Margaret Cox
Life and Death in Spitalfields 1700-1850
Council for British Archaeology 1996
A fascinating and gruesome account of the removal and analysis of the bodies from the crypt of Christ Church Spitalfields, one of the key sites in Peter Ackroyd's Hawksmoor. Science, archaeology and sociology then combine to investigate the lives, diseases and deaths of the people that the bodies once were. A horrible job, with danger from old diseases - smallpox in particular, and an unsurprisingly high level of sick-leave amongst 'members of the project who found dealing with human remains, some with surviving soft tissue, some which appeared almost complete, and some putrescent, distressing." The results give fascinating insights into many aspects of the lives of old Londoners. Like the fact that the late 17th / Early 18th Centuries saw the coldest temperatures since the Ice Age, resulting in the famous Frost Fairs on the Thames, and that increased mortality rates, famine, epidemics and migrations at the time can all be put down to this Little Ice Age. And that the illicit trade in corpses for Anatomy Schools lead to much increased security in coffin construction and that a 'mort-safe' was sometimes used to temporarily protect coffins for a few weeks, that is until 'autolysis, putrefaction, and insect activity' made the corpse drastically less saleable and the coffin could be removed.
 

Rachel Lichtenstein and Iain Sinclair 
Rodinsky's room Granta 1999
In 1969 David Rodinsky left his attic room above the synagogue at 19 Princelet Street, Spitalfields, and never returned. He left behind a room full of papers and books and the trappings of his life, which remained undisturbed, gathering dust and damp and fascination, until it was opened in 1980. An impression of his head remained on his pillow, and piles of papers, books, LPs, pieces of paper and chocolate wrappers contained odd notes and scribblings in many of the obscure languages Rodinsky spent his time learning. He was, in short, one of those odd unkempt men who study and write endlessly, often impenetrably, on reams of paper in strange hand-writing in public libraries all over London. But Rodinsky has the advantage of the post-mortem patronage of  artists, and the Spitalfields factor. Rachel Lichtenstein stumbled on Rodinsky on a visit to the Princelet Street synagogue, and became obsessed with the mystery and how his family's history shared common ground with her own. It's easy to see the fascination of this life mysteriously left in abeyance, and the appeal of sifting through boxes of resonant detritus. But to allow your interest free rein you must quell your doubts: doubts about whether the story would've got the same exposure had Rodinsky's home been in, say, Stamford Hill; doubts about how the whole thing plays up to the romantic needs of the rich residents of the new Spitalfields who have bought into a history of the lives of generations of poor immigrants whose successive colonisations of the area they have put a stop to, with their inflated house prices, ever-present builder's skips, and minimal bars with short names. Sinclair's awareness, and discussion, of this phenomenon, and his part in it, only comes across as a desire for both cake and the eating of it. 

There is also a facsimile of Rodinsky's copy of the A to Z of London called Dark Lanthorns Goldmark 1999, in which Iain Sinclair follows the routes Rodinsky had marked in biro. It comes complete with a facsimile Cadbury's Whole Nut wrapper bookmark. 

Then there's a lovely little booklet of Lichtenstein's walk Rodinsky's Whitechapel Artangel 1999, which is a good introduction to whole thing, and full of photos of fascinating little scraps and scenes of long-lost Jewish Whitechapel. Mighty interesting stuff, then, combining the fascination of the history of real people, out of control mythologising, and the dubieties of the present, and well worth quelling many doubts for. Try to visit the Synagogue too - it's a visit you'll not soon forget.