Deacon Brodie, pillar of the establishment turned arch criminal terrified the Edinburgh
of the late l8th century. Here, the author describes in vivid detail the two Edinburghs
in which the Deacon lived his double life, the developing capital city of lawyers and
landed gentry, cheek by jowl with the lurid underworld of thieves and whores. Nearly a
century later Robert Louis Stevenson, who had himself experlenced both worlds from his
parent's elegant New Town house to the drinking dens of the Cowgate and Grassmarket, found
inspiration for his monstrous creation, Edward Hyde, in the story of Deacon Brodie.
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