The big book list 'From Hell'

I finished reading a lengthy graphic novel last week that I’ve wanted to read for years, “From Hell” by writer Alan Moore and artist Eddie Campbell.

Originally published in serial format between 1991 and 1998, “From Hell” was later published in a trade paperback edition that’s an awesome 572 pages long. My edition is the fifth Top Shelf Printing from 2009, and it’s every bit of 1-1/2 inches thick.

Combining two of my favorite topics – Jack the Ripper and freemasonry, “From Hell” follows the premise of author Stephen Knight’s 1977 book, “Jack the Ripper: The Final Solution.” In his controversial book, Knight proposes the theory that the Jack the Ripper murders were actually a masonic plot to hide the birth of an illegitimate royal child fathered by Prince Albert Victor.

Those of you who haven’t read “JTR: The Final Solution” or “From Hell,” may be more familiar with all of this from having watched the 2001 film adaptation of “From Hell,” which starred Johnny Depp and Heather Graham.

Needless to say, there is a world of difference between the 122-minute movie and the 572-page graphic novel versions of “From Hell.” The print version is widely regarded as perhaps the finest graphic novel ever published, and it is a well-researched and impressive example of historical fiction. The graphic novel not only tells the story, but also offers a painstakingly accurate depiction of Victorian personalities, London geography, locales and street life.

Moore and Campbell drew on a wide variety of books and other sources while writing and drawing “From Hell,” and many of these works are referenced within the graphic novel’s story pages and within the highly interesting, 66-page-long appendix. Many of you will be familiar with some of these referenced works and what follows is a list of them that took several hours to compile. Here they are:

