After having finished reading the novel, my favourite thing about American Psycho is decidedly the unique insight into Patrick Bateman as a character where his perception, thoughts, actions, and mental state is so much more interesting than any other character I have read about. Personally, I tend to read books where the characters are relatable, familiar, and comfortable. Patrick Bateman is none of these things, which makes the whole American Psycho experience so interesting. My favourite thing about this book is the narrative consistency about such an emotionally inconsistent narrator, since there are so many consistently recurring motifs that perfectly encapsulate Bateman's character. Once I finished reading the book, I watched the movie. I was excited to see how the book could be translated into a movie and to compare that with the version that played out in my head. At last, I can conclude that, although the movie portrayed the story well, the movie simply does no justice
If I had time, I would have written a more in-depth analysis of Bateman's interpretation of reality. But since I am so busy right now, this will be a short post about the epiphany I had that will conclude my psycho-analysis of Patrick Bateman. Patrick Bateman is a psychopath because his only source of experiencing anything real is through extreme means. All this to say, Bateman is a victim of his perception of reality, which could be the result of a mental illness like schizophrenia, with which reality is difficult to comprehend. In any case, Bateman is seeking for some escape from the pain in his life, whether that is feeling loved, finding his identity, or some other void that he needs to fill. The reason why Bateman is able to carry out these inhumane acts is because he does not consider the consequences to be real. For example, while in the middle of torturing a woman, he thinks, "This is my reality. Everything outside this is like some movie I once saw" (Easton