Imperial Bedrooms by Bret Easton Ellis: October 2010

Saturday, October 23, 2010

American Psycho

!1: Now is the time American Psycho Order Today!

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Oct 23, 2010 17:00:10

The controversial novel about a handsome serial killer who moves among the young and trendy in 1980s New York.

!1: Best Buy I've heard in the blogosphere that there's been a resurgence of interest in American Psycho. Since I hadn't read the book when it first appeared, I thought I'd try it on this go-around. It is a darkly humorous novel and highly original in many respects, such as the narrator's propensity to describe in exquisite GQ detail other characters' attire--as refreshing and as bracing as the J&B the main character, the wealthy young Wall St. scion, Patrick Bateman, favors. It's not a typical 'American' novel and reminds me of Jim Thompson on steroids, with a dash of F. Scott Fitzgerald. There's alot of very detailed horrorific (and creative) killing, which alternates with comedy, like Bateman evading an hopeful homosexual paramour at Barney's. In a scene the movie did well, there is a hilarious panic attack brought on by the comparison of business cards, their quality of paper, their ink, and typeface.

The 'unreliable narrator' is played to the hilt: we don't really know if this is a 'real' person doing 'real' things, or a real crazy person, or a real crazy person doing 'real' things, etc. It's hard to believe a mass serial killer could rack up this number of victims even in NYC. That's part of a deeper inquiry--what really lies below the surfaces, like tastes in clothes or music, that makes people more deeply human, if anything.

But it's also subtle commentary on the American scene, or at least a slice of it, so to speak, in the late '80s, which is just as applicable today, hence, I suspect the resurgence in interest. Here we have crime hiding in plain sight, and nobody interested in doing much about it--as large a problem in the '80s as with the more recent derivatives-based scandals with characters like Madoff and such. Some elements are quite dated--such as the need to return videos to a store, or the references to 'hardbodies'--but that doesn't detract from the core update of Vanity Fair.

I'm also reminded of a recent article in the Times about the 'compassion deficit' that the wealthy can experience, as they feel that they become less and less connected to the same society as the rest of us. This concept was elaborated in a discussion of charitable giving, and how the wealthy give far less than the less well off as a percentage of income, and when they do give, it's usually to 'status' organizations.

How long can the unsustainable be sustained? There is no comeuppance for Bateman--though there is a hint, towards the end, which is weirdly prescient given 9/11: "History is sinking and only a very few seem dimly aware that things are getting bad. Airplanes fly low across the city, crossing in front of the sun."

Alas, the mendacious rich, as well as the poor, will always be with us. on Sale!