Imagery In Erik Larson's The Devil In The White City

The Devil in the White City portrays the Chicago World’s Fair as a significant event that set itself in America’s history books as one of its greatest achievements. Though the Fair itself was a sensation alone, with all its dazzling features and worldwide attention, the Fair was not the only significant even happening in Chicago at the time. This event however involved murders hidden by the shining brilliance of the Fair. The murderer in question, arguably America’s first notable serial killer, was H. H. Holmes. Through the use of descriptive imagery, the juxtaposition between him and the World’s Fair, and the one self-defining allusion of Holmes, Erik Larson provides the reasons why Holmes truly is the Devil of the White City. In the book,

. . utterly without light” (294). The imagery causes the readers to read in horror as each of Holmes’s unwitting victims are killed with such

The contrasting ideas between the colors black and white appear throughout the entire book. The “Black City” is supposed to represent the harsh, cold reality that patiently awaits the return of the guests and jobless workers “with filth, starvation, and violence” (323). Though with a much less extent towards “filth”, Holmes does support the use of “starvation” and “violence”, which the reader can visualize how much Holmes has affected the people associated with him. On the subject of “starvation” Holmes was no saint in the matter, whether being “a demanding contractor” (67) using tricks and tactics to gain free labor from desperate workers who built his hotel, or not paying his charmed creditors, he still gave plenty to the tide of unemployment and desperation. Furthermore, “violence” was no stranger to him, as he was, indeed, an infamous serial killer whose cruelty may have even cost the lives that was estimated to “range as high as two hundred [victims], though . . . implausible even for a man of his appetite” (385). Though “filth” is not really a strong point, the word itself can imply for the reader of represent humanity’s darkest, dirtiest parts, and with all these considerations, Holmes’s seems like the perfect candidate to represent the “Black City” as he too walk among the visitors in the seemingly protective