Portrait of a Killer : Jack the Ripper — Case Closed

This is one of the best non-fiction books that I have read; very well written, well detailed and extremely informative. Patricia Cornwell's research is not only fascinating but compelling and convincing.

Cornwell's research presents damn near irrefutable, extensive forensic evidence that Walter Sickert is Jack the Ripper. Cornwell does an amazing job explaining the psychological profile of Walter Sickert that adds to her proof that he very well could be the infamous Jack the Ripper. She holds nothing back, giving us readers, in great depth, all the gore and gruesomeness.

She also tells, in great detail, of the deplorable conditions the poor had to endure in 1880’s London, England, which I found captivating.

I have always been fascinated show more with all things related to Jack the Ripper. So much so that when in London, my husband and I did the “THE ORIGINAL JACK THE RIPPER MURDERS TOUR”, https://www.jack-the-ripper-tour.com/.... Now whether or not Walter Sickert is The Ripper, I couldn't say 100% one way or another. However, I can say if you are a Ripperologist, this is definitely worth a go! show less

My review will be scattered and short as I read this a long while back, but the aftertaste I got after reading it still lingers today. If I ever re-read this work, I'll update this review as needed.

I am a person who to this day still looks at the ripper case and tries to figure it out and have been for many years.

The book is more or less an interesting theory, but it does not hold up when you look at all of the evidence. Cornwell has convinced herself that her theory is correct and her bias is on every page. After finishing the book, I remember distinctly feeling unsatisfied and blown away by how many people I knew praised the book and considered the ripper case now closed with how much evidence didn't fit. More so, I felt show more disappointed. I will update this review at a later date to lay down the contradictions between her theory and the evidence.

I will not say it wasn't intriguing, but overall if you are a hard core ripper case follower, you'll likely find the book as "meh" as I did. If you ever watch the documentary that accompanies the release of this book, Cornwell's condescending tone confirms her attitude about the entire case and her approach in her investigation. She believes she is right and I am unsure if any amount of evidence will change her mind. show less

It is unnecessary to add to the compelling arguments against Patricia Cornwell's thesis that the 19th century English murderer, Jack the Ripper, was in fact the celebrated early modern painter, Walter Richard Sickert. If you have the stomach for the repellent detail of the Ripper murders and mutilations and the patience for its digressions and fractured chronology, Cornwell's book does have a certain interest for its expository technique. The title, 'Portrait of a Killer' is indicative. Cornwell has created a composite figure of Jack the Ripper from police records and newspaper accounts and superimposed on the composite whatever information she could find, infer or imagine about Walter Sickert. The imaginative glue that holds this show more rickety structure together is the re-iterated assertion that Sickert, like the Ripper, was a 'psychopath'. Even if one allows latitude to Cornwell for her impressionistic accounts of psychopathy, there is very little to support that characterisation of the artist. The diabolic cunning which she attributes to the generic figure of the 'psychopath' is invoked whenever the evidence fails to implicate Sickert. The spelling, orthography and style of letters supposed to have been written by the Ripper are inconsistent with each other and bear no resemblance to Sickert's own hand? Readily explained: Sickert the psychopath was a cunning and skilled counterfeiter of styles. Witness accounts of the men seen with the victims bear no resemblance to the Ripper? Sickert the psychopath was a master of disguise, who had acted in plays when young. The other point of interest, for me, has to do with trashing cultural values. Cornwell would not have invested her time and wealth in pursuit of Sickert if she had not expected a commensurate return from her vandalism. No-one would be particularly surprised or interested to learn that the Ripper was a semi-literate brute called Smith, Brown or Jones from the seething London underworld of the late 19th century. I knew little of Sickert before reading Cornwell's Portrait. I now owe a debt to his memory and to myself to read a fair, frank and well written account of his life. show less

Cornwell, better known for her true crime and crime fiction, makes a bold stab at history and tries to prove that Walter Sickert was Jack the Ripper. She makes a good case that Sickert was a nutball, and may have written some of the letters, but did he commit all the murders? The DNA evidence is iffy, not compelling, and she bends some of her facts too far, but it is a neat theory. Why did Sickert create a painting called "Jack the Ripper's Bedroom"?

Having recently sworn off Cornwell's fiction, I decided to give this last title on my shelves a try, more out of a passing interest in the crimes than out of any sense of rehabilitating Cornwell's writing. Sure enough, Cornwell's bitter pride still shines through in this attempt to identify and convict a man in the court of public opinion. Cornwell knows enough about behavioral analysis to get her into trouble. Certainly, Sickert bore an unusual interest in the gory and sensational crimes, and probably had a similar unnatural interest in violence, particularly against women. But the evidence in his paintings and writings doesn't pass the smell test for evidence of guilt, Cornwell herself admits he was around the crime scene areas and show more the places where the victim's plied their trade. It's not much of a stretch to think that Sickert simply collected images and impressions from these experiences to include in his work, including his writing. All of the imagery would've fueled his active and creative imagination and tapped into his taste for violence. And Cornwell also admits Sickert was quite the performer, a seeker of attention. Again, it's not tough to imagine his use of the collected information to create more of a stir around his work. There's nothing definitive to prove Sickert's guilt, not for lack of Cornwell trying to convince everyone. But the strength of her personality can't make her take on things into any certainty.

The redeeming characteristic in the book is Cornwell's surprising research abilities. More than anything, the book carries a great flavor of Victorian England.

3 bones!!! show less

Patricia Cornwell is a very good writer of crime fiction. I have enjoyed several of her novels featuring Dr Kay Scarpetta. But I think she should have stuck to the fiction. This 365-page tome is full of speculation, but completely lacking in evidence. It was widely panned when published and Cornwell’s response was to write an even longer version, still without any evidence.

There are many theories regarding who was the infamous Whitechapel murderer who terrorised London in the 1880s. The idea that the painter Walter Sickert may have been the killer had been around for a while when Cornwell wrote this book. None of those authors proved Sickert’s connection to the crimes. Cornwell did not succeed either. The case is most certainly not show more closed. show less

I couldn’t handle this book. It came off as if the author had a grudge against the Sickert family and wrote this just to drag their name through the mud. Now, of course I’m not saying that’s what they did, but that’s the way it read. All of the stated facts are peppered with maybes and this could have happened. I misquoted in one of my updates for this book, but it actually spends a few paragraphs talking about Sickerts nurse, and how she could have been an alcoholic and mistreated her patients, and then finishes with, but I don’t know anything about Mrs. Whateverhernamewas, she could have been a teetotaler. If there’s no proof either way, why include it, and why spend paragraphs talking about the negative aspects that you show more don’t know about, but a sentence taking it back.

Sickert might or might not have been the Ripper, but this book actually does a disservice to convincing me he was. If the hypotheticals were left out and just the cold hard facts that could be proved presented it would have gone a lot further as a credible book.

Definitely NOT Case Closed... show less