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John Hacker
Detective Sergeant
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 67
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 6:46 am: |       |
Caz,
Why on earth would the forger have any reason to fear that Maybrick might be exonerated by his medical records? When you look at how few suspects we can definatively rule out based on a 100+ year old alibi it doesn't seem like much of a risk at all to me. Look at Tumblety for example, the historical record suggests that he was in jail during MJK's killing, yet he's still considered a strong suspect by many.
In my opinion, you're giving the forger WAY more credit than she/he/it deserves, for what is really a pretty shoddy piece of work. If the forger didn't care enough to get Michael's occupation correct, or the handwriting, why should we believe that they had a care in the world about medical records?
I think the forger simply had a great understanding of the philosophy of P.T. Barnum and knew that there's one born every minute.
Regards,
John Hacker
P.S. The "she" did profit from the diary, and more from her own book, so let's not pretend that there was no potential profit motivation there. Nor do we know that the forger was motivated by profit. The forger wrote the @#%^ thing for reasons known only to themselves. |
Caroline Anne Morris
Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 413
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 7:28 am: | |
Hi John,
This is what I'm asking - why didn't the forger have a concern in the world? I'm giving her/him/it no credit at all for anything actually. You are the one crediting her/him/it with creating the diary in modern times.
One born every minute, John? Talking about 'potential' profit motivation for the diary forger is useless if the profits from that diary were actually rejected when they were needed most by a woman with a child to support. A bit of a cop out to say it doesn't matter why the forgers (composer and penman) did it, when the money motive can't be pinned on the donkey along with the tail.
Love,
Caz
PS Interesting comparison your post conjures up there - the diary as 'a pretty shoddy piece of work', carelessly thrown together for no apparent reason except to make her life more difficult, followed by 'her own book', which 'she' spent a lot of time and effort meticulously researching. In fact, I can't see any comparison whatsoever. |
Caroline Anne Morris
Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 414
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 7:42 am: | |
BTW, RJ and John,
Have you met 'her'? In your opinion, would it be in her character to do anything remotely like you are suggesting she did?
Or doesn't that matter either?
Love,
Caz |
John Hacker
Detective Sergeant
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 68
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 8:29 am: | |
Caz,
How on earth would I know what the forger was thinking? I'n not he/she/it. I am in no way arrogant enough to believe I can understand what another person is thinking. It's simply not possible. What I am saying is that simply because the forgers actions do not meet our mental picture of how the forger "should" act, doesn't mean they don't make perfect sense to the person who forged it.
While it is interesting to speculate on the why's, we can't make any rational judgement based on these speculations. It's that kind of thinking the propogates suspects like Barnett and Lewis Carroll.
Nor am I "crediting" them with creating the diary in modern times. That is what the evidence suggests. "Credit" is not involved.
As far as your "cop out" remark, you're way off base. I never said it didn't matter why the forger made the thing. I said that we don't know why they made it. HUGE difference there.
Look at the vast array of forged "Jack" letters that the police received. Cornwell aside, I think that most reasonable people accept that they were written by a considerable number of different forgers. Somehow I doubt they all had exactly the same motivation, yet they all did the same basic thing. People do things for their own reasons, and these reasons are not always apparent to those witnessing them.
As far as your comparison between the diary and Graham's "Last Victim" goes, I think you'll have to admit that there is a world of difference between making a forgery where the research has to be done quietly and a work that can be publically researched and is co-written by another author. You're right that there is no comparison there, but it's not because both could not have come from the same person, it's because they are fundamentally different endevours.
As far as meeting "her" or any of the other principles, nope I haven't met any of them. Nor do I see any value in doing so. In my opinion, it's not possible to determine if something is "in their character" by meeting or interacting with them. I am continually suprised by the actions of people I have known for years, so how on earth would meeting them be any use at all? All it could do is allow personal predjudice (for or against) to lead me into believing I can answer a question that it is not possible to answer.
Regards,
John Hacker |
Caroline Anne Morris
Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 416
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 11:27 am: | |
Hi John,
You don't have any evidence that 'she' (or he/it) created the diary in modern times, so how can you say this is what 'the evidence' suggests to you?
