Kathy Stuart, associate professor of history, delights in crime and deviance — her research specialty. Her research has inspired a period film, The Devil’s Bath, based on her latest research and book, Suicide by Proxy in Early Modern Germany: Crime, Sin and Salvation (Palgrave MacMillan, 2023). The new movie, like the book, deals with a practice common during two centuries in Western Europe, whereby suicidal people, predominantly women, would murder children, primarily. The heinous act originated, ironically, as a way to avoid hell. In lieu of killing themselves to escape their depression and lives of anguish — and face eternal damnation for the sin of suicide — they would kill a young child, punishable by execution. Before their execution they could receive absolution by a priest, repent, and ultimately ensure themselves a path to heaven instead. The practice, and the book, intersects with poor understandings of mental health and depression, particularly in women, religious practices and even accusations of witchcraft and demonic possession during the 17th and 18th centuries. The movie will premiere Feb. 20 at the Berlin International Film Festival, or Berlinale, in German, her native language. The annual festival is among the “Big Three” alongside the Venice Film Festival and Cannes Film Festival. Filmmakers hope to bring it to the United States in the near future, and Palgrave is reissuing the book in paperback in conjunction with the movie’s release.

Access the book at Springer Link 

Also available at Shields Library