![]() ![]() Theaters and authors profiled victims and events from the news of the day. Charles Dickens was the most prolific of these, using incidents and even quotes in many books, including Bleak House and Oliver Twist. Their treatment of the accused depended largely on their social class. Those and the newspapers of the time readily admitted that truth was irrelevant-profit was the goal. From the beginning of the 19th century, broadsides and “penny dreadfuls” were circulated immediately after an event. ![]() The author demonstrates the significance of the press in the investigations of the murders. Instead, Flanders organizes the text according to who killed whom: husband/wife, servants/employers, etc. ![]() Since the author does not present the murders chronologically, it’s difficult to tell if the murder trials had any effect on the evolution of the rights of defendants. Flanders devotes most of her book to murders-one after another after another, many sensational, others notable for the innocence of the executed. The author does not track the history of crime-solving during this period most crimes were solved by the simple expedient of someone pointing a finger. The accused had very few rights, and those who couldn’t afford to pay a lawyer were on their own. Flanders ( Consuming Passions: Leisure and Pleasure in Victorian Britain, 2006, etc.) attempts to trace the growth of murder and its detection in Victorian England. ![]()
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