Characteristic of Murder Scenes in Literature - Case Study Example

The following work analyzes two murder scenes, one of which is extracted from chapter forty-five of Perfume, a novel written by Patrick Süskind, and the other from chapter eleven of Thérèse Raquin, one of Emile Zola’s most famous literary works. In Perfume, Grenouille, the main character, murders a young girl in order to extract her scent which forms the ultimate ingredient required to successfully create his exquisite perfume. The enchanting odour of this perfume would serve Grenouille’s goals as it would make him hypnotize people.On the other hand, in Thérèse Raquin,Thérèse ,an adulterous wife, gives her consent to Laurent, her lover, to kill her own husband,Camille,as he’s the osbtacle standing against their mariage. The similarities between the two scenes are mostly based on the fact that both are ones of murder. Fear for example is an emotion that the protagonists of both scenes experience. Although Grenouille has managed to maintain his calm during and after the murdering process, the fear element still existed. The sound of the blow is what got him scared or even more the possibility of hearing an echo to this sound. When it comes to Camille’s murder scene, fear plays a prominent role. Throughout the scene, Thérèse’s panic went gradual. It started by an unexplained anxiety that preceded the murder. During the murdering process, that anxiety turned into a nervous breakdown that eventually led to her losing consciousness. The panic that this young woman felt was expressed by many physical evidences: ‘’her lower limbs were trembling with anxiety. ‘’, ‘’ The young woman turned horribly pale ‘’and ‘’ bursting into sobs, and falling to the ground.. ‘’.These descriptions are revealing of the character of madame Raquin.She strikes us as a woman who is torn between her love and her conscience.Her fear is explainable however as it is normal for any woman in her situation to feel such feeling. When it comes to the victim, Camille, his fear is mixed with a feeling of shock and one of denial. All that mixture of feelings prevented him from expressing himself .His reaction is also revealing of his nature. On one hand, he appears to be a man who has an unlimited confidence in his wife and his friend. On the other hand, he seems to be a gullible person who fails to understand the visible signs exchanged by Therese and Laurent proving they are planning for something. Fear in both scenes influenced the protagonists’ behaviour. In Perfume, Grenouille, being scared of losing any of the victim’s scent, finishes all his work in a few minutes. That explains the rapidity of the rhythm that the execution followed. The abundance of action verbs in the scene "cut, pulled, tossed, lifted, tugged, rolled, packed, tied up, pressed" is revealing of Grenouille’s character. He seems to be determined as well as materialistic. He is scared for the perfume but doesn’t think of the victim or even fear being caught by the police. The rapidity of action is also one trait in common between the two scenes. In Thérèse Raquin, Laurent managed to commit his crime in a relatively brief time. His quick reaction after the murder proves how afraid he was of being caught. Laurent, "without losing a second", managed to regain his calm and to successfully convince the other party of sailors that it was only an accident that caused Camille’s death. Apart from the fear by the main characters, another important element links between the two scenes which is Violence. Any murder scene is normally more or less violent. The way Grenouille dealt with the corpse is the main source of violence in the scene extracted from Perfume. He wouldn’t hesitate before cutting her nightgown with scissors and scalping her head without giving any sign of compassion. The comparison "[..]rolled her up in it as a baker rolls strudel" illustrates his inhuman way of dealing with the corpse. The violence of the scene is highlighted by the considerable number of body parts mentioned in it : “mouth, armpits, breasts, genitals, feet, shins, ..etc.” In the other scene, violence was integrated in the killing process. Laurent used no weapons to kill his victim, he just counted on his physical power by managing to throw Camille off the skiff. That kind of executions must be accompanied by violence. Indeed, both Laurent and Camille had to physically confront each other, the latter being forced to defend himself by violently biting his aggressor. There are other resemblances between the two scenes concerning their circumstances and the atmosphere surrounding the crimes committed in them. The two scenes take place at night. The weather in both scenes reflects death in different ways. In Thérèse Raquin’s scene, "The country, scorched by the ardent