Conscience of a Killer

There is a theory regarding serial killers. Even the most gruesome murderer wants to be caught. The trademark mode of operation, the calling cards, the letters to the police and the press may not be just a few strokes of the ego. These tropes may be desperate cries to stop the cycle. Granted this is just one theory.

However, the guilt of the murderer plays an integral role in literature. For instance, in Edgar Allen Poe's The Tell Tale Heart, having slain his neighbor, a tenant hides the body under the floorboards. Meanwhile, police were informed of a scream during the night and interview the murderer. The man covers up by claiming the scream as his own. During that night he hears the beat of a heart, the heart he assumes to be that of the victim. This paranoia builds and builds. He is shocked the police do not hear the sound. Finally he confesses to the crime, the beating heart to loud to ignore. It turns out the heart beat he heard was his own, a manifestation of guilt.

Dostoevsky takes a similar approach. In Crime and Punishment, a young student murders his greedy landlady with an ax. However, an innocent woman walks in and in a panic he kills her as well. The guilt of this unintended murder haunts the young man, eating at his soul. Meanwhile, the investigator circle ever inward. The student meets a poor woman and falls in love. He finally turns himself in, atoning for his crimes by pursuing a Christian life and living out his sentence in peace.

The Brothers Karamazov is the story of four brothers dealing with the murder of their father. Each of the four sons has some motive for the murder save the next to youngest, Alyosha, who is pursuing a life of religion. Dmitri, The eldest son, is romantically involved with his father's mistress, and spending money liberally, seems the most likely. Ivan, the middle son, is a student and atheist whose cold logic appears to make no room for morality. It is this approach that inspires the youngest son, Pavel, an epileptic bastard, to confess to the murder. However, it is the student who feels the most guilt. This guilt manifests in hallucinations and poor health. At one point he imagines the devil speaking with him, undermining his atheistic beliefs.

Even in Fritz Lang's M, the murderer feels guilt for his crimes, or at least claims to. The spirits of the slain girls haunt his every moment, silenced only when he is in the act of pursuing, molesting, and killing. In his breakthrough performance, Peter Lorre brings a pathos to what is really a hateful, cowardly character - a child murderer. Whether the guilt he admits is real or not is left for the viewer to decide.

If we train our conscience well it will kiss us as it bites - Friedrich Nietzsche