- “Albion: A Guide to Legendary Britain” by Jennifer Westwood (1985)
- “Alec” by Eddie Campbell
- “Alice in Wonderland” by Lewis Carroll (1865)
- “The Annals of St. Paul’s Cathedral” by Henry Hart Milman (1869)
- “Apocalypse Culture,” edited by Adam Parfrey (1990)
- “The Aquarian Guide to Legendary London,” edited by John Matthews & Chesca Potter (1990)
- “Autumn of Terror” by Tom Cullen (1965)
- “A-Z Guide to London”
- “A-Z London Street Atlas”
- “The A-Z of Victorian London” by Harry Margary (1987)
- “Bacchus” by Eddie Campbell
- “Beyond Belief” by Emlyn Williams (1967)
- “Beyond Power: On Men, Women and Morals” by Marilyn French (1985)
- “The Birth Rug” by Iain Sinclair (1973)
- “Blake” by Peter Ackroyd (1995)
- “The Blossom and the Fruit” by Mabel Collins
- “The Book Keeper of Ancient Atlantis” by Edward Campbell
- “The Book of Predictions” by David Wallechinsky, Amy Wallace and Irving Wallace (1981)
- “Book of the Damned” by Charles Fort (1973)
- “Born in Blood” by John J. Robinson (1990)
- “Brady and Hindley” by Fred Harrison (1987)
- “The Brotherhood” by Stephen Knight (1989)
- “Buffalo Bill” by Nellie Snyder Yose (1979)
- “Buffalo Bill and the Wild West” by Henry Blackman Sell & Victor Weybright (1955)
- “A Casebook on Jack the Ripper” by Richard Alphonse Bernard Barrington Carrington Whittington-Egan (1975)
- “Chronicles of Crime” by Dr. Thomas Dutton
- “Clarence: The Life of the Duke of Clarence and Avondale KG, 1864-1892” by Michael Harrison (1972)
- “Collins English Dictionary”
- “The Complete History of Jack the Ripper” by Philip Sugden (1994)
- “The Complete Jack the Ripper” by Donald Rumbelow (1987)
- “The Confessions of Aleister Crowley,” edited by John Symonds and Kenneth Grant (1979)
- “The Crimes, Detection and Death of Jack the Ripper” by Martin Fido (1987)
- “The Criminologist” by Nigel Morland (1979)
- “Diary of Jack the Ripper” by Shirley Harrison (1993)
- “Dictionary of National Biography”
- “Dictionary of Symbols” by Tom Chetwynd (1982)
- “The Dionysian Artificers” by Hippolyto Joseph Da Costa and Manly P. Hall (1964)
- “Doing the Islands” by Eddie Campbell (1997)
- “Down Among the Meths Men” by Geoffrey Fletcher (1966)
- “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and Other Stories”
- “The East End Murderer – I Knew Him” by Dr. Lionel Druitt
- “The Elephant Man and Other Reminiscences” by Dr. Frederick Treves
- “The Encroachment” by Leo Baxendale (1988)
- “The Encyclopedia of Modern Murder” by Colin Wilson and Donald Seaman (1983)
- “The Enlarged Devil’s Dictionary” by Ambrose Bierce (1967)
- “The Fate of the Artist” by Eddie Campbell
- “Folk Heroes of Britain” by Charles Kightly (1984)
- “The Fourth Dimension and How to Get There” by Rudy Rucker
- “Ghosts of London: The East End, City and North” by J.A. Brooks (1982)
- “Glimpses of the Future” by David Goodman Croley (1888)
- “Gluck”
- “Hawksmoor” by Kerry Downes
- “Hawksmoor” by Peter Ackroyd (1985)
- “Hindu Mythology” by W.H. Wilkins (1882)
- “Hitler, A Study in Tyranny” by Alan Bullock (1952)
- “The Horla” by Guy de Maupassant (1888)
- “The Identity of Jack the Ripper” by Donald McCormick
- “Illuminatus!” (trilogy) by Robert Anton Wilson (1977)
- “Indian Myth and Legend” by Donald A. Mackenzie (1913)
- “Inside the Brotherhood” by Martin Short (1989)
- “Jack the Myth” by A.P. Wolf (1993)
- “Jack the Ripper” by Daniel Farson (1972)
- “Jack the Ripper” by Martin Fido (1987)
- “Jack the Ripper” by William Stewart (1939)
- “The Jack the Ripper A-Z” by Paul Begg, Martin Fido and Keith Skinner (1991)
- “Jack the Ripper: The Bloody Truth” by Melvin Harris
- “Jack the Ripper: In Fact and Fiction” by Robin Odell (1965)
- “Jack the Ripper: One Hundred Years of Investigation” by Terence Sharkey
- “Jack the Ripper – One Hundred Years of Mystery” by Peter Underwood (1987)
- “Jack the Ripper: When London Walked In Terror” by Edwin Thomas Woodhall (1937)
- “Jack the Ripper: Summing Up and Verdict” by Colin Wilson & Robin Odell (1987)
- “Jack the Ripper: The Final Solution” by Stephen Knight (1977)
- “Jack the Ripper: The Uncensored Facts” by Paul Begg (1988)
- “James Hinton: A Sketch” by Havelock Ellis (1918)
- “Jerusalem” by William Blake
