The Big Bow Mystery

Book excerpt: The Big Bow Mystery (1892) is a novel by Israel Zangwill. Although he is frequently recognized as a writer who focused on the plight of London’s Jewish community, Zangwill also wrote works of genre fiction. Originally serialized in The Star, The Big Bow Mystery is a satirical take on the locked room mystery that continues to astound, entertain, and frustrate readers to this day. Having risen through poverty to become an educator and author, Zangwill dedicated his career to the voiceless, the oppressed, and the needy, advocating for their rights and bearing witness to their suffering in some of the most powerful novels and stories of the Victorian era. On a foggy morning in a working-class neighborhood on the East End of London, a landlady rises to light the fire and make a pot of tea. Eventually, Mrs. Drabdump realizes that one of her tenants has overslept, and goes upstairs to wake him. Finding his room locked from the inside, she grows concerned and enlists the help of another tenant. Forcing open the door, they find the man—a prominent activist for worker’s rights—dead in his own bed. When the coroner’s report reveals that the man was neither murdered or killed by his own hand, an investigation is launched involving inept policemen, a major politician, and several strange characters whose peculiarities provide a darkly humorous tint to an otherwise brutal tale of death and urban decay. With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Israel Zangwill’s The Big Bow Mystery is a classic of British literature reimagined for modern readers.