Violence In American Psycho. Forms And Function

Seminar paper from the year 2015 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: 1,7, Bielefeld University (Linguistik und Literaturwissenschaft), language: English, abstract: Why was there such a public outcry about American Psycho? To add further dimensions to this question, this paper will try to provide a deeper insight on the functions of violence in American Psycho. To pursue that goal, this paper follows a certain structure: After providing background information on the author, historical context and also the creational process of the book itself, violence as portrayed in American Psycho will be analyzed. Therefore, a theoretical framework, which ascribes specific functions to certain forms of violence, will be created. In a second step, the forms of violence as presented in American Psycho will be discussed and classified on the basis of the previously constructed framework. After having found, named and classified distinct features of violence and their functions in the novel, it will be investigated to what extent the horror Bret Easton Ellis has created differs from traditional illustrations of violence and horror. The overarching question of this segment will be: What did Bret Easton Ellis do differently which would explain the audience’s intensive feeling of horror? The introductory hypothesis is that American Psycho was able to use violence on various levels and with multiple functions. Violence is not solely used to assign certain character traits to the protagonist and the society he lives in but also serves as vehicle to overcome the protagonist’s problems, namely anonymity of the cold-hearted world presented in the novel. Furthermore, violence also serves as a symbol for a constant and omnipresent threat, which creates the feeling of horror. Additionally, violence is also used as a provocation while simultaneously hinting at the absence of ethics, which then again turns out to be social criticism of the protagonist’s world. In addition to this, the horror Bret Easton Ellis creates unites well-known concepts, brands, locations, etc. and combines those with an, until then, unknown feature, namely irrational and thereby uncontrollable violence. This creates a feeling of realism which, together with the absences of ethics, moral judgment and rationality, leaves the reader behind in a more vulnerable state than solely explicit violence in a surreal setting. This hypothesis will be taken up by the end of the paper and will then be verified, falsified or further modified.