Behind the Murders

Type :

School essay

Pages :

3 pages

Format :

.doc

Published date :

01/03/2008

Category :

Philosophy & literature

Sub category :

Literature

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Summary :

History of Clive Wilkes
Clive's stay at the museum
History of Edward Skipperton
Skip's fued with Frosby
Motivations of Skip and Clive for the murders

Abstract

Patricia Highsmith's short stories exemplify her interpretation of the human condition. However, her stories tend to involve characters with very extreme emotional conditions which ultimately cause them take surprising actions, those being the typical climaxes of Highsmith short stories. In "Woodrow Wilson's Necktie", she tells of a teenage boy named Clive who enjoys visiting the local Waxworks Horror museum. After fulfilling a longing to stay overnight at the museum, Clive decides to perform what he thinks is another brilliant plan. He murders the museum workers and positions them around the museum displays in bizarre positions, after which to his irritation he is unsuccessful in convincing people that he committed the murders. In "Slowly, Slowly in the Wind", we meet Skip, a middle aged man who moves to the country in an effort to relax and rejuvenate after a heart attack. He inevitably enters into a feud with his neighbor over water rights and ends up killing him, disposing of the body in a peculiar way as well. Both men find satisfaction in committing the murders, but their intentions are different in various important ways. Skip, an extremely angry and competitive man, kills because he loses, while Clive, a young boy who doubts his own existence, kills for notoriety; both men take great pride in their deeds.