The huge difference between the forged ripper letters and the diary is that none of the forgers, or co-forgers, delivered their work in person. You are answering what you have just described as 'a question that it is not possible to answer', by accusing someone you don't know, have never even met, and do not wish to question, of allowing, or encouraging, this shoddy unresearched forgery to be taken in person by her co-conspirator to Doreen Montgomery, for an unimaginable purpose, without a care in the world whether there might be easily obtainable historical records showing that Maybrick was not in or anywhere near London at the time of one or more of the ripper murders. Did your forger not give a damn either if Doreen, or whoever else became involved, turned out not to be in the 'one born every minute' category?
Was there no concern that the forgery might never reach first base if records existed that your forger hadn't bothered to look for? Particularly when it would be pretty obvious who would therefore be suspected - and possibly charged with a criminal offence and even put in prison, as had happened to the forger of the Hitler Diaries?
Had Doreen been representing Melvin instead of Shirley, your forger would have been in the poo right from the start - not in the money, not in the limelight for playing a funny little practical joke - just in the poo. And all for what?
Quite frankly, the reasoning I've seen here lately is beginning to look as desperate as it is unlikely. And I'm fed up with people who think they can judge from afar what an individual is capable of doing, and therefore what they must have done, better than those who have known that individual for years.
Mindboggling.
Love,
Caz
|
John Hacker
Detective Sergeant
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 69
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 11:54 am: | |
Caz,
You know, I am really tired of hearing that I am "accusing" someone. That ploy of your is getting really old, you need a new one. I am not accusing anyone, I am pointing out what seems to me to be a huge flaw in your approach to the case.
In my opinion, there is no way accurately assess the document based on what we "think" the forger might have done, or what we "believe" the person is capable of. That's an invention of your own mind, and not evidence.
If you wish to approach your research in such a manner, that's fine. But don't expect others to be led into your dead end trap of pretending that we can use arm chair profiling to rule people in or out.
You keep asking rhetorical questions such as "Was there no concern that the forgery might never reach first base if records existed that your forger hadn't bothered to look for?" The answer to that, as well as most of the questions you've asked over the years is "evidently not". The thing WAS made, despite the risks you seem to find so dire. I wonder what leads you to think that the actions of someone who decides to forge the diary of a long dead serial killer has to make any sense whatsoever?
Frankly I find your arguments as desperate as you appear to find mine, and find it patently rediculous that you think you could spot a forger by simply meeting or knowing them. Oddly enough people are capable of hiding their secrets even from their loved ones.
Again, we don't know why it was made. We don't know what efforts they made in doing so. We don't know what their assessment of the risks were. And we won't until the forger gets around to telling us.
I find suggestions to the contray, as you say, mindboggling.
Regards,
John Hacker |
John V. Omlor
Detective Sergeant
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 132
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 12:26 pm: | |
A brief thought, as I see the discussion once again dissolving into the same sort of unpleasant rhetoric that inevitably accompanies all diary debates (for whatever reason).
When Caz asks people, regarding Mike or Anne or anyone else for that matter:
"In your opinion, would it be in her character to do anything remotely like you are suggesting she did?"
She is asking a question whose answers, even for those who have met and know the person involved, are problematic at best and irrelevant at worst as evidence of anything. No matter how many times one may have spoken to Mike or Anne or how well one someone might feel they "know" them, claims such as "they could never do such and such a thing, they would not be capable, it's not in their character, it's not consistent with their other actions, etc." are not, logically speaking, valid claims as evidence of anything. People are inconsistent all the time. People behave in ways that surprise even those who know them best, most intimately, all the time. And people behave in ways that cannot be logically explained all the time. So when weighing who could or could not have been the forger of this little book, just saying "I've met them and they don't seem like the sort of people who would or could do this" is not really evidence of anything other than a purely limited and subjective personal impression that tells us nothing in any objective or material way.
It does not help us address, in any serious investigative way, the question of who the forgers might or might not have been.
