Portrait of a Killer by Patricia Cornwell

For nearly a decade or so, the mystery related to Jack the Ripper has not been solved. Many have attempted to decipher who Jack the Ripper really was but have failed in their attempts. A number of questions related to Jack the Ripper have remained unanswered.

Who committed the atrocious slayings of so many Whitechapel prostitutes in England in the late 1800s? What was the reason behind these murders? A vast number of theories have been put forward by people who have tried to investigate it.Theories include Jack the Ripper being a crazy doctor, a member of some royal family, an artist etc. After centuries now, someone has taken a completely new approach and has used Scotland Yard's verification, in conjunction with other letters and ephemera, and has used latter-day forensic science to the still-open inquiry. That someone is none other than Patricia Cornwell. Although the results of the investigation that have been put forward by the author are not that convincing, but still they are a bit persuasive.

In her book, the author has asserted, that too with full confidence, that Jack the Ripper was none other than the well-known impressionist artist namely Walter Richard Sickert, who was an novice to Whistler, and was also one of the most extremely talented and acknowledged artists. If truth be told, the author of the book believes that the work of Sickert perhaps presented the most important clue related to his crimes. As the author of the book says, even though hundreds of years have passed, the sexual crimes that have been committed by Jack the Ripper have become feeble and ineffective.They are now more like mere games, puzzles, weekends full of mystery, and the "Ripper Walks" in the dead of the night that eventually end up with pints in the Ten Bells pub. Ripper liked to be known as Saucy Jack and a number of movies have been made on him that too starring very famous actors with “special effects and spates of what the Ripper said he craved: blood, blood, blood.

His butcheries no longer inspire fright, rage, or even pity as his victims moulder quietly, some of them in unmarked graves” (Cornwell, p. 14).Book Report The book under consideration, that is “Portrait of a Killer: Jack the Ripper—Case Closed” puts forward an investigation of a number of crimes that were committed centuries ago. This book has been taken up by me to writer a report on because of the interesting matter and basically because of the interesting topic that has previously been attempted to be investigated by plenty others.

In order to solve a crime mystery that was committed nearly a century ago, the investigator has to think exactly the way the criminal would think.In this book, the author has put forward the most reasonable suspect that has yet been brought up in the crime serial of "Jack the Ripper", who is perhaps one of the most infamous people of the century involved in the killings of many prostitutes in London in the late 1800’s. The author has the ability to break down the facts in a very organized manner and has also made attempts to rule out the other suspects such as royal Prince Albert and the doctor to the monarchy.The suppositions that she has made, along with the theories put forward a very strong case against Sickert. What is more fascinating is the fact that the suspect was a very well-known figure of his times. As mentioned above, the criminal as asserted by the author is none other than Walter Richard Sickert.

The author begins by putting forward a good deal of information about him including his looks, his career etc. As the author says, Sickert had always despised people belonging to the upper class and he had stalked some well-known stars of that time.But, he managed to mingle with celebrities of those times including Henry Irving and Ellen Terry, Aubrey Beardsley, Henry James, Max Beerbohm, Oscar Wilde, Monet, Renoir, Pissarro, Rodin, Andre Gide, Edouard Dujardin, Proust, Members of Parliament. Sickert also had a fascination with constantly changing his name. His numerous careers such as acting, paintings, etchings, drawings, and abundant letters to colleagues, friends, and newspapers expose many personas.

These include Mr. Nemo, which is Latin for "Mr.Nobody", An Enthusiast, A Whistlerite, Your Art Critic, An Outsider, Walter Sickert, Sickert, Walter R. Sickert, Richard Sickert, W. R.

Sickert, W. S. , R. S. , S.

, Dick, W. St. , Rd. Sickert LL.

D. , R. St. A. R.

A. , and RDSt A. R. A. (Cornwell, p. 3-4).

In all of the information that the author has presented for the reader, she has also told us that there is a fair chance that Jack the Ripper was someone within whom there resided a deep hatred for women, most probably a result of his own sexual frustration, inability or perhaps meagerness.The author tells us that the criminal at a very young age went through remedial penile surgeries, due to which he was perhaps impotent. A problem here is that there is no such evidence that he suffered sexual dysfunction, and the author just presents hints that give some credence to her theory. The author believes that Sickert despised women and that they reminded him of his secret which he never revealed to anyone and carried it not only to the grave but beyond it, because cremated bodies reveal no tales of the flesh, even if they are exhumed.Sickert was born with a deformity of his penis requiring surgeries when he was a toddler that would have left him disfigured if not mutilated.

He probably was incapable of an erection. A letter dated October 4th, 1888 with the Whitechapel Murders papers at the Corporation of London Records Office says that it can be asserted that the criminal who committed these crimes must be extremely disfigured and “-- possibly had his privy member destroyed -- & he is now revenging himself on the sex by these atrocities. " (Cornwell, p. -6).Right in the beginning of the book, the author does a great job of setting the scene, and has placed the setting in late 1800 England. She has given references to John Merrick, Henry Irving (one of the best stage actors of those times), Henry James (writer and constable) and a number of other people.

She believes that Jack the Ripper was a very famous person and his name usually appeared in the newspaper just like any of the other people mentioned above. The author also supposes and also presents hints about his guilt.For example, she says that he was great at disguising himself and it would have been extremely easy for him to lure a woman or in this case a prostitute into her own death and then escape without even being suspected. She believes that he used to walk in the lonely streets of the Whitechapel area, that too in the late hours of the night and that too for hours. His obsession with the anatomy of the human body and the way he included insinuations in the Ripper letters were something that were pretty much alike the drawings that he made.In order to solve the case, the author of the book uses many sources.

