The Italian Boy: Murder and Grave-Robbery in 1830s London

In The Italian Boy, Sarah Wise not only investigates the case of the London Burkers but also, by making use of an incredibly rich archival store, the lives of ordinary lower-class Londoners. She shows how the case challenged their notions of community and criminality, and how it made many feel that at the heart of their great city lay unknown, unknowable mysteries. Here is a window on the lives of the poor – a window which is opaque in places, shattered in others but which provides an unprecedented view of low-life London in the 1830s.