7. The creation of A. J. Raffles helped define the British view of burglars
In 1898 E. W. Hornung, brother-in-law to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle created the character A. J. Raffles, a gentlemen and thief. Raffles proved instantly popular, appearing in short stories, novels, and eventually plays and motion pictures. In many ways, he resembled Sherlock Holmes, as a master in disguise, an adept user of the tools of crime, and as an astute judge of character. He has a male companion, who assists him in his many brilliant crimes and narrates them to the public. Raffles viewed burglary as a sport, a worthy challenge to his mental and physical abilities. As such, he steals only from the wealthy, more for the thrill of the act and the problem of eluding the police than for the money involved. Eventually, their crimes are exposed. Raffles fled the police and presumably drowned while his faithful companion and chronicler, Bunny Maunders, goes to prison.
Eventually Bunny reunites with Raffles, who did not drown, and the pair embark on another crime spree. The popularity of the criminal pair, with its allusions to Robin Hood, masculine superiority, and Sherlock Holmes, continued for decades. Raffles was the first of the gentlemen thieves who appear with regularity in literature and served as another example of why burglary remains in the realm of male pursuits. During the Victorian and subsequent Edwardian Ages, women’s issues remained at the forefront of societal and political discussion. Suffrage and equal rights arguments leaped from the front pages of newspapers. Those opposing both could not countenance the idea women were men’s equal in anything, that certain activities were solely within the purview of the male sex. Burglary appears to have been one of them.