Published February 18, 2010

“This is a history of the most dangerous imagination of the last half of the twentieth century.” During her presentation and Q&A in LL 502 on Feb. 3 on her new book “The Talented Miss Highsmith,” biographer Joan Schenkar repeated this phrase to emphasize how unusual her chosen subject was. According to Schenkar, Patricia Highsmith, the author of “Strangers on a Train” and creator of the famous Ripley character from works such as “The Talented Mr. Ripley,” was constantly staging murders in her head, such as that of her stepfather, but would never have murdered anyone else due to her fear of the sight of blood.

Immediately, she tells her audience that Highsmith is not a typical writer, and it only gets more interesting after that.

Highsmith’s imagination is dangerous because it is unique, and yet reflective of a reality where not every murder is solved. To clarify what she meant, Schenkar stated that “[Ripley] was the first American criminal who was successful in his work.” Ripley succeeds despite the fact that in most crime and noir stories, the criminals are punished for their actions in order to establish a sense of justice. By getting away with murder, Ripley defies readers’ expectations of karma in fiction, that a bad act has to lead to death, physical prison, or prison of the mind. It takes a truly unique mind to defy conventions and a dangerous one to go against the standards of society

While Highsmith lived in a time where homosexuality was never mentioned by name, she was apparently well known for seducing several women in cities like New York. Of note is the fact that Schenkar says that she was both “lesbian and misogynist.” Perhaps this is why, when Schenkarwas asked what Highsmith had to say about gay rights, her answer was a simple “Nothing.” However, she did write “The Price of Salt” (under a pseudonymn), a lesbian romance which is the only book of Highsmith’s that does not have a murder. Of it, Schenkar said it was the “only book in which Highsmith chose to write… as a woman.” Crime writers tend to be men as “darkness has never been the province of women writers,” so writing an unusual lesbian romance was seen as more normal for Highsmith.

Although Schenkar obviously knows a great deal about Highsmith (she even says she knows her better than her friends did), she never actually met her. Her knowledge is simply the result of almost eight years of research. Lenny Cassuto, associate professor of English, said in his introduction, “Just immersing yourself does not mean that you can emerge to tell the tale,” but Schenkar’s book has received very positive reviews, which suggests that the time was well spent. Schenkar said that she “had to write an entirely new form of biography” centered around Highsmith’s obsessions in order to tell a well structured tale. This was obviously a labor of love despite the fact that Highsmith was anti-Semitic and Schenkar is Jewish and had to read her hateful comments in her diaries. Through an interesting presentation, Schenkar was able to stir up interest for her new book even for audience members that were only slightly familiar with Highsmith.