What's next — Lit CSI?
A British crime novelist has come out with a book in which she alleges that Jane Austen was murdered. Publicity stunt? Perhaps. It certainly can't hurt sales for the book, which is, after all, a novel.
And even though the book is written by a journalist/criminologist who was the first woman ever to graduate from Queens' College in Cambridge, I can't help wondering whether the sort of analysis that Lindsay Ashford is bringing to this kind of inquiry is a bridge too far.
After all, do we really need to know, after all this time, that Jane Austen died of arsenic poisoning? Would that increase sales of her books? (The answer to that question is probably "Briefly.") Austen is one of those timeless authors whose books continue to sell precisely for the right reasons: They are filled with endearing, enduring characters whose struggles resonate, at least in a few small yet recognizable ways, with the readers of yesterday and today and tomorrow. Do we need to add "murdered" to the description of this revered author?
If the book is that much of a hit and the drumbeat for exhumation is loud enough, we could be in for a repeat of the Zachary Taylor affair or the Tycho Brahe business. (The jury is still out on that second one, by the way.) Was it really necessary to dig these guys up and do more tests on them? Surely they're long dead and we can get on without having to know more and more about their lives (or bodies).
I suspect it is, after all, a publicity stunt. I, for one, don't want to know what really killed Jane Austen. I'm happy for her death to remain mysterious, for the simple reason that I care far more for the words that she wrote and published and that generations since have far and away appreciated.
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