The Rational Madman
Note: I begin by summarizing the story, and then fully discuss the plot and all its’ twists. I highly recommend going and reading the featured story first. If it is available for free online, I will link to it in the story title below. Otherwise, continue reading only if you don’t mind spoilers! ~ LL
ECDYSIS by Rebecca J. Allred
A young man sits in his psychologist’s waiting room, reflecting on his mental diagnosis and the many doctors he has seen to treat it. A woman emerges from the Dr’s room, crying, and he wishes he could stop her and give her a hug, because then he and she could “share everything” and “be made whole again”.
He goes in to have his appointment with Dr. Allison. Telling her about his mother’s mental illness and death has the doctor feverishly taking notes because this is something they’ve never talked about before. She eagerly encourages her patient that he’s suffering from guilt over his mother’s death—something she feels capable of helping him process and heal from—and excitedly asks him to continue. To her chagrin, he begins to tell her of the two other women who died because of him.
He believes his insanity is reality, and that if he’d been able to “share” his mother’s burden, she wouldn’t have died. He believes it’s an unfortunate but inescapable fact of life that he must feed the insects he believes infest his body. His psychologist recognizes the danger, but he is the last patient of the day and there’s no one else around. The young man kills his doctor, regretting she was not someone who could help him with his condition.
He picks up the patient files which have the address of the woman he’d seen leaving the doctor’s office crying—the woman he hoped would be someone could share his burden and make everything right.
PLOT DEVICES
Throughout the story, the young man recites the medical terms for everything from his symptoms of itching to his psychotic wet dream. We learn that he was studying to become a doctor and is bright enough to have aced the MCAT. Both of these elements create a sense of the character’s intelligence and high level of education, which makes the cold logic he employs to rationalize murder all the more chilling. He believes his insanity is reality, and he acts accordingly.
Another effective plot device, which underscores his tragic belief system, is his relationship with his father. His dad is a psychologist, and the young man wanted to be a doctor too. It’s implied they had close relationship which was systematically broken and destroyed over time. At first, the father used his connections with other doctors to get his son treatment. He kept his son away from his mentally-ill wife, hoping his son could escape her fate. As the young man’s madness pulled him further away from his father, their relationship becomes distant. Even to the point that the son wonders whether his father suspects him of murder but is simply too apathetic to do anything about it.
The ticking clock of his mother’s sickness and eventual demise creates a sense of growing crisis in the plot, foreshadowing the length to which he will go to placate his own hallucinations of insects infesting his body. His belief that if he could’ve shared his mother’s burden she’d have been saved, helps us keep tracking with the story when his actions suddenly veer off the rails of sane behavior. It ensures we are not left in disbelief when he kills his doctor and leaves the office intent on finding the crying woman. It’s very likely he will murder her too, though that’s not his intention. He believes he can be healed by finding someone to share his burden in the same way his mother wanted him to share hers. We buy his logic, though we know he is tragically mistaken.
THEMES
Madness and what it’s like to question reality are definitely two strong themes in this story. Many readers will have a mental caricature of the “murderous lunatic”. But this story challenges, at a very deep psychological level, the characteristics and images we might associate with such a person. The young man in this story is probably well-dressed, conversational though perhaps a little distracted, calm and collected, reasonable and quite human. He has a moral code. He’s educated. A stark departure from what we might picture—a disheveled man foaming at the mouth as he roams a dark street seeking his next victim.
Another theme is self-hatred. The young man is very, very aware of the murderous impulses which stem from his mental illness. He knows he’s killed two people and that he’ll kill more if he doesn’t find a way to become well again. Though he regrets his actions, he sees himself as a powerless and despicable victim of the insects which inhabit him. He has accepted his hallucination as reality, and with that acceptance he has lost control of his actions, becoming a self he deeply despises. Instead of taking responsibility, he loathes his current state and is desperately seeking what he believes will liberate him, or at least bring him relief.
This theme is also an uncomfortable, but helpful idea for readers to wrestle with. We all have things we don’t like about ourselves. Perhaps it is something we feel unable to change, like our weight or appearance or a bad habit we do without thinking. It can be tempting to shrug our shoulders and say, “this is just how I am”, leaving the responsibility for our subsequent choices to fate. How different are we than this madman? Isn’t the definition of insanity doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different result?
There’s lots more that could be unpacked from this short, powerful look into the psyche of a rational madman. Stories like this are wonderfully rich, and I come away from them with plenty to mull over. If I happen to find someone to discuss it with, I’ll be over the moon with glee. Isn’t this fun? We have minds over-sated with sugary, quick-access entertainment. While such entertainment has its' place, from time to time, I enjoy chewing on something this substantial and getting my effort’s worth out of it.
