RARA-AVIS: Re: RARA-AVIS Digest V2 #567
Thomas A. Jones (jonesta@wheat.mnsfld.edu)
Mon, 07 Dec 1998 13:45:35 -0500
I recently finished reading Patricia Highsmith's novel The
Talented Mr. Ripley
and I must say that I am having trouble seeing it as a Noire
book.
This is especially true when I think about Ripley himself. He
is supposed to
be characterized as cold and calculating, but he isn't. He is
extremely
emotional. He despises his friends in New York, he cries at the
Bon voyage basket
he is given, he stares in an envious rage at Dickie and Marge
kissing, and he
kills Dickie in a very emotional way (he beats him to death).
As a protagonist,
Ripley is pathetic. He doesn't have the inner strength of the
hard boiled
detectives, he doesn't have the icy coolness of Lou Ford, he
doesn't have the
utter desperation of Eddie in Shoot the Piano Player, and he
doesn't have the
passion of the lovers in the Postman. Yet he tries to be all of
them.
His motivations are also suspect. Lou Ford was sexually abused
by the family
housekeeper and distanced from his father for the rest of his
life. Eddie's, best
friend had an affair with his wife who later killed herself and
his brothers are
psychotic. Ripley was called gay in a hip New York nightclub
and his aunt treated
him poorly as a child. There seems to be a discrepancy
here.
The settings of the book are also completely different from
other Noire
stories. The settings are sunny beaches, famous European
cities, first class
hotels, French cafes and a cruise ship! Noire has always
suggested to me dark
seamy streets, the torrential downpours of Chandler's LA or the
bitter cold of
Goodis' Philadelphia.
As a noire novel, The Talented Mr. Ripley just doesn't seem to
have the
essential sort of characteristics that place a novel in the
noire category. It
left me with a bitter taste from having expected so much more,
but having received
so little.
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