Burke & Hare

by Martin Conaghan

In 1828, two Irishmen named William Burke and William Hare murdered 16 people and disposed of the bodies to Dr Robert Knox at Edinburgh University for dissection, setting in motion a scandal that would rock the world's medical establishment. Writer Martin Conaghan and artist Will Pickering deliver a ghoulishly true story of of medicine, murder and money set at the height of Edinburgh's enlightenment. In addition to the full length comic story, the book is also fully annotated.. Introduction by Judge Dreddwriter Alan Grant. Bonus gallery featuring Frank Quitely and Gary Erskine. Cover by Rian Hughes.

Genres: Graphic Novels, Comics, Historical

112 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2009

Reviews

[Rod Brown]

A promising true-crime book about serial killers in 19th century Scotland is marred by poor storytelling as many of the scenes and characters make little sense until you've read all the end notes that explain what the author failed to communicate in the main part of the book.

Though it was obvious from appearances from the first page, the author announces in the end matter that he modeled the book on Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell's From Hell. I'm not sure why you'd want to set yourself up for that comparison, because the odds are not good for coming off well.

[Iain]

2 for the price of 1. The first half is a graphic novel giving the story of notorious murderers Burke and Hare in 19th century Edinburgh, with a sparse script and detailed artwork. The second half, listed as an appendix, is the author's dissection of the known facts, myths and artistic licence used in the story. Entertaining and educational and a fascinating glimpse into one of the most misrepresented crimes in history. Well worth a read.

[John Shaw]

Wm's. Burke and Hare
are the rare case of
absolute villains being
made into folk heroes.
Imagine finding out Robin Hood
was a pederast..

Burke and Hare
have long been portrayed
as nothing more than
Resurrection Men.
Grave robbers who
provided bodies
to the medical colleges
in Edinburgh.
The colleges needed cadavers
(as they do today)
to teach anatomy to surgeons.
But this was forbidden
by narrow minded nonsense.

Burke and Hare
decided to cut out the middle man.
Instead of waiting for
someone to die and get buried.
They decided to start killing
drifters, and then selling the corpses.

By any measure
evil men.

Or men who were faced with an unrelenting system
designed to keep them in perpetual poverty.

As always in history it's difficult
to find true hero's.
When you look close enough
You always find humans.
Flawed and imperfect.

BUT
it's always wrong to kill people
and sell their corpses.
(I just wanted that out there)

[Marissa]

I'm currently reading this book for a class on medical madmen and would have never picked it up if it wasn't required for the class. I'm entirely glad I'm required to read it because the subject matter is extremely fantastic to read about. The pictures of course are not comparable to more recent DC/Marvel graphic novels, but they're able to convey enough emotion to understand what is occurring within the pages. The appendix at the back of the novel really allows for beter understanding/tells you the research the author went into for each chapter or what they felt was necessary/unnecessary to add to the book.

[Stargazer]

Although the subject content and some of the language make this unsuitable for the younger readers I was researching for, this is a great wee book with some fantastic black and white illustrations of the atmospheric auld toon of Edinburgh. It also has the factual details for each chapter at the end of the book.

[Bettie]

Now for the 2010 film with Tim Curry - the best way to fill in the hours before a trip to Auld Reekie, yes?

[Alex Brown]

Simple, attractive art. Little embellishment of the known facts and a detailed appendix elaborating on theories and justifying the story given.