Red Dragon
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| Red Dragon | |
 First US hardback edition cover |
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| Author | Thomas Harris |
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| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Series | Hannibal Lecter |
| Genre(s) | Thriller |
| Publisher | G.P. Putnams, Dell Publishing (USA) |
| Publication date | October 1981 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 480 pp (first edition, hardback) |
| ISBN | ISBN 0-399-12442-X (first edition, hardback) |
| Followed by | The Silence of the Lambs |
Red Dragon is a mystery thriller novel written by Thomas Harris featuring the brilliant psychiatrist and serial killer Dr. Hannibal Lecter. It was originally published in 1981, but found a new audience in the early 1990s after the success of its sequel, The Silence of the Lambs. The title refers to a painting by William Blake, "The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed with the Sun" (though Harris describes the similar painting, "The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed in Sun"). It was adapted in 1986, as the critically well-received but unpopular Michael Mann film, Manhunter, which has since gained cult status. After the success of the sequel The Silence of the Lambs, in which Anthony Hopkins won an Oscar for the Lecter role, Red Dragon was made again as Brett Ratner's Red Dragon. Anthony Hopkins reprised as Dr. Lecter.
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[edit] Plot introduction
Red Dragon is the second book in the Lecter saga. It was written first and comes second in chronologic order; Hannibal Rising documents Hannibal Lecter's life before Red Dragon. While this is the second novel to feature Lecter, the book places its central focus on the characters of Will Graham and Francis Dolarhyde.
[edit] Plot summary
Will Graham is called out of retirement by the FBI to help track down a serial killer known to law enforcement agencies and the press only as "The Tooth Fairy," who has murdered two families. Graham retired after being nearly killed by the serial killer Hannibal Lecter, who was subsequently captured in the process. Graham turns to Lecter for help in tracking down The Tooth Fairy. However, Graham discovers that Lecter is manipulating not only him but also the man he is hunting.
The relationship between Lecter and Graham parallels the relationship between Lecter and Clarice Starling in the later books, but here there are different overtones. Lecter treats Starling as an unworthy student but Graham as a fellow professional (though not an equal). Lecter's acceptance of Graham does not stop at the being "professional" level, but extends further into the overlapping realm between Graham's and Lecter's psyches.
A complication in the investigation is Freddy Lounds, a tabloid reporter who once ran afoul of Graham during the Lecter case and is now dogging him to get the story on The Tooth Fairy. The Tooth Fairy is Francis Dolarhyde. Dolarhyde, an avid reader of Lounds's paper, The National Tattler, is displeased with what Lounds writes about him, and murders him after torturing Lounds for several hours.
Dolarhyde meets Reba McClane, a blind co-worker at Gateway Processing Services, where Dolarhyde's work gives him access to the home movies which the company develops for direct consumers and for local camera stores. Dolarhyde and McClane begin a romantic relationship. Dolarhyde's newfound love conflicts with his homicidal urges, which manifest themselves in his mind as a separate personality he calls "The Great Red Dragon," after the famous painting The Great Red Dragon and the Women Clothed in the Sun by William Blake, a painting that Dolarhyde is profoundly obsessed with. Posing as a researcher, Dolarhyde enters the Brooklyn Museum, beats a museum secretary unconscious, and eats the original Blake watercolour of The Red Dragon which is kept there. Dolarhyde believes that if he consumes the Dragon, he can stop killing and pursue a normal relationship with McClane.
After Lecter gives Dolarhyde Graham's address in code (through the personal advertisements in The Tattler), thus endangering Graham and his family, Graham becomes obsessed with the case, eventually realizing that the killer knew the layout of his victims' houses from their home videos, which he only could have seen if he worked for Gateway. Sensing that he is about to be caught, Dolarhyde goes to see McClane one last time, but he finds her talking to a co-worker, Ralph Mandy. Enraged, Dolorhyde kills Ralph Mandy, kidnaps McClane and, having taken her to his house, sets the place on fire. He apparently intends to kill her and then himself, but finds himself unable to shoot her. After Dolarhyde apparently shoots himself, McClane escapes.
It transpires that Dolarhyde had not shot himself, but merely the body of Arnold Lang, a service station attendant who had offended Dolarhyde previously. Dolarhyde had killed the attendant earlier that day and returned to his house with the body and a tow truck, which he uses to make his getaway. Dolarhyde pursues Graham to his home, and attacks Graham's family. Dolarhyde gains the upper hand and is about to kill Graham when Graham's wife, Molly, strikes him with an aluminium fishing rod, embedding a barbed hook into his cheek, before finally shooting him several times in the face. Having been permanently scarred by Dolarhyde through Lecter's machinations, Graham convalesces in a hospital thinking about Molly, who plans on leaving him. Graham's mentor at the FBI, Jack Crawford, intercepts a letter sent by Lecter congratulating Graham on his victory and destroys it.
