The Talented Mr Ripley

Limitless Obsession, Self-Delusion and Greed

The Talented Mr Ripley by Patricia Highsmith introduces her famous antihero, Tom Ripley. He will continue his insidious tramp across Europe in four more novels — The Ripliad.

Tom Ripley is possibly the most profoundly unpleasant character you will ever encounter.

Synopsis

Thomas Ripley is a charming, intelligent and well-educated failure. He scratches a livelihood in 1950s New York by defrauding taxpayers, sponging off his friends and living in somebody else’s flat. Ripley is a man with one eye looking over his shoulder while the other is looking for a sucker.

Events take a turn for the better when he meets Herbert Greenleaf, the wealthy father of a distant acquaintance. Greenleaf asks him to travel to Europe and persuade his son to return to his family in the US.

So starts Tom’s all-expenses trip to Europe and his obsession with the millionaire’s son, Dickie Greenleaf. Ripley covets his looks, mannerisms, way of life and trust fund. What starts as an all-expenses-paid holiday ends in murder and a game of cat and mouse with the Italian police as Ripley strives to avoid their attention.

Review

Highsmith’s protagonist is a charming sociopath with a talent for mimicry. He despises everyone around him, is full of self-loathing, and is convinced of his superiority. Tom Ripley is a deeply unpleasant character. A man who believes the world owes him a living.

Highsmith’s pencil-sharp description of Ripley and his disdain for others propels both the book and the reader’s dislike of Ripley.

Marge was already dressed in slacks and a sweater, black corduroy slacks, well-cut and made to order, Tom supposed, because they fitted her gourdlike figure as well as pants possibly could.

The book is not a high-voltage read but an unyieldingly taut splinter of noir. It explores the unpleasant but scarily believable attitude and behaviour of an ineffective and selfish young man.

Tom Ripley won Highsmith notoriety and fortune in Europe, though less so in her native US. Americans appear to like their heroes to be a little more wholesome. The French director René Clément turned The Talented Mr Ripley into a film in 1960. It wasn’t until after Highsmith’s death that Hollywood turned it into a blockbuster.

Highsmith’s real achievement is that no matter how much you dislike Tom Ripley, you can’t help but wish he will succeed.

Excerpt

On another afternoon, he wrote a polite note to Aunt Dottie:

Dear Auntie [which he rarely called her in a letter and never to her face],
As you see by the stationary, I am on the high seas. An unexpected business offer which I cannot explain now. I had to leave rather suddenly, so I was not able to get up to Boston and I’m sorry, because it may be months or even years before I come back.
I just wanted you not to worry and not to send me any more cheques, thank you. Thank you very much for the last one of a month or so ago. I don’t suppose you have sent anymore since then. I am well and extremely happy.
Love,
Tom

No use sending her any good wishes about her health. She was a strong as an ox. He added:

P.S. I have no idea what my address will be, so I cannot give you any.

That made him feel better, because it definitely cut him off from her. He needn’t ever tell her where he was. No more of the snidely digging letters, the sly comparisons of him to his father, the piddling cheques for the strange sums of six dollars and forty-eight cents and twelve dollars and ninety-five, as if she had a bit leftover from her latest bill-paying, or taken something back to the store and had tossed the money to him, like a crumb. Considering what Aunt Dottie might have sent him, with her income, the cheques were an insult. And Dottie insisted that his upbringing had cost her more than his father had left in insurance, and maybe it had, but did she have to keep rubbing it in his face? Did anybody human keep rubbing a thing like that in a child’s face? Lots of aunts and even strangers raised a child for nothing and were delighted to do it.

After his letter to Aunt Dottie he got up and strode around the deck walking it off. Writing to her always made him feel angry. He resented the courtesy to her. Yet until now he’d always wanted her to know where he was, because he had always needed her piddling cheques. He had to write a score of letters about his changes of address to Aunt Dottie. But he didn’t need her money now. He would hold himself independent of it, forever.

The Talented Mr Ripley by Patricia Highsmith