All the best,
--John
|
R.J. Palmer
Inspector
Username: Rjpalmer
Post Number: 172
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 1:02 pm: | |
Good Golly Caz. I call the forger a 'she' because 'she' is unknown. Why not a 'she' rather than a 'he'? There's some who think the author of the Illiad was a she, and even a strange fellow in England who thinks Shakespeare was a she. Call it a sudden outburst of feminism if you like; but, for the record, I wasn't referring to Anne Graham (nor anyone else specific) and have said on numerous occasions that I personally don't suspect her as having written the diary. Cheers. |
John Hacker
Detective Sergeant
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 70
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 1:26 pm: | |
John,
Thanks for your post. You managed to convey what I was trying to say without slipping into the unpleasant rhetoric that, as you noted, most diary debates seem to devolve into.
It certainly seems to bring out the worst in me.
Thanks again,
John Hacker |
Christopher T George
Inspector
Username: Chrisg
Post Number: 350
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 2:04 pm: | |
Hi, all--
Here's a list of deficits that the Diary possesses. Feel free to suggest others I have not included.
 1. Not in James Maybrick's handwriting.
2. Contains wording identical to a police list only made public in 1988 ("One tin matchbox empty").
3. Gets placement of body parts in 13 Miller's Court wrong.
4. Says that Diarist took refreshment in the Poste House, a Liverpool pub not called by that name in 1888, and not known as "The Poste House" until recent decades, it having been previously known as "The Muck Midden."
5. Gets the claim to fame of Michael Maybrick, the Diarist's brother, wrong--he's a composer not a lyricist.
6. Not written in a diary but in an old photograph album or scrapbook.
7. Sixty three pages crudely cut out of the front of the book.
8. Has no provenance and cannot be proven to ever have been in the possession of James Maybrick.
9. Emulates the bantering style of the Jack the Ripper letters in terms of taunting the police but does not use the name "Jack the Ripper" until the final page when the writer signs the document "Yours truly Jack the Ripper" the same way the Dear Boss letter of 25 September 1888 is signed.
10. Despite there being evidently missing pages in the beginning of the book, the story appears whole, beginning with Maybrick planning his murder spree and ending with his death.
11. Contains no new information about the Ripper case or about the Maybrick family, with the possible exception of details about two possible Manchester murders and a Liverpool neighbor named Mrs. Hammersmith.
Given this list of dud notes rung by the Diary, and there may be more, but particularly points 2 and 4 above,
2. Contains wording identical to a police list only made public in 1988 ("One tin matchbox empty").
4. Says that Diarist took refreshment in the Poste House, a Liverpool pub not called by that name in 1888, and not known as "The Poste House" until recent decades, it having been previously known as "The Muck Midden.",
is it any wonder that most of us are skeptical of the story told by Anne Graham that the artifact has been in her family since the 1950's when the indications appear to be that it is likely more recent?
All the best
Chris |
Jennifer D. Pegg
Detective Sergeant
Username: Jdpegg
Post Number: 113
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 2:18 pm: | |
hi,
the only thing you said i have a probl;em with is number 6 on the list. i am not not not a pro diarist but i have to say that the word diary even journal is probably muisused in relation to this artefact. lets be honest does a serial killer think , i want to write a diary of the events i am about to commit bcos i am a weirdo psycho of some description, i will go to the shop yonder and buy one never mind that it is august and the year is but 8 months gone!
no need fotr unpleasant rhetoric here just like a collectivist can't agree with an individualist a pro diarist will never come round to accept one pov of an anti diarist and the reverse is alos true as i am not picking on any one side.
i'd like to place myself squat bang in the middle however, i don't care if the diary is a forgery, if it is does that mean JTR wasn't JM, not really and if it isn't it doesn't nec. prove he was.
why is a date of 1921 plus or mimnus whatever so improbable are we so set in our ways open mindedness isn't allowable! why does it haev to be genuwine or recent aaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!
this started off as a statement and has turned into questions
jennifer |
John Hacker
Detective Sergeant
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 72
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 2:28 pm: | |
Chris,
12. The ink contains chloracetamaide.
Jennifer,
In my opinion a date in the 20s is extrodinarily improbable due to the contents of the ink, as well the text of the diary containing facts that were not publically available until the late 80s.
The only thing supporting a 1920s origin is the ion migration test which was performed. Unfortunately that test is NOT one that is normally used in detecting the age of documents and it is extremely suspect. I've done some looking into it, and it's typically used to measure degradation of electronic circuits, where the ions migrate at a fairly predictable rate. Using it on organics such as paper doesn't seem to make a lot of sense. And indeed, I haven't found anything to suggest that it has been tried again since it was done on the diary.
