Two books to report which, on the face of it, should have absolutely nothing in common, but which in fact turned out to share quite a lot of interesting themes.
68: The Real Jane Austen: A Life in Small Things - Paula Byrne
69: The Five - Hallie Rubenhold
Of the explosion of books about Austen in recent years, Paula Byrne's biography must be one of the most successful - told through chapters that explore objects relevant to Austen's life or work: a portable writing desk; a card of lace ribbon; a piece of jewellery; a silhouette of a beloved relative, etc. The research is impressive, the style highly readable - and most importantly, I came away feeling I really knew what Austen was like as a living, breathing, funny and much-loved person.
The Rubenhold book sets out to do something very similar for the five victims of Jack the Ripper who are, time and again, dismissed as merely forgettable trash; prostitutes whose horrific deaths are titillating fodder for the ranks of (mostly male) obsessive Ripperologists. She's done an incredible job in giving lives and dignity back to these women, who've mostly been ciphers up till now. And what a grim tale it makes....as she points out, just being women pretty much doomed them from the outset. Add in the weight of expectation - that their lives as working-class girls would be ones of unrelenting work, then constant childbirth, grinding poverty, hardship.....it's nothing short of heartbreaking. That almost all of them took to drink is hardly surprising, but that was, almost always, the terrible path to their downfall.
Rubenhold's research is incredible and reveals the lives and back-stories that make them real people - not 'just prostitutes' (only the final victim, Mary Kelly, was actually known to be one) but mothers, daughters, sisters, wives, people in their own right. It's not the world's most elegantly-written book but my goodness, I really felt grateful that she'd done it.