Desire In The Devil In The White City

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“All histories are histories of desire” (Ron Butlin). In every story, book, memory of the past, there is always desire. Any movie you will watch, will contain heaps of desire. At some point in a human’s life, they will desire something or someone. This is for anybody, everybody. Desire is everywhere, whether it is known or not. Desire. Verb. To want or wish for something/to want to have sex with someone. Noun. A strong wish/the feeling of wanting to have sex with someone (Merriam-Webster online). Desire is lust. Desire is passion. Desire is a wish, a hope. Desire is also human nature. Sexual desire is possibly one of the strongest drives in animals alike (including humans). When repressed, it can lead to depression and angst. It can also …show more content…

Holmes, a vehement, mad murderer. Holmes is very lustful of killing people, specifically women, which only helps the definition of desire. In one of his first killings, he murders Julia, a woman who he actually impregnates. He makes it obvious to her that he does not want the child. She lets him do an abortion on her, thinking he is a trained doctor, on the eve of Christmas. He subdues her by applying a chloroform-soaked rag to her mouth and nose, and instead of aborting her baby, he takes her life. Larson says, “the chloroform and his own intense arousal made him feel light-headed. The sensation, as always, was pleasant and induced in him a warm languor” (148-149). The word arousal is used to give the illusion of H.H. being, well, turned on by the smell of chloroform, murdering somebody. He desires killing people, lusts after …show more content…

This again alludes to the sensual definition of desire, because Holmes, again, was aroused by abusing and murdering people. This time it was just more sickening, because it was children who had their whole lives ahead of them, instead of a fully grown adult. In Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare, the star-crossed lovers’ story is tragic because of both desire and teenage stupidity--seriously, they were thirteen and sixteen years old. After finding Juliet “dead”--she was actually in just a deep sleep, like a medically induced coma by Friar Laurence--he says in a soliloquy, “Death, that hath sucked the honey of thy breath, Hath had no power yet upon thy beauty” (5.3.92-93). Basically, Romeo wasn’t in on the plan of Juliet fake dying so she could escape with him and they could live happily ever after. Instead, he notes that she is still stunning, that even death couldn’t take beauty away from her, and drinks real poison to kill himself. He does this instead of suffering without his wife like most people would, thus the teenage stupidity. Juliet awakes to find her love dead, and kills herself as well. This is all because of the strong feeling of desire. They loved and wanted each other so bad that they went as far as possible. Romeo and Juliet decided they couldn’t live without each other, so they

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