Death & the Maiden

  • Breakfast, Then Death

    Breakfast, Then Death

    This work of short fiction by Claire L. Smith centres on the death of a victim of domestic abuse. Her trauma so embedded, she mindlessly continues her everyday life as she dies. Please note that although this post does not contain graphic descriptions of violence, it does contain graphic descriptions of injury. 

  • The Monster Inside Me

    The Monster Inside Me

    By Caroline Reilly Since I was old enough to go out on my own, my mother has been talking to me about Ted Bundy. In high school, when we had off campus privileges starting in our freshman year, she explained to my 14-year-old self about the serial killer who was good looking, and charming, and…

  • Double Take at Sharon Tate

    Double Take at Sharon Tate

    This summer marked 48 years since the brutal murder of Sharon Tate and her unborn son. After discovering crime scene photographs framed at Hollywood’s Museum of Death; Tia Price reflects on the lasting legacy of this valley doll, icon and mother.

  • Bluebeard & the Final Girl: Feminist Retellings of Perrault’s Classic

    Bluebeard & the Final Girl: Feminist Retellings of Perrault’s Classic

    Sonya Vatomsky is here to examine the myth of Bluebeard, Perrault’s text as a canonical work, is in dire need of retelling. Culturally, Bluebeard has found itself linked more to temptation/knowledge narratives like the Garden of Eden and Pandora’s Box than to narratives of heroic escape from monstrous kings and ogres. This in itself is…

  • The Privilege of a Good Death

    Who is more likely to access a good death? Who is more likely to face a bad death? While tragic accidents tend to be great equalizers, we cannot make whole a death positive movement without addressing how privilege grants likelier access to a good death, and how oppression can position someone more likely to face…

  • Poison Panic: Arsenic Deaths in 1840s Essex

    Helen Barrell examines the lives of three apparently ordinary women: Sarah Chesham, Hannah Southgate, and Mary May. 1840s Essex became notorious as a place where women stalked the lanes looking for their next victim to poison with arsenic, though much of the reported horror remains unfounded.

  • Sweet Fanny Adams

    Sweet Fanny Adams

    On this day 149 years ago, eight year old Fanny Adams was brutally murdered by Frederick Baker, a 29 year old solicitor’s clerk. Her grave still stands in Alton Cemetery, adorned lovingly with teddies, tea lights and flowers. Perhaps her name is familiar to you. Maybe you have heard the phrase “Sweet Fanny Adams” or “Sweet…

  • The Crime Museum Uncovered

    Yesterday, after six months this long awaited exhibition at the Museum of London came to an end. With plans for New Scotland Yard to close the future of the Metropolitan Police’s infamously known “Black Museum” is uncertain. This carefully curated exhibition allowed the public to experience a selection of the items found inside. Many still…

  • Monsters

    “Be home when the street lights come on!” Was a common directive during many of our childhoods, as we anxiously ran out into the world to play. However, in my neighborhood and for many of us who lived out our childhoods on the East Side of Los Angeles that directive also came with a sinister…

  • Murder She Crafted

    Dolly Stolze introduces Frances Glessner Lee, a pop culture inspiration who many believe was the inspiration for Jessica Fletcher, the crime-solving mystery novel author in Murder She Wrote. Lee’s Nutshell Studies also inspired an episode of CSI where miniature crime scenes were left behind by a serial killer as clues. Lee is known as the…

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