RARA-AVIS: Highsmith is good for you
michael david sharp (msharp@umich.edu)
Sat, 21 Feb 1998 15:24:58 -0500 (EST)
You may be right, Bill. I may have to defend Highsmith in the
classroom. I
certainly had to defend Dorothy Hughes when we read Ride The
Pink Horse a
couple of weeks ago. While Humbert Humbert certainly had a
driving force,
a motivation behind his hilarious/insane/criminal behavior, I'm
not sure
L. Ford does. All of these characters (Ripley included) have
palpable
revulsion toward most of humanity -- I think misanthropy is the
best
word for it, though it's a perspective which, as I say, we are
invited
to share (at least partially) in each case. As for Ripley's
repressed
queerness . . . I would buy that this is some 50s textbook case
of the
dangers of sexual inversion, except that I think Highsmith
isn't that
cheap. I think she turns the homicidal faggot thing on its ear,
giving
his hostility toward the banalities of straightness (evident in
all his
assessments of Marge and Dickie -- what a name) a strange
righteousness.
Tom is not the evil closing in on the hero/heroine, as the
queer of
crime fiction and film often is. He's some kind of symbol of
modern
alienation, one whom we can pity, hate, admire -- meant to
inspire not
revulsion but ambivalence. I think we're even supposed to root
for him.
I know I do. Now that I think of it, Ford seems more clearly
drawn from a
psych text book than Ripley (perhaps bec. Thompson makes it
clear that
Ford devoured such books). I'm left feeling pretty bad for
Marge, though,
who I think is the most genuinely sympathetic character in the
story (even
if Ripley does hate her).
ps speaking of homosexuality: just taught "Human Interest
Stuff," by
Halliday (in *Hard-Boiled*, Adrian and Pronzini), and am
convinced more
than ever that that is the gayest crime story ever written.
Hilariously
so. I've never seen a more brazen use of sexual metaphor and
double
entendre in a pulp story. It's brilliant. Brilliant.
MDS
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Michael D. Sharp Email: msharp@umich.edu
Department of English Lang. and Lit. Phone: (313)
761-8776
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor Fax: (313) 763-3128
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