Owen Dudley Edwards (1) (1938–)

I'm a pretty avid reader of a lot of what this book was about so it was interesting to read about the when, why and where many of these authors came from and what they were trying to do in their stories. Dudley Edwards divides the chapters into two parts, Part One "The School of War": Orwell v Richards: Children's fiction to 1940; Rations and Quislings; Evacuees and Gurus; Women and Fathers; and Officials and Genteel-men. Part two is "Lessons which May have been Learned": Gods Things and show more Others'; Identity, Authority and Imagination; Gender; Class; and Race. He takes a number of the popular writers of the time and looks at how they treat these issues, featured authors include: Enid Blyton; Elinor M Brent Dwyer, Richmal Crompton and Captain W E Johns. These were some of the authors he grew up with and I grew up with too. Many of them I am still fond of and there's a lot fo interesting points in the stories.

It's a deep look at this topic and I found myself reading it in small bites to try to absorb as much as possible. I'd like to read more of the stories and come back to it some other day. show less

The case of William Burke and William Hare, who murdered at least fifteen people to sell the bodies to anatomists for dissection, has fascinated readers for almost two hundred years. Broadsides and pamphlets and songs told crowds about their fates and their confessions (the tales being based on a little truth and, usually, a lot of imagination). Their story continues to be retold even today.

We are probably due for a modern re-examination of the case, based on current knowledge of anatomy and show more of history and custom. Sadly, this book isn't it. Apart from a strange and quixotic attempt to make Burke look relatively good, it has little new to offer. And the organization leaves much to be desired. It was simply too easy to get lost -- even though I already knew at least a little about Burke and Hare, which many modern readers will not.

If you already have a good knowledge of the era of the resurrectionists, and of the Burke and Hare case, this may be an interesting counterbalance to the usual attempt to portray both men as the worst of the worst. But I would start with other sources before turning to this. show less