Regards,
John Hacker |
Christopher T George
Inspector
Username: Chrisg
Post Number: 351
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 2:46 pm: | |
Hi, John and Jennifer:
John, yes, fair point about the chloracetamide, although I think Shirley Harrison has countered that by saying chloracetamide was present in ink as early as the 1860's.
Jennifer, yes of course you are right that the document is not really a diary but merely a collection of thoughts, and that not even a day- by-day account but whenever the person thought about putting them down. For all we know indeed, if the document, which I will call a "Diary" since that is how we conventionally call it, is a forgery, it may have been written in just one or several sittings not over a 9-month period as the Diary purports.
However, I still think it is most odd and suspicious that pages containing other items, i.e., probably photographs, were removed as if they could date the document to some year later than 1888 when the Diary was supposedly begun.
All the best
Chris |
John Hacker
Detective Sergeant
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 73
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 2:55 pm: | |
Chris,
I don't recall hearing/reading anything from Shirley asserting the use of chloracetamaide in the 1860s. The chemical was certainly in existence then, but it's cost would make it's use prohibatively expensive. Do you recall where you saw that? I would be interested in seeing what exactly she said, and what she provides as evidence.
Regards,
John Hacker |
Christopher T George
Inspector
Username: Chrisg
Post Number: 352
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 2:59 pm: | |
Hi, John:
I think the statement about chloracetamide being in use in the 1860s might be either in the British Blake edition of Shirley's book that came out in 2000 or else something she said in Ripperologist. I'll check into it and get back to you about that point.
All the best
Chris |
John Hacker
Detective Sergeant
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 74
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 3:03 pm: | |
Chris,
I seem to remember a statement in the Blake edition regarding it's use in "preperations", but nothing that suggested that it was used in ink. Any help you could provide in clarifying that would be greatly appreciated!
Many thanks,
John |
John V. Omlor
Detective Sergeant
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 133
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 4:31 pm: | |
Hi Chris,
I'm not sure how you'd word it, but a line about the diary's overtly well-made plot structure and artificial narrative closure and use of explicitly literary conventions might be added. This is not, clearly, an active chronicle of a life being lived. I suppose this is a slight addition to your point #10. Also, the reduction in the diary of the criminal investigation into an exclusively mano-a-mano struggle between the Ripper and (specifically) Abberline, including a moment where Abberline nearly catches the Ripper in a deliberately created trap (an event without any real historical referent or precedent but which occurs at around the same moment in both narratives) -- parallels quite neatly the structure and events to be found in the Michael Caine Ripper mini-series broadcast at the time of the centennial. That seems like it too might be a cause for suspicion.
Oh, and, of course, it has James Maybrick quoting two lines from the middle of an obscure poem by Richard Crashaw (a literary-historical howler) -- the very same two lines which also just happen to be excerpted and conveniently quoted in a prose essay in the middle of a book that just happens to be owned by the same person who brought the diary forward (a book which just happens to fall open to that exact page where the same two lines appear and also just happens to be owned by the guy who also just happens to be the first and only one able to locate the literary source of the lines after the fact – and who just happens to locate those lines in that same book that he just happens to own).
Oh yeah. There is that.
Just a friendly reminder,
--John
|
Christopher T George
Inspector
Username: Chrisg
Post Number: 353
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, October 09, 2003 - 1:58 am: | |
Hi, John Omlor
I agree with the points that you bring up, although I might say they are pointers to something being rotten in Denmark rather than the more definite howlers of Diarydom that I have listed.
Indeed, John, I believe you are correct that the odds are long that, as you put it, the man "who brought the diary forward [owns a book which contains a passage from an obscure poem by seventeenth century poet Richard Crashaw, two lines of which appear in the Diary] which just happens to fall open to that exact page where the same two lines appear . . . who also just happens to be the first and only one able to locate the literary source of the lines after the fact – and who just happens to locate those lines in that same book that he just happens to own."
