BODY LANGUAGE

READ THE STORY AT: http://writ.rs/thebodysnatcher

For this month’s master class I’ve chosen a dark little tale. The Body Snatcher by Robert Louis Stevenson delivers exactly what the title suggests and, as always, you will benefit most if you read the story for yourself. It’s quite long, but worth persevering with: http://writ.rs/thebodysnatcher.

The story, which enters the murky world of obtaining bodies for medical dissection, addresses all sorts of important issues including sin, guilt and conscience. We’re going to go through and look at some of the significant moments in the story, but first let’s take a brief overview of the structure.

There are two narrative strands here, one of which is a flashback to past events involving two of the characters. We start with four characters talking in the parlour of an inn. They are the unnamed narrator, the landlord, an undertaker and a man named Fettes. The significant occurrence of this section is the reappearance of someone