The Cultural Work of Serial Killers

Abstract

A 2002 entry in the syndicated daily comic strip "The Born Loser" shows the meek title character in a restaurant asking how the place serves liver. With "fava beans and a nice Chianti," the waiter informs him, and the would-be diner runs away in horror (21 May 2002). The humor here (if there can be said to be any) comes from a reference to the dining preferences of Hannibal "the Cannibal" Leder in Thomas Harris's 1988 The Silence of the Lambs. Lecter, the most famous fictional serial killer in literary history, is also a gourmet, and he likes his human liver with fava beans and chianti. Why are serial killers sudi a staple of popular entertainment these days? The prominence of The Silence of the Lambs (aided by Jonathan Demme's Oscar-winning 1990 film adaptation of the novel) surely has something to do with it, but why such a reception for that story? What's so fascinating about Hannibal Lecter that he has become an American cultural icon?