These sources have all been cited by the author and include contemporary forensic procedures as well as methodology related to crime scene, and historical investigations. Vast numbers of documents as well as other physical proof such as fingerprints, snaps, museum paintings, accessories of as well as DNA tests etc. The techniques that were unknown to the people of those days have been used by her along with the letters that Ripper wrote to the police.Another thing that has led her to the judgment is her in-depth analysis of his art which shows the ghastly defacement of his sufferers, and her suppositions about his past and the effects that it might have had on his mind tell us of the ways by which a psychopath and a killer are created.

The book, for people of today is very informative especially for those involved in complicated investigations as it gives them patterns as to what to look for and what to do. Even though the book is extremely interesting and informative, people might find certain loop holes in it.First of all, no matter how much evidence the author puts forward, one would always want either a deathbed confession or eyewitnesses. In simple words, although the evidences put forward by the author are extremely substantial and this is perhaps the strongest case that has been made of guilt of Jack the Ripper, anyone going through the book might believe like wise and would find loopholes.

She herself confesses that she did not have any idea what so ever about the theories of this murder till about a year before she published her book.Secondly, the evidence that she puts forward, especially the DNA test reports, which are perhaps very much unlike the nuclear DNA tests that take place, could have matched any of the thousands of Sickert’s of those days. The watermarks were certainly not special. Another charge against him is that he loathed women where as the author contradicts this herself by telling us that he was a womanizer. In the words of the author, “The anticipated connubial bliss of the flamboyant artistic genius and egocentric James McNeill Whistler must have been disconcerting to his former errand boy-apprentice.

One of Sickert's many roles was the irresistible womanizer, but offstage he was nothing of the sort” (Cornwell, p. 6). The author here believes that the driving force behind Walter Sickert turning into one of the most dangerous yet baffling murderer of all times was him imagining Whistler in love and having a sexual relationship with a woman. This eventually led him into acting out what he had long been drawing, not only in his mind but in sketches that he made as a boy which portrayed women as victims of abduction and stabbing. The challenges of the book do not stop here.The author, in order to not let only her book speak for itself, presents too much information about what she did, why and how she did it and exactly how did it make her feel.

She also puts in way too much information about the forensic sciences and also praises herself for a job that has been done successfully by her. Another put off in the book is the constant nagging of certain evils that existed in the past years such as the Victorian society and its hypocrisy, the ineptitude of bureaucrats and the injustice of a culture subjugated by men.In the evidence, the letters that she has put forward which are supposedly written by Ripper to the police department are considered by most of the authorities as hoaxes as the kinds of murders that are mentioned in them were very different to the style by which Ripper killed his victims. As the author says, the psychology of a person or a psychopath like him is not easy to understand. It takes more than just connecting dots to get to the main point to solve a case against such a person.Another fact as she says is that there are no simplistic clarifications or foolproof succession of basis and effect, and here the human nature is to be blamed as she supposes that such psychopathic thoughts accumulated his head because of Whistler getting married to none other then the widow of the well-known architect and archaeologist Edward Godwin, who was the man who had previously lived with actress Ellen Terry and was also the father of her children, which meant that Whistler had links with not just one but two of Sickert’s manias now and this hurt his ego perhaps because of the fact that this group of three stars did not include him.

They did not care about him nor were they bothered. He had now truly become Mr. Nemo…Mr. Nobody.

This made him so furious that in the late summer of 1888, he decided to give himself a name which would not be linked with him or his personality while he’s alive, but would be known and remembered by all even after centuries and that too even better those of Whistler, Irving, and Terry.Jack the Ripper and his fantasies gained actuality on a very happy-go-lucky kind of day, which was a bank holiday on the 6th of August, 1888, “when he slipped out of the wings to make his debut in a series of ghastly performances that were destined to become the most celebrated so-called murder mystery in history. It is widely and incorrectly believed that his violent spree ended as abruptly as it began, that he struck out of nowhere and then vanished from the scene” (Cornwell, p. 15-16).

The book is excellent and a must read for all of the crime related students because of the kind of information that it presents.The book is nearly impossible to put down without being read completely because of the fascinating way by which it has been written. Although the evidence might be wrong and perhaps an innocent man might be being blamed here, but still the author provides much information about the ways by which criminals are made. The information about science, the facts of history along with the life story of Sickert himself eventually turn this book into a very interesting read, although everyone would have different opinions on whether the author found enough evidence against Sickert or not.As for myself, I believe there is enough information to believe that Sickert was Jack the Ripper, as is pointed out by the DNA tests and the other evidences that were provided by her.

His sexual disability, his hatred for women, his drawings, his letters etc present enough proof for one to believe that the murders were committed by none other than Sickert and even the author has ruled out the other suspects by providing information about them that rules out all of them from the case.Conclusion In the light of the above discussion we can hereby culminate that the book under consideration that is Portrait of a Killer, which was written by Patricia Cornwell takes up the issue of Jack the Ripper and provides us with evidence against an artist namely Walter Richard Sickert, who committed various murders of several women in very torturous ways.She believes that perhaps the murderer was a psychopath and did so as the result of deep-rooted feelings against women as he considered them inferior and had sexual disabilities. She has also presented information about the other suspects which prove that they did not commit the murder; neither did they have the intention to do so.

But it is to be noted that the evidence provided by the author might not be enough for everyone to believe that her arguments are fair.