Such an unlikely chain of events certainly does defy logic. But then there's the case of the gravemarker for one Eleanor Rigby in St. Peter's churchyard, Woolton, Liverpool, a few yards west of the church hall where John Lennon first met Paul McCartney in 1957. A definite link many would say to the 1966 hit song, "Eleanor Rigby," written by Lennon and McCartney, yes? And yet Sir Paul McCartney is defiant in denying that the grave of Eleanor Rigby has anything to do with the song. The "Eleanor" in the song was inspired, he insists, by actress Eleanor Bron, who appeared in the 1965 movie "Help" with the Beatles. So some things that defy logic to the extent that we would swear they are linked are, it seems, just incredible coincidences. 
All the best
Chris |
Caroline Anne Morris
Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 417
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, October 09, 2003 - 6:59 am: | |
Blimey, clawing my way through a sudden outpouring of ancient history on why the diary is not genuine.... 
Hi John Hacker,
It's not a case of anyone being able to spot a forger by meeting or knowing them. Of course I can't claim any such knack. But you believe you can spot one from your computer chair, because you are accusing one or more of the usual suspects with every argument you make. All your arguments are based on just the one basic assumption - that a recent forgery was knowingly presented to Doreen by a co-conspirator intent on committing fraud - Mike Barrett. The watch then follows suit along with one or both of the Johnsons. You fail to ever go back and question this original assumption - which has now become a firm belief - even when the facts start getting in the way of little things like Anne's 'potential' money motive, or when you are forced to conclude that an intelligent woman with a young child risked prison sentences for her husband and/or herself if the diary had quickly proved to be bogus. Never mind all that, you respond. How can you be expected to know why people do such things or take such risks? All you know is that they did. Except that you don't 'know' any such thing, because in order for your belief to become knowledge, there has to be 100% justification for it.
And there are many very well-informed people in the world (not just all those who have ever known the seven or so named suspects personally) who see no justification whatever, and consider your original assumption to be no more than that - an assumption, on which only speculative arguments can grow. And from where I'm sitting, the speculation is growing too wild and uncontrolled to do anything constructive with.
My own arguments spring from questions, not from assumptions or beliefs that could all be false. I have no conclusions to offer, only questions. And I'll keep on asking them until I can see the justification for other people's assumptions and beliefs.
If you are happy not to question your basic assumptions, or object to having them questioned by anyone else (whether they concern the diary author, the ripper or any other unsolved or disputed case), I can't see where you want to go with this, or indeed where you can go. You have already solved it in your own mind – case closed.
Would you care, if Mike or Anne or Albert or others know beyond all doubt that you haven't solved anything? Is it a case of “Well, as long as none of them can prove it, my belief is as safe as – er – history”?
If you, and others here, want to see history written in this rushed and shoddy manner (and I can’t imagine why they would, but, as you say, people want things for all sorts of peculiar and personal reasons), I can see why my questions get the reception they do.
Love,
Caz
|
John V. Omlor
Detective Sergeant
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 134
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, October 09, 2003 - 8:49 am: | |
Chris,
Yes, but that's the thing about unlikely coincidences. They are, finally, unlikely.
--John
PS: And when Mike becomes the one who "finds" the source of the quote before everyone else, and in that very same book yet, there is more than just a coincidence of proximity involved. (Oh sorry, I forgot, he walked into the library and there it was....) |
John Hacker
Detective Sergeant
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 75
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, October 09, 2003 - 9:14 am: | |
Caz,
You say that you can't spot a forger by meeting them or knowing them and yet you have continually suggested that others should do just that. ("And I'm fed up with people who think they can judge from afar what an individual is capable of doing, and therefore what they must have done, better than those who have known that individual for years.") It seems a tad hypocritical for you to suggest that others should do so, when you yourself admit that it can't be done.
Your assertation I am assuming anything is way off. I certainly believe that the diary is a modern artifact, and in my opinion there is plenty of evidence to support that belief. However, there's a large difference between that and accusing anyone of complicity in fraud. It is possible for the diary to be modern and not be a product of any of the "usual suspects". It's just not particularly likely.
I continually test my own beliefs regarding the diary (as well as the actual JtR case), but I refuse to close off potential possibilities based on hypothetical "what if", or "why" scenarios of the sort you're proposing. ("Was there no concern that the forgery might never reach first base if records existed that your forger hadn't bothered to look for?") People do things for reasons known only to themselves.