[edit] Characters in Red Dragon
- Will Graham
- Jack Crawford
- Francis Dolarhyde
- Hannibal Lecter
- Reba McClane
- Freddy Lounds
- Molly Graham
- Ralph Mandy
[edit] Themes
One of the main themes covered in the book is Will Graham's struggle with his own nature: specifically, his ability to think and feel like a serial killer. Will's greatest fear is that he differs from the likes of Lecter and Dolarhyde by only the slim barrier erected by personal choice; that he is really a deranged and demented being who chooses to engage in an eternal standoff with his darker impulses. This ability (or inability) to have final dominance over one's impulses is what Dolarhyde sought to establish by eating the Blake painting.
It is no accident that Lecter calls Dolarhyde "Pilgrim". Yet, where Lecter is base and primal in his communications with Dolarhyde ("You're very beautiful"), he behaves in a cultured, refined manner in his dealings with Graham. Lecter symbolizes a midpoint between the two journeyman "monsters": Dolarhyde, who is at a "less-evolved" state where he still acts solely to satiate his impulses, and Graham, who instead fights his darker nature and uses it to hunt those who would not share his fight. Lecter, who has chosen to rationalize and intellectualize his actions by killing only the rude and incompetent, seems to harbor an affinity towards Graham, perhaps because of their similar backgrounds in academia and their mutual disdain for 'irrational' killing, but most likely because Graham's decision is based on choice. Dolarhyde, in believing he has no choice in the matter, exhibits weaker mental fortitude, and thus places himself below Graham in Lecter's eyes.
A key moment in this storyline occurs when Graham tries to goad Lecter into helping him catch the Dragon. Graham suggests it would be an opportunity to prove that Lecter is smarter than the emerging Dragon character. Lecter proves himself capable of meeting Graham's challenge, ruining both Dolarhyde and Graham, having set the two against each other. Dolarhyde leaves Graham with a permanent disfigurement, something Graham's mind will be hard-pressed to ignore as a sort of "mark of the beast", a reminder of what he is. Harris foreshadows Graham's fate during Lecter and Graham's exchange on the Tooth Fairy's self-loathing and disfigurement. Lecter accomplishes all of this on a whim while incarcerated in a maximum security facility.
Lecter's wit and charm, his ability to toy with people and to remain a serious threat even while imprisoned and heavily restrained and the obvious fear he evokes through this, were all used by Harris to create a dark mystique and infamy around the Lecter character, which Harris highlights by refusing to ever directly mention the nature of Lecter's crimes or his exact methods of murder. This leaves the reader with the challenge of reconciling the debonair and affluent, if evidently sadistic character whom they are introduced to through the narrative, with the psychotic mass-murderer perception Harris deliberately builds up around the character of Dr. Lecter, but never in his presence. It was these qualities and their contrast with the usual slasher-story method of totally dehumanizing the killer through excruciating explication which made the Lecter character such a show-stealer, and set the stage for that character to become the subject-in-his-own-right of the now world-famous "Hannibal Lecter" series of books which have inspired the blockbuster films.
[edit] Editions
The original hardcover and paperback editions mentioned Hannibal being held in the "Chesapeake" hospital. After the publication of the sequel, The Silence of the Lambs, one reprint of Red Dragon has the name of the hospital changed to the "Baltimore" hospital in order to maintain continuity with the sequel. In all following editions, the name is changed back to "Chesapeake".
[edit] Adaptations
- The first film, released in 1986 under the title Manhunter, was written and directed by Michael Mann and focused on FBI Special Agent Will Graham, played by William Petersen. Lecter (renamed Lecktor) was played by Brian Cox.
- The second film, which used the title Red Dragon, appeared in 2002. Directed by Brett Ratner and written by Ted Tally (who also wrote the screenplay for The Silence of the Lambs), it starred Edward Norton as Graham and Anthony Hopkins as Lecter.
- Michael Mann, after directing Manhunter, produced an episode of Miami Vice, 'Shadow In The Dark,' that is a loose adaptation of this tale. Crockett and Tubbs (having been transferred to homicide duties) pursue an eerie cat burglar. Crockett attempts to predict the thief’s moves by trying to think like him. However, Crockett and Tubbs can only succeed in apprehending him after getting help from the former lead investigator of the case. They visit him in the mental institution he was remanded to after becoming mentally deranged (because he also tried to project himself into the mind of the bizarre burglar). After benefiting from the mad man’s help and insight, they catch the intruder.
- Thomas Harris’ own The Silence of the Lambs is itself a reworking of this story: Both serial killers have a strong self-loathing and kill to facilitate a “transformation” into something they feel is more powerful than their current state. Both protagonists must visit Lecter to gain insight to catch the killer. Both protagonists are tasked only with helping to track the killer at large, not apprehending him. However, both end up catching the killer single-handed after a lethal confrontation that results in the killer being fatally shot.
[edit] External links
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| Novels Red Dragon • The Silence of the Lambs |
Main Characters |
Films Manhunter • The Silence of the Lambs • Hannibal |
| Secondary Characters List of minor characters in the Hannibal series |
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