Patricia Highsmith – Carol's Notebook

Author: Patricia Highsmith

Patricia Highsmith (January 19, 1921 – February 4, 1995) was an American novelist and short story writer best known for her psychological thrillers, including her series of five novels based on the character of Tom Ripley. She wrote 22 novels and numerous short stories throughout her career, and her work has led to more than two dozen film adaptations. Her writing derived influence from existentialist literature, and interrogated notions of identity and popular morality. She was dubbed “the poet of apprehension” by novelist Graham Greene.

Her first novel, Strangers on a Train, has been adapted for stage and screen numerous times, notably by Alfred Hitchcock in 1951. Her 1955 novel The Talented Mr. Ripley has been adopted numerous times for film, theatre, and radio. Writing under the pseudonym “Claire Morgan,” Highsmith published the first lesbian novel with a happy ending, The Price of Salt, republished 38 years later as Carol under her own name and later adapted into a 2015 film.

I did see the movie version of The Talented Mr. Ripley starring Matt Damon back when, so I had some vague idea of what I was getting into with the novel, but I didn't honestly remember much. Tom Ripley is probably a sociopath. He conveniently leaves murder off his list. He is definitely an expert manipulator and liar, lacks a conscience, is obsessive, and has difficulty with personal relationships. He is sent to Italy by a wealthy man with the intent of convincing the man's son to return to America. Needless to say, that does not happen. He spends some time playing the rich American, sight-seeing, eating, hanging out with his new friend, Dickie Greenleaf, and Dickie's maybe girlfriend Marge, who Tom clearly doesn't like. He wants Dickie to himself and sees Marge as an obstacle to that. We see the world through Tom Ripley's eyes, which is fascinating and disturbing. Everything he does is logical, given his reasoning. He has...

There are some classics that I wonder why it has taken me so long to get around to. Strangers on a Train by Patricia Highsmith is one of those. It's a dark, psychological thriller that shows anyone can be capable of murder, given the right, or wrong, circumstances. As the blurb states, Guy Haines and Charles Anthony Bruno meet on a train. Guy tells Bruno the story of his problems with his wife, who he wants to divorce but who is putting up obstacles left and right, even though she's pregnant with another man's child. Bruno, meanwhile, tells Guy about his meany dad and suggests they trade murders. Guy declines, he's basically a good guy after all, but he fails to realize that Bruno is an alcoholic psychopath, who, after killing Guy's wife, expects Guy to follow through with his end of the deal. That's where the bulk of the novel, and tension lies. Bruno is manipulative and black-mailing; Guy never knows...