A lovely example of that turned up in the local papers in the last few days. A young couple, had the husband's mother living with them. They felt that the mother was "cramping their lifestyle". Rather than ask her to leave, they decided to murder her in her bed and fake a break in. It all fell down of course when the side door they claimed the burgler broken in through turned out to be nailed shut! It was a stupid, evil, risky, and truly pointless act. Yet they did it anyway. Their friends of course were "shocked" by the turn of events.
You ask if I am willing to challenge my own opinions. Of course I am. That's why I bother responding to your posts as you are the leading champion of the innocence of the principal players. And your posts, as well as your book, have more than anything convinced me that we cannot eliminate anyone at this point. I would LOVE to be able to eliminate any of the named suspects definatively, but speculations about the risk and what the forger was thinking don't further that cause at all. They simply confuse the issue with meaningless noise.
In the interest of fair play, I ask you: Could Mike, Anne, or Albert have any complicity in the the creation of the diary or watch? Or is your mind as closed as you keep trying to suggest mine is?
And to respond to your last statement "If you, and others here, want to see history written in this rushed and shoddy manner (and I can’t imagine why they would, but, as you say, people want things for all sorts of peculiar and personal reasons), I can see why my questions get the reception they do." I'd like to point out that the diary has been out there for 10 years now. There's hardly a rush to judgment here.
Indeed, I have not rushed toward anything. I've spent thousands of hours of my own personal time beyond that the time I've spent on the boards in research into not only the diary, James Maybrick, and the whole sordid story of the diary principals, but in understanding the science behind the ink tests, ion migration tests, etc. I've researched paper and ink, historical forgeries, Crawshaw, etc. I'm not writing a book. I have no profit motive. I am simply interested in answering the question to my own satisfaction.
And I have to ask what efforts you've made to clear it up, or to determine the forger? Your efforts seem devoted only towards convincing others of that which YOU seem to assume. That Mike, Anne, and Albert are innocent, that they couldn't have done it, that it's not in their personality to do so, etc.
Regards,
John Hacker |
Caroline Anne Morris
Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 418
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, October 09, 2003 - 11:02 am: | |
Hi John Hacker,
Hypocritical? No, just asking you to back up your assumptions about the forger(s) with something. I don't care what form the something takes, but if we are both saying you can't do it by close examination of the suspects, it's more your problem than mine.
I refuse to close off potential possibilities...
Great to hear it. So do I. That's presumably why we are still here debating.
The young couple in your scenario were found out and very quickly. If the forgers had been found out and very quickly we wouldn't still be here debating a decade later.
It just shows how little you have really grasped from what I've written when you refer to me as 'the leading champion of the innocence of the principal players'. All I've ever asked is that people provide proof of their involvement in forgery or fraud. I don't remember ever having declared anyone to be innocent and it would go against everything I am asking of others if I did so now.
Funny enough, before I saw your latest post I composed one about open and closed minds, so here it is:
My mind is open to the possibility that Mike knows the diary is a modern forgery, and never had any intention of telling the truth about what he knows and how he knows it.
My mind is open to the possibility that Anne made up her ‘in the family story’ and asked her father to back it up, for reasons that only she can know or understand.
My mind is open to the possibility that the scratches were made in the watch shortly after the diary started making the news, again, for reasons that may never be known.
My mind is open to the possibility of a late 1980s conspiracy to create the diary for the purpose of deception.
Are your minds (I don't mean just you, John, but everyone who has been adding to the current discussion) open to the possibility that Mike was given the diary and has no idea who wrote it or when (and the possibility that he didn’t realise he had his own source of ‘O costly/ oh costly/ oh sweet…’ until three months after his greatest lone forger in history ‘confession’ – a boast that curiously he didn’t repeat after revealing how clever he was to find it - er, not so clever if he simply recommended it to the real forger)?
Are your minds open to the possibility that Anne has no idea how the diary began life either?
Are your minds open to the possibility that Albert doesn’t know how long ago the scratches were made, but believes they must have been there when he bought the watch?
Are your minds open to the possibility of being wrong about a late 1980s forgery conspiracy?
That's about it for now.
