My opinion about the book

To be honest I decided to read that book after I saw the movie in TV. But I have to say that I’m not disappointed. When I started I had in my mind a picture of Matt Damon, Jude Law and Gwyneth Paltrow (because of the movie of course). But it was only a matter of time when I imagined my own Ripley or Dickie. I think it’s because of Highsmith’s greatness. Her book is a real piece of art. When I started reading I couldn’t stop!

For example a character of Tom Ripley. During reading I felt like I was in his head, in his mind. I saw things like he did. I even tried to understand his evil way of life. Why he did in that and no other way. I wanted him to succeed! Maybe it’s because I never like the good guys in the books. But I think that Ripley is not only a bad guy. He is the perfect one.

For me ‘The Talented Mr. Ripley’ is an incredible genius psychological thriller. The third-person narrator does not try to manipulate the reader in any way. He shows us the truth about Tom Ripley, his feelings, thoughts, and behavior. During the reading I felt that I was guilty as the Ripley was! For me it was something amazing and never-felt-before.

For example when Marge is in Venice and she’s a Tom’s guest. I wanted her to go to hell! Immediately! She had nervous me so much. And Tom felt the same about her…I was reading and I was very, very curious if he murder her or not. When he didn’t I felt a little disappointment…

The power of that novel is great and amazing. I have never thought that book can do something like that with me. Who is right in one's mind and wants murderer to be happy and has a good life? Nobody! But I supposed that it was something, what Patricia Highsmith really wanted. That her book’s main character, even is he bad and he is supposed to be catch by the police and judge, is the favourite one of readers. They don’t like pretty boy Dickie Greenleaf, who is too sweet, too pretty and to rich. Or Marge, who is too serious, too much in love with Dickie, too normal.

That was in my case. I don’t know if you like thrillers but that one is different than all you may have read in your life. In this one you will meet the talented Mr. Ripley.

The Talented Mr. Ripley movie trailer

The Book

New York City. Tom Ripley, 23 year old man without job, friends, family. Lives as a layer and dishonest guy. He has great ambitious but no opportunity...until he meets Mr. Greenleaf, a desperate older man, who mistook Tom with friend of his son Dickie. Greenleaf hires Ripley to go to Italy and persuade his son Dickie to come back to US. That was like a dream come true. Tom goes to Italy, to small village called Mongibello and there meets Dickie-man who was a perfection of human being and lifestyle. Young Greenleaf had his own boat and beautiful house. He didn't care about anything, only living his live in the way he wanted to. He also had a very close friend, an American girl- Marge Sherwood, who loved him in a platonic way.

From the very begin of living in Italy Tom knew that neither he nor Dickie come back.
Tom as only one American (except Marge) in the village very quickly won Dickie's heart. They started to spent together whole hours and even days. They were inseparable. But there was something what made Tom angry-Marge. She didn’t trust Toms as much as Dickie did. She was also very reserved and suspicious of Ripley.

Over time Tom started to be for Dickie somebody, who stopped being attractive and interesting. Dickie was tired of him and wanted to finish that relationship.

Tom didn’t want to loose what he had and decided to kill Richard. They were in San Remo on a short holiday. Men hired a small boat and Tom murdered Dickie on board with cold-blood. Next he dumped friend’s boy into the water and scuttles the boat.

It was a begin of Tom’s new life, life as Dickie Greenleaf. Ripley assumed friend’s identity and started living as he always desire. He tricked Marge, that real Dickie is still alive, and he only wanted to be alone, without her and he decided to move to Rome.

During living as Dickie Greenleaf Tom tried to avoid contacts with Dickie’s former friends. But unfortunately for Tom, one of them, Freddie Miles found him. Freddie visited Ripley at ‘Dickie’s’ apartment in Rome but he started to suspicious that something is wrong. Then Tom felt dangerous and he murdered Miles. Now he started a game with Italian police, a game which one he won of course. But before it happened Tom had to fool many people, including Marge, Herbert Greenleaf, Italian police and American private detective. He also double-crossed everyone about Dickie’s last will, in which ‘Dickie’ left him everything.

