Wednesday, 27 August 2008
Jack the Ripper exhibition
As I've already mentioned, Jon and I recently visited the Museum in Docklands to see the Jack the Ripper exhibition. And it was amazing!!! We arrived at around 2:15pm, having eaten lunch nearby. Then we paid £7 each to enter the exhibition, which also gave us free entry into the rest of the Museum.
The exhibition really tries hard to set the scene of what life was like in the East End around the time of the Jack the Ripper murders. We learnt what was on display in Madame Tussaud's Chamber of Horrors (wax models of John Thurtell and William Burke, amongst about sixty other notorious killers), and what was playing at the West End (Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde). We saw videos where authorities on each topic explained the similarities and differences between then and now for, among others, prostitutes in the East End, and the police. We also got to see the original police reports (with typed copies for ease of reading) of each of Jack the Ripper's murders, of which there were eleven that are believed to be linked to the mysterious murderer. There was even a brief look at all the people that it has been suggested over the years could be Jack the Ripper, with some explanation as to why they might be suspected and why they're perhaps unlikely to be the killer.
It was such a huge, fascinating exhibition, and yet, when we had gone all the way through it, I wished there were more. I was particularly intrigued to find out that a police surgeon was asked to profile the killer, much in the manner that psychologists and others are ask to nowadays! I loved every moment of the exhibition and made copious notes throughout (in purple pen, of course!). We spent two hours in the exhibition, and, even though I wanted to learn even more on the topic, I also felt incredibly tired when I finally came out of the exhibition back into the rest of the museum.
Jon and I decided to look around the rest of the museum, but, indeed, found that we were so tired that we could not really take in anything more (which was a shame, because it did look good, so we'll probably return another day), and after a quick rush around and a short look around the shop, we left to move on to our next stop for the day: The Tate Modern, in search of London Graffiti.
