Some people don't realize what's really happening in front of them, no matter how obvious it may seem to others. In the case of HH Holmes, it's able to lie and charm to make people trust him so that he can get away with murder by Erik Larson, the author presents his audience with the thoughts of both Holmes and of his victims, clouding the mind. light of perfection Holmes creates with the dark reality of his true intentions to allow readers to see how the ignorance of his victims allows his evil ways to hide beneath the good they cannot see. further. Say no to plagiarism. wrote an essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay Larson gives his readers a glimpse into the mind of Holmes to allow them to compare what he says and what he feels. truly in the first known murder presented in In the novel, Larson tells his audience that Holmes "knew he possessed great power over Julia... [He] now possessed her as fully as if she were an antebellum slave, and delighted in her possession" (146). The reader can tell that Holmes believes he dominates Julia, that she is not in control of what he will do to her. This is scary for the audience as they now see that Holmes is quite crazy. Holmes not only possesses these women, but sees them as objects. Larson titles one of his chapters "The Acquisition of Minnie" (198) to tell how Holmes seduced Minnie so he could kill her. He uses the same word “acquired” to describe how Holmes “acquired high-quality furnishings” (198) for his hotel. This directly compares Minnie to an inanimate piece of furniture, showing how Holmes sees these women as objects to be purchased with charm, gifts, and false love. Larson hopes that his audience will think poorly of Holmes because of the way he thinks of these women; he hopes they can easily see through Holmes' fake comedies and uncover his true psychopathic plans. Larson also mentions some very disturbing details about Julia's murder. He tells us how Holmes finds it “particularly exciting” (148) when Julia begins to react, and how “the sensation, as always, was pleasant and induced a warm languor in him, like the feeling he felt after sitting too long in front of a hot stove” (148-149). Larson allows his readers to see how Holmes gets this soothing sexual relief by smothering this poor woman he lied to and lied to so he could kill her. He hopes to disgust readers with this description and cause them to see Holmes in a negative light. This way, when they see what these women think, they realize the tricks Holmes plays and how he clouds the truth with his charm, taking advantage of the fact that these women are too ignorant, hypnotized by Holmes, to see the dangerous truth. Holmes' victims are so mesmerized that they don't realize how dangerous he truly is, Larson lets his audience enter the minds of some of Holmes' victims, one of whom is Georgiana Yoke. The audience feels that “they had never met anyone like him. He was handsome, eloquent, and clearly wealthy” (Larson 307). I am able to see what Georgiana truly believes that Holmes is a wonderful man. Because Larson reveals this point of view to the audience, they are able to compare it to Holmes' point of view and see how easily he deceived these women and got away with it. Another girl, Anna, was suspicious of Holmes until she met him and "his warmth, his smile, and his obvious affection for Minnie made [her] suspicions quickly vanish" (Larson 264). “Holmes was truly a manfascinating. And now that Anna knew him, she saw that he was actually quite handsome” (Larson 292). Something about him has led her, like many before her, to lower her guard and not question his actions, no matter how skeptical they appear to the reader. The audience, however, is able to realize that when Holmes invites her to his hotel, alone, something bad will happen. It is especially clear that Holmes intends to kill Ana when he asks her into his vault and "blithely, she [ obeys]" (294). He trusts Holmes so much; she is so fascinated by its perfection that the thought of danger never crosses her mind. These women, so fascinated and trusting of Holmes, let their guard down and walk towards death, but they don't see it that way. The only reason the audience can see the danger is because Larson reveals Holmes' point of view to them. Since the public is aware of Holmes' tricks, these women appear to be responsible for their deaths because they should have seen it coming. It's not entirely their fault though, as Holmes charms them to gain their trust, causing them to ignore his true intentions. It is so obvious to the reader because Larson allows his audience to see inside both the minds of Holmes and his victims, getting both points of view of situations and always being aware of what is really about to happen while the others remain innocent . No matter what Holmes does, the people around him never suspect him of shady dealings. He is so narcissistically confident that when he hires Charles Chappell to transform a murdered body into a skeleton, the man thinks nothing of the corpse on the table that "looked like that of a rabbit that had been skinned by splitting the flesh." skin along the face and rolling it away from the entire body” (Larson 151). Larson informs his audience that the body did not bother Chappell, "because [he] knew Holmes was a doctor" (151). The man was easily fooled into thinking that Holmes was simply dissecting the body for research purposes. Holmes, as convincing as he is, was able to let someone enter his torture chamber, see a skinless corpse, and still have no suspicion of Holmes. Larson makes sure to include details about the body so the audience sees how obvious it was to us, knowing Holmes, that he had killed this person, and Chappell didn't notice anything like his audience did. Larson also includes Chappell's reasoning for not thinking anything of the corpse; Chappell knew Holmes was a doctor, so it was perfectly normal to have a dismantled corpse lying on a table in a hotel basement. The audience realizes this isn't right just because Larson gave them a glimpse into Holmes' mind; these viewers are completely unaware of the murders literally in front of them. Even for a victim it is not obvious that he is about to be killed. In Anna's case, after Holmes locks her in the vault, she still doesn't believe he's a bad guy. She “imagined that [Holmes], unaware of her situation, had gone elsewhere in the building” (Larson 295). She thought this would “explain why he still hadn't come despite his blows” (Larson 295). In this hypnotized state of mind Holmes has trapped her using his charm and devious seduction, she is unable to understand what is really happening. The audience knows what's really about to happen thanks to a glimpse into Holmes' mind. If the audience didn't have a general idea of what goes on in Holmes' mind, they might not have realized that she was about to be killed. Since Larson gave them the opposite point of view, however, they are able to tell that this woman is about to be killed. The public sees how little.
tags