Love,
Caz
PS No profit motive for me either, John, sadly. I knew three years ago that my losses from working on the book would end up greater than the profit I would have made if I had been stacking shelves in Tesco’s or claiming social security handouts. My choice - the reader's loss.
|
John V. Omlor
Detective Sergeant
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 135
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, October 09, 2003 - 11:25 am: | |
Here's one thing my own mind can't manage to open itself to....
that Mike Barrett was given two random unidentified lines from an unknown poem by an unknown author and walked into a public library and found them, excerpted in the middle of a prose essay in the middle of a single volume of the Sphere Guide to English Literature which he just pulled off the shelf.
If, given all my experience in research studies and in library work and in the history of literature and criticism, not being able to believe that still makes me closed-minded, then I happily acquiesce to the charge and accept whatever condemnation accompanies it.
--John
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John Hacker
Detective Sergeant
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 76
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, October 09, 2003 - 11:56 am: | |
Caz,
"Hypocritical? No, just asking you to back up your assumptions about the forger(s) with something."
First off, I would LOVE to know what you think my assumptions are. I don't understand why I should be forced to "back up" a position that I haven't taken.
Mike, Anne, Albert, etc COULD be involved in the forgery. That shouldn't require any backing up, the possibilities there are self-evident. But if you'd like, I'd be glad to go through it step by step with you.
"All I've ever asked is that people provide proof of their involvement in forgery or fraud. I don't remember ever having declared anyone to be innocent and it would go against everything I am asking of others if I did so now."
There is currently no proof that either definatively condemns or exonerates them. I refuse to be put on the spot to provide a smoking gun that doesn't exist simply because I discuss the various possibilities. If we cannot discuss what is possible, as opposed to what is already proved we're all wasting our time here.
Thanks for your response regarding what your mind is open on. I notice that you don't seem to be open to the possibility that Mike, Anne, or Albert were actually involved in the creation of the fakes. It seems to me that you've closed off some viable possibilites there. But that is of course your choice. (I would like to know what evidence convinces you that it's not possible, unless of course you left those possibilities off your list inadvertantly.) In return I'll be glad to answer your questions.
"Are your minds (I don't mean just you, John, but everyone who has been adding to the current discussion) open to the possibility that Mike was given the diary and has no idea who wrote it or when (and the possibility that he didn’t realise he had his own source of ‘O costly/ oh costly/ oh sweet…’ until three months after his greatest lone forger in history ‘confession’ – a boast that curiously he didn’t repeat after revealing how clever he was to find it - er, not so clever if he simply recommended it to the real forger)?"
Sure, Mike could be unaware of the diaries origin. That's a valid possibility. The Sphere guide is pretty damning, but he's not the only one who could have had access to it.
"Are your minds open to the possibility that Anne has no idea how the diary began life either?"
That's possible, but very problematic in my opinion given the new and improved provenance.
"Are your minds open to the possibility that Albert doesn’t know how long ago the scratches were made, but believes they must have been there when he bought the watch?"
That's completely possible. Faking the scratches is a pretty quick and dirty task that anyone who had access to the watch could have performed in short order.
"Are your minds open to the possibility of being wrong about a late 1980s forgery conspiracy?"
Sure. It might not have been a conspiracy. :-)
As far as the diary actually being produced before the late 80s, I think that the evidence shows that it's highly unlikely that it's older than that. But it's not completely beyond the realm of possibility.
Regards,
John Hacker
P.S. I'm sorry to hear that you're not making any money off your book. That is indeed a pity. While I don't agree with you on many counts, it obviously represents a considerable investment in time and effort which is commendable. |
John Hacker
Detective Sergeant
Username: Jhacker
Post Number: 77
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, October 09, 2003 - 12:04 pm: | |
John O.,
"that Mike Barrett was given two random unidentified lines from an unknown poem by an unknown author and walked into a public library and found them, excerpted in the middle of a prose essay in the middle of a single volume of the Sphere Guide to English Literature which he just pulled off the shelf."
I agree that the odds of it happening like that are astronomical to say the least, but not entirely impossible. People actually win the lottery.
I certainly appreciate how rare that peom is. I've tried internet searches. I've looked in virually every library and bookstore I have been in for years for a copy of that poem, and have not found it yet. And I KNOW who wrote it.
Regards,
John Hacker |
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