beams of summer, feels death coming with the first cold winds». Same with the one from Perfume, the absolute calmness that reigns in the scene that inspires death; even the wind has “died away”. When it comes to the victims of both scenes, the two of them happened to be asleep before the crime is committed. Food is part of the two scenes. On one hand, Grenouille decides to eat the biscuits he found in his victim’s nightgown. On the other hand, the last thing the triangle Laurent, Camille and Thérèse did before crime took place was ordering food from the restaurant. The two scenes are taken from two different contexts, that explains why many differences between the two scenes can be pointed out. In Perfume, the motivation of Grenouille is grudge. He is committing this crime to be able to get the scent that will cause people to accept him for he has always been rejected by others. With Thérèse and Laurent, what motivates the crime is desire. Camille’s death is the price they have to pay to get married and spend their lives together. In other words, the murder took place in Perfume to take advantage of the victim when in Thérèse Raquin it did to eliminate an obstacle. The protagonists of the two scenes are nothing alike. Grenouille is a professional murderer who committed many similar crimes prior the one in this scene. He even compares this murder to a previous one. Logically, he has everything planned in advance and doesn’t do any mistakes. It appears to be more of a ‘’performance’’ than an execution. On the other hand, the crime Laurent committed came as a fruit of the instant without any previous intention from his side or Thérèse’s. It is the first time they are involved in such situation. That explains Therese’s nervous breakdown throughout the scene. The two crimes happened in very different circumstances. In perfume, the crime took place in a house more specifically in a bedroom. The crime scene in Therese Raquin was water ,the murder was executed in open air as they were taking a skiff in the Seine river. The number of persons is unequal in the two scenes. In perfume’s murder scene ,there was just one murderer and one victim when in Thérèse Raquin, there was three persons in the scene. The difference between the two victims Laure and Camille is considerable. The first is a young beautiful female with a hypnotizing natural scent, the second is a deformed man that inspires reject and disrespect to his entourage. Their state during the crime was also not the same. Laure wasn’t aware when she was murdered. On the contrary, Camille faced his destiny and even resisted to it before he fails to defend himself. In both scenes a clear description of the emotional state of the protagonists was offered to the reader. Grenouille’s crime was described in an extremely calm tone proving the absence of any human feelings in that man’s heart. The attitude of Grenouille towards his own crime is curious. He feels proud of committing it and describes it as ‘’holy’’. Instead of thinking of the future consequences of his criminal act like any murderer would do, he spends the post-crime time remembering his past through a ‘’flashback’’. His ecstasy being almost surreal is relevant of how complicated he is on the psychological level.He finds pleasure and joy in causing others to suffer. In Thérèse Raquin,the emotions felt by the protagonist was exactly the opposite of those by Grenouille. The scene is charged with human emotions and contradictions. Clear signs of regret can be noticed in Therese’s behaviour. She seems to be fighting her conscience and failing to calm it. The first thing they think about after committing the crime is how to get away with it. Finally, the two scenes end in two very different tones. It was the scent ,the word repeated twice, that closed the chapter extracted from Perfume proving that it is the unique concern of everything that happened. On the contrary, Zola chose to finish his chapter with a human note in the following sentence: “It was the boating men who sat down to the dinner prepared for Camille.".This sentence seems to be sarcastic however it evokes a feeling of bitterness. Every crime is motivated by a given desire. It can be love like in Thérèse Raquin or power and like in Perfume. Other than the common murder act and some additional secondary details, the two scenes strike us as contradicting because of their different motivations and execution techniques. Ironically, another two contradicting murder scenes end both novels. When Thérèse and Laurent choose to commit suicide by taking a poison, Grenouille is to be violently murdered by some criminals. Sources: *Süskind, Patrick, Perfume. Translated from the German by John E. Woods: Penguin books, 1987 *Zola, Émile, Thérèse Raquin. Penguin group, 1867. Read More