches the reins and hearts."

Among the most important sources is Tobit’s Book, one of the deuterocanonical books. Here is an example of sacrificial magic directed against women. A large fish is gutted, and the intestines are burned to neutralize a woman’s sexual powers.

Jack the Ripper brought along pieces of his victim’s intestines, and at the last crime scene (Mary Jane Kelly wasly was killed indoors), the police found evidence that the murderer had lit a fire and burned something. To this day nobody knows for sure. But it is possible to speculate.

All of this does not mean more than one want it to mean. I myself have used these facts and mythic stories to focus on an age-old war against women, and against everything that smacks of sexual, religious, institutional or physiological powers vested in women. In that matter Jack the Ripper is not unique. He is a part of our modern mythology, but the patterns of his crimes are ancient.

LONDON, JACK THE RIPPER AND ANCIENT MYTHS

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