From Hell

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From Hell
ISBN 1603094695

From Hell is a graphic novel by writer Alan Moore and artist Eddie Campbell, originally published in serial form from 1989 to 1998. The full collection was published in 1999 by Top Shelf Productions.

Set during the Whitechapel murders of the late Victorian era, the novel speculates upon the identity and motives of Jack the Ripper. The novel depicts several true events surrounding the murders, although portions have been fictionalised, particularly the identity of the killer and the precise nature and circumstances of the murders.

The title is taken from the first words of the "From Hell" letter, which some authorities believe was an authentic message sent from the killer in 1888. The collected edition is 572 pages long. The 2000 and later editions are the most common prints. The comic was loosely adapted into a film, released in 2001. In 2000, the graphic novel was banned in Australia for several weeks after customs officers seized copies of the seventh issue from a shipment intended for Quality Comics.

Development

Moore began developing the plot for From Hell in the late 1980s. Writer Neil Gaiman recalled Moore calling him up to discuss a television documentary he had just seen about Jack the Ripper, and then asking for Gaiman's help tracking down "rare and forgotten biographies of possible Ripper suspects at the British Museum".^[1]

From Hell takes as its premise

Gull, a high-ranking Freemason, murders the four women in Whitechapel with the aid of a carriage driver, John Netley. While he justifies the murders by claiming they are a Masonic warning to an apparent Illuminati threat to the throne, the killings are, in Gull's mind, part of an elaborate mystical ritual to ensure male societal dominance over women. While targeting Kelly, Gull also kills Catherine Eddowes, who was using Kelly's name as an alias. As the killings progress, Gull becomes psychologically unhinged and has a vision of the future while murdering a woman he believes to be Kelly.

Gull takes Netley on a tour of London landmarks, expounding on their hidden mystical significance. Later, Gull forces the semi-literate Netley to write the infamous From Hell letter. Following this, several people write letters to the police claiming to be the murderer, and the nickname "Jack the Ripper" becomes a household name.

Inspector

Gull is tried by a secret Masonic council, which determines he is insane. Gull refuses to submit to the council, informing them that because of his accomplishments and his visions, no man amongst them may be counted as his peer and cannot judge the "mighty work" he has wrought. A phony funeral is staged, and Gull is imprisoned under a pseudonym "Thomas Mason." The Freemasons frame boarding school teacher Montague Druitt as a suspect, killing him and making his death look like suicide. Years later, and moments before his death, Gull has an extended mystical experience, where his spirit travels through time, observing the crimes of the London Monster, instigating or inspiring a number of other killers (Peter Sutcliffe, Ian Brady), causing Netley's death, as well as serving as the inspiration for both Robert Louis Stevenson's Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and William Blake's painting The Ghost of a Flea. The last experience his spirit undergoes before it "becomes God" is visiting a woman living in Ireland. The woman has four children who are named after the women murdered by Gull in Whitechapel. She is apparently able to see Gull's spirit, and abjures him to begone "back to Hell."

Interpretations and themes

From Hell was partly inspired by the title of Douglas Adams' novel Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency, in that it explores the notion that to solve a crime holistically, one would need to solve the entire society in which it occurred.^[4]

From Hell also explores Moore's ideas on the nature of time. Early on, Gull's friend James Hinton discusses his son Howard's theory of the "fourth dimension", which proposes that time is a spatial dimension. All time co-exists, and it is only the limits of our perception that make it appear to progress. Sequences of related events can be seen as shapes in the fourth dimension: history can "be said to have an architecture", as Gull puts it.^[5] Gull's experiences seem to confirm this: he has visions of the 20th century during the murders, and as he is dying he experiences, and appears to influence, past and future events. Moore had earlier explored similar ideas in Watchmen, where Doctor Manhattan perceives past, present and future simultaneously, and describes himself as "a puppet who can see the strings".^[6]

Critic Gary Groth says the most elaborate theme in From Hell stems from Moore's statement that "the Ripper murders — happening when they did and where they did — were almost like an apocalyptic summary of... that entire Victorian age."^[7]

Awards

From Hell won several

The book also won the 2000

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