Ten of the best acts of cannibalism

A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift

The horror and the jokiness of imagined cannibalism combined. Swift published the pamphlet anonymously and let his unnamed "projector" persuade any right-thinking person that there was a ready cure for the twin evils of starvation and over-population in Ireland: get the Irish to eat their babies. Recipe details follow.

Titus Andronicus by Shakespeare

The Bard's most murder-filled play has Titus revenging himself upon Tamora, Queen of the Goths, in the nastiest manner. She has arranged the murder of his sons and the rape and mutilation of his daughter, so he has reasons to be cross. He slits the throats of her two sons and, dressed as a cook, feeds them to her in a pie, before killing her.

Thyestes by Seneca

Is this where Shakespeare got the idea? Atreus, King of Mycenae, plots revenge against his brother Thyestes, who has seduced his wife. He kills Thyestes's sons, hacks up the bodies, and then gets to work in the kitchens. A horrified messenger tells us, "Some of the flesh is fixed on spits and, set before slow fires, hangs dripping; other parts boiling waters tosses in heated kettles". Thyestes eats heartily, before Atreus lists the ingredients.

Inferno by Dante

Nothing jokey about the consumption of human meat in Dante's hell. Count Ugolino's enemy, Archbishop Ruggieri, incarcerated him and his children and left them to starve to death. In desperation, Ugolino ate the flesh of his children. In hell he is condemned to gnaw Ruggieri's skull for all eternity.

Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe

Our hero never gets angrier than when he discovers cannibals feasting on the beach. First he throws up, then he shoots them. Man Friday is their intended meal, but having rescued him, Crusoe finds that he too is a cannibal. Naturally Crusoe converts him to a Christian diet.

The Coral Island by RM Ballantyne

This classic boys' adventure repeats the Robinson Crusoe scenario, but this time with a group of teenage chaps. Shipwrecked on a South Sea island, they have to dodge sharks and pirates, but most scarily encounter cannibals, whose grim feasting they witness in horror. Like Crusoe, they persuade some of the savages to reform.

Typee by Herman Melville

Melville's debut novel was taken to be a traveller's true tale when it was first published. The Typees are a tribe of cannibals living in the islands of the South Seas. The narrator, Tommo, and his shipmate, Toby, abscond from their whaling ship and go to live with them. The Typees are generous and civilised - but occasionally they do indeed eat people. When they have a cannibalistic beano after a battle has provided rich fare, Tommo decides to head home.

Black Mischief by Evelyn Waugh

Basil Seal travels to the invented African country of Azania, where an old Oxford chum has become emperor. Basil has an affair with the British ambassador's daughter, but inadvertently eats her when she is served up stewed at a funeral feast. Some critics have thought it Waugh's revenge on his unfaithful first wife.

Aiding and Abetting by Muriel Spark

Muriel Spark's satire features two men who claim to be Lord Lucan. Both end up taking refuge in central Africa, where a tribal chief is so persuaded by the Christian eucharist that he enacts his own version. He has the real Lucan killed, then cooked and eaten by the tribe's male children.

American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis 

Ellis's succè s de scandale is narrated by a Manhattan investment banker who loves to describe the many murders he commits. With his taste for torture and mutilation, we know it cannot be long before we get some cannibalism, and indeed he soon turns to chewing on his victims.