At the end of the book Tom traveled to Greece as a young, wealth man, who can do whatever he wants.

My funny Valentine-by Matt Damon as Tom Ripley in the movie

Main Characters

Tom Ripley-main character,23-year-old American boy, who has many 'talents'. The author of the book said, that he is 'suave, agreeable and utterly amoral'person ,who has a lot of luck in everything what he does, even in the bad things.
Dickie (Richard) Greenleaf- young, rich boy, who came to Italy and in that way went away from being a part of family business, living a bohemian live as a sailor and painter in Italy.
Marge Sherwood-American young woman, she lives in the same villige as Dickie-Mongibello. She has platonic feelings to Richard.
Herbert Greenleaf- a father of Richard, hires Tom to go to Italy and persuade his son to come back.
Freddie Miles-a friend of Dickie and Marge.
Alvin McCarron-a private detective from States, hires by Mr. Greenleaf.

Highsmith's awards

• 1946 : O. Henry Award for best publication of first story, for "The Heroine" in Harper's Bazaar
• 1951 : Edgar Award nominee for best first novel, for Strangers on a Train
• 1956 : Edgar Award nominee for best novel, for The Talented Mr. Ripley
• 1957 : Grand Prix de Littérature Policière, for The Talented Mr. Ripley
• 1963 : Edgar Award nominee for best short story, for "The Terrapin"
• 1964 : Silver Dagger Award from the Crime Writers' Association of Great Britain
• 1975 : Grand Prix de l'Humour Noir for L'Amateur d'escargot
• 1990 : Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres from the French Ministry of Culture

Bibliography of Patricia Highsmith

Novels

* Strangers on a Train (1950)
* The Price of Salt (as Claire Morgan) (1953), also published as Carol
* The Blunderer (1954)
* The Talented Mr. Ripley (1955)
* Deep Water (1957)
* A Game for the Living (1958)
* This Sweet Sickness (1960)
* The Two Faces of January (1961)
* The Cry of the Owl (1962)
* The Glass Cell (1964)
* A Suspension of Mercy (1965), also published as The Story-Teller
* Those Who Walk Away (1967)
* The Tremor of Forgery (1969)
* Ripley Under Ground (1970)
* A Dog's Ransom (1972)
* Ripley's Game (1974)
* Edith's Diary (1977)
* The Boy Who Followed Ripley (1980)
* People Who Knock on the Door (1983)
* Found in the Street (1987)
* Ripley Under Water (1991)
* Small g: a Summer Idyll (1995)

Short Story collections

* Eleven (1970), also published as The Snail-Watcher and Other Stories
* Variations on a Game (1973)
* Little Tales of Misogyny (1974)
* The Animal Lover's Book of Beastly Murder (1975)
* Slowly, Slowly in the Wind (1979)
* The Black House (1981)
* Mermaids on the Golf Course (1985)
* Tales of Natural and Unnatural Catastrophes (1987)

Short story collections assembled by her publishers after her death:

* Nothing That Meets the Eye: The Uncollected Stories (2002)
* Man's Best Friend and Other Stories (2004)

about Patricia Highsmith

Mary Patricia Plangman-it's the real name of the one of the most famous American writer.
She was born at 19^th January of 1921 in Texas.
Her personal life wasn't very calm and peaceful. She had serious problems with an alcohol. None of her relationships survived more than a few years. She prefered the company of animals than people. Once she even said : "My imagination functions much better when I don't have to speak to people."
She had never got married but she had a number of affairs with both men and women. One of them was an affair with another writer Marijane Meaker, who wrote of their affair in her memoir Highsmith: A Romance of the 1950s.
Highsmith believed in American democratic ideals and in the promise of US history, but she was also highly critical of the reality of 20th-century American culture.
In 1963 she moved to Europe, where she spent the rest of her life.
She died in February of 1995 in Locarno, Switzerland. She had leukemia.