The Body Snatcher

Infobox short story |
name = The Body Snatcher
author = Robert Louis Stevenson
country = Scotland
language = English
genre = Short story
publication_type = Newspaper
publisher = Pall Mall Gazette
pub_date = December 1884
media_type = Print (Newspaper)
pages =
isbn =

"The Body Snatcher" (1884) is a short story by the Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson. It was first published in the "Pall Mall Christmas "Extra" 13 (Dec 1884).

Plot summary

"He's come," said the landlord, grabbing the attention of the four men at the George, a local tavern. There, a sick man awaits the visit of a London doctor. Fettes, a drunk on his third glass of rum, sits in a fog, minding the events of the pub out of the corner of his eye. The cloaked and grungy Scotsman hears the doctor's name. It is Wolfe Macfarlane. Fettes wakes suddenly from his drunken stupor, rushing to confirm the face of this golden clad man. Fettes short dialogue is mysterious, and ends abruptly with a question, "Have you seen it again?" Doctor Macfarlane, now an esteemed doctor, worked with Fettes, studying medicine together under a famous unnamed professor of anatomy. The two men were employed for the purchase of dead bodies, a fishy but regular labor of the two assistants. Fettes, received and paid for corpses, doing his duties in the late of night. These frightening transactions included the suppliers, gruff grave robbers, targeting the “freshest” corpses. In the course of his labors, Fettes discovers that a body brought to him is a woman’s he knew. He was sure that the woman had been murdered, thus planting the seed of guilt in the poorly functioning conscience of the assistant. Following this event, Fettes coincidentally meets Macfarlane at a tavern. Macfarlane and a man named Gray sat together, discussing things in a secretive manner. Gray handled the meeting with a subtle power over his converser, an unexplained superiority in the tone of his voice. The following night, Macfarlane arrived, this time bearing Gray's body. There was no room for suspicion in the mind of Fettes, and the shallow man knew his coworker was a murderer. Fettes' attitude was one of forced and inevitable assent. The men made sure the body was dissected, destroying any evidence or suggestion of murder. Fettes and Macfarlane continued their work. When a shortage of bodies left the professor in need, they were sent to a country church yard to upheave a recently buried woman. After completing the task, they set the body between them, shoulder to shoulder with the “relic of humanity”. With suspicion, they examined the body, seemingly morphing into a larger structure. Horrified, the two men unveiled the corpse. With only a flicker of lamp light, the lifeless face of Gray was revealed.

Film, TV and theatrical adaptations

*1945 – "The Body Snatcher" produced by Val Lewton, directed by Robert Wise, starring Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi. A TV version was directed in 1966 by Toby Robertson. Both the short story and the film make reference to the West Port murders. The Dr. K--- of the short story is Dr. Robert Knox.

External links

* [http://gaslight.mtroyal.ca/body.htm Full text]
* [http://www.sc.edu/library/spcoll/britlit/rls/bsnatch.jpgCover of the Christmas 1884 edition of the Pall Mall Gazette]