- “Jesus Christ is the Sun of God” by David R. Fideler (1979)
- “The Killing of Justice Godfrey” by Stephen Knight (1984)
- “La France Juive” by Edouard Drumont (1886)
- “The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen” by Alan Moore
- “The Letters of James Hinton” by James Hinton
- “Library of History” by Diodorus Siculus
- “The Life and Letters of James Hinton” by James Hinton (1878)
- “The Life of William Blake” by Alexander Gilchrist (1942)
- “Lo!” by Charles Fort
- “The Lodger” by Belloc Lowndes (1911)
- “London” by Christopher Hibbert (1969)
- “London Labour and the London Poor” by Henry Mayhew (1985)
- “London’s Secret History” by Peter Bushell (1983)
- “London, The Biography of a City” by Christopher Hibbert (1969)
- “London… The Sinister Side” by Steve Jones (1986)
- “London Under London, A Subterranean Guide” by Richard Trent and Ellis Hillman (1984)
- “Lord Arthur Savile’s Crime” by Oscar Wilde (1887)
- “Lost Girls” by Alan Moore
- “Lud Heat” by Iain Sinclair (1987)
- “Lycidas” by Milton
- “The Magical Revival” by Kenneth Grant (1972)
- “Man, Myth & Magic” by Richard Cavendish
- “The Maul and The Pear Tree” by P.D. James & T.A. Critchley (1971)
- “The Mirror of Love” by Alan Moore
- “Mortal Lessons” by Dr. Richard Seltzer
- “Murder & Madness: The Secret Life of Jack the Ripper” by Dr. David Abrahamsen (1992)
- “Murder at the Priory” by Bernard Taylor & Kate Clark (1988)
- “Mysterious Britain” by Janet and Colin Bord (1974)
- “Mysterious King’s Cross” by Chesca Potter (1987)
- “The Mystery of Jack the Ripper” by Leonard Matters (1929)
- “The Mythology of Secret Societies” by J.M. Roberts (1972)
- “Neoplatonism” by R.T. Wallis (1972)
- “The New Book of Knowledge,” edited by Sir John Hammerton
- “Notes and Aphorisms” by Sir William Whitey Gull
- “The Origins of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind” by Julian James
- “People of the Abyss” by Jack London
- “The Portable Blake” (1946)
- “Promethea” by Alan Moore
- “The Ripper and the Royals” by Melvyn Fairclough (1991)
- “The Ripper File” by Melvin Harris (1989)
- “The Ripper File” by Elwyn Jones and John Lloyd (1975)
- “The Ripper Legacy” by Martin Howells and Keith Skinner (1987)
- “The Sacred Prostitute, Eternal Aspect of the Feminine” by Nancy Qualls-Corbett (1988)
- “The Second Coming” by W.B. Yeats
- “The Secret Teachings of All Ages” by Manly P. Hall (1928)
- “Sexual Homicide” by Robert Ressler
- “The Shoemaker” by Flora Rhetta Schreiber
- “Sickert and The Ripper Crimes” by Jean Overton Fuller (1990)
- “Sickert, The Painter and His Circle” by Marjorie Lilly (1971)
- “The Silent Executioner” by Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre (1988)
- “The Spirit of Freemasonry” by Foster Bailey (1957)
- “St. Paul’s and The City” by Frank Atkinson (1985)
- “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” by Robert Louis Stevenson
- “The Stumbling Block Its Index” by B. Catling (1990)
- “A Survey of London” by John Stowe (1598)
- “The Teachings of All Ages” by Manly P. Hall (1928)
- “The Ten Books on Architecture” by Vitruvius (1914)
- “Things I Know About Kings, Celebrities and Crooks” by Tufnell LeQueux (1923)
- “A Treasury of Masonic Thought” by Carl Glick (1961)
- “The Trial of George Chapman” by H.L. Adam (1930)
- “Tuetonic Myth and Legend” by Donald A. Mackenzie
- “V for Vendetta” by Alan Moore
- “Very Special People” by Frederick Drimmer (1973)
- “Visions of the Daughters of Albion” by William Blake (1793)
- “The Vitruvius Britannicus” by Cullen Campbell
- “The Voice of Destruction” by Hermann Rauschning
- “Voice of Fire” by Alan Moore
- “Watchmen” by Alan Moore
- “What is the Fourth Dimension” by C. Howard Hinton (1884)
- “White Chapell, Scarlet Tracings” by Iain Sinclair
- “The White Goddess” by Robert Graves
- “William Blake” by Kathleen Raine (1970)
- “William Whitey Gull: A Biographical Sketch” by Theodore Dyke-Acland (1896)
- “The World’s Tragedy” by Aleister Crowley (1910)
- “Yeats’ Golden Dawn” by George Mills Harper (1974)
- “The Yorkshire Ripper” by Roger Cross (1981)

In the end, how many of these books have you read? What did you think about them? Which would you recommend and why? Let us know in the comments section below.