Author : Rachel Mayrer-Minnie
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9780549925613
Total Pages : pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (256 download)
Book Synopsis Behind the Ripper's Mask by : Rachel Mayrer-Minnie
Download or read book Behind the Ripper's Mask written by Rachel Mayrer-Minnie and published by . This book was released on 2008 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Jack the Ripper's influence has since surpassed the fear and panic he caused in 1888 London, occupying the attentions of both expert and amateur detectives for over one hundred years. Embedded in contradiction and amplified to legendary status, Jack the Ripper has become a cultural icon, engaging the imagination of a vast popular audience. Throughout the twentieth century and into the twenty-first, the Ripper has appeared in film, in literature, in material culture, and onstage. Yet despite the many representations that seek to put a face to the Ripper, he remains fascinating precisely because of his facelessness. Why has an anonymous killer been so often and so differently represented by so many media for so many different audiences? What about this killer, his victims, and the time in which he murdered has had such a powerful effect on audiences? By placing the literary, cinematic, and material representations of the Ripper in historical context, this study explores the continued appeal of the Ripper as a cultural icon, the compelling and multifaceted representations of him and their surprising blind spots, and the cultural capital--monetary and conceptual--he offers to authors, filmmakers, and audiences.