Between the beautiful bloom and scent of amaranth, lavender, acadia and the most precious fumes that have ever been sensed lies a story of a gifted boy - murderer in heart. Patrick Süskind’s novel „Perfume” was published in 1985, which, I believe, is one of the most imaginative and eccentric story ideas I have ever read. This cross-genred novel is one of the most successful German publications of the 20th century alongside with Erich Maria Remarque’s novels and roughly twenty years later – in 2006 Tom Tykwer adapted Grenouille’s story for cinemas.
For a brief rundown of the plot – the story is based in eighteen century Paris, where an orphan named Jean-Baptiste Grenouille grows up. For a long time he does not learn to speak and although he does not have a natural smell of his own it is enough for him to smell the ambient and to allow all the odours of the world flew through him. The reason why it is so hard for him to harmonize with people or at least to properly blend in is because of his remarkable and unusually keen sense of smell – and it is not an unnatural sign of his to detect odours in things that average people would not believe to have scent at all. As Grenouille trains to be a perfumer he is determined to make the utopian scent that could place him into God’s place. Nonetheless, the ‘perfect perfume’ in his eyes is created of the scents of thirteen virginal girls since is the only way to preserve and obtain their natural smells.
Patrick Süskind, the author of this outstanding novel, reveals the story bit by bit without losing the control of his protagonist Grenouille’s intense and heightened thoughts, feelings and expressions, while not forgeting to replete the story with immense descriptions of various scents and odo...
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... believe that the movie is a great supplement of the book, even with its’ imperfections, and I definately have seen much worse and deceptive adaptions of a book.
Personally I encountered beautiful lines and sentences from „Perfume” that could be used as ravishing every-day quotes and most probably my exemplar of the book has more highlighted pages than plain ones just because I can connect these underlined quotes with some period of time from my life, and quite often I want to read some of the pages again and again to inspire or just to get that delightful feeling and goosebumps and the same goes for the movie – I could find some quotes which was not taken from the book only because it lacked monologues and dialogues. In the movie there were moments which you can watch over and over and still would not get bored nor of the acting, nor of the same placement.
In conclusion, details involving the characters and symbolic meanings to objects are the factors that make the novel better than the movie. Leaving out aspects of the novel limits the viewer’s appreciation for the story. One may favor the film over the novel or vice versa, but that person will not overlook the intense work that went into the making of both. The film and novel have their similarities and differences, but both effectively communicate their meaning to the public.
In his 1984 novel Jitterbug Perfume, Tom Robbins presents a narrative that rivals the often fantastical tales told in myth. Using classical mythology as a foundation, and, in particular, providing a loose adaptation of The Odyssey by Homer, Robbins updates and modifies characters and concepts in an effort to reinforce the importance of the journey of life and the discovery of self. Like the ancient myth-makers, Robbins commands the reader’s attention with outrageous situations and events while at the same time providing characters that the reader can relate to and learn from.
When Divakaruni moved to the United States, tried to abandon the smells of her childhood in favor of acculturation. She realized this is a mistake when she has a child of her own. She eventually comes to appreciate the smells’ abilities to comfort, give joy, and motivate. One smell in particular she told about is how the smell of iodine reminded her that “love sometimes hurts while it’s doing its job.” In rearing her own offspring, she intentionally tried to replicate the “smell technique” with her own twist in hopes that her children reap similar benefits. One example is how she filled the house with the aroma of spices and sang American and Indian tunes with her
Mersault, the narrator and protagonist, is The Stranger. He has cut himself off from the world. As he narrates the novel is divided into two parts. In part 1 he deals with everyday affairs except for two important events. At the beginning of the novel his mother has died. He is struggling to make ends meet, therefore he sent his mother to a nursing home in Marengo. This has brought criticism from the community. At the funeral he does not feel the grief as is expected nor is he concerned with the formalities of mourning. The next day Mersault starts an affair with Marie, who at one time been a typist in his office. They have a wonderful time eating, swimming, watching movies and making love. People, i.e. society is aghast that he has not observed what is considered a proper mourning period for his mother.
The book and the movie were both very good. The book took time to explain things like setting, people’s emotions, people’s traits, and important background information. There was no time for these explanations the movie. The book, however, had parts in the beginning where some readers could become flustered.
Throughout the novels Perfume and Chronicles of a Death Foretold the authors tends to use many literary devices in order to really bring life to the work and keep the reader intrigued. Exaggeration is very apparent in both novels and almost seems excessive, but vivid at the same time. In Perfume Suskind refers to “stench” many times and based on the imagery used in the novel the context gives the word “stench” almost a positive meaning at times. For Example, when Grenouille murders the girl, the way he describes her “sweaty armpits, oily hair, and fishy genitals”, makes the sensation seem like an actual perfume to his nose. The author also uses scent to characterize in the novel. Grenouille who had to apparent sent seemed equal to one with
The Motivation behind Grenouille's first murder is his obsession with the perfume his victim is wearing he feels that “without the scent his life would have no meaning” , and that he should do anything to obtain it without any remorse for his actions, what he discovers about himself and his own destiny after he kills the red haired girl for the scent is that he is destined to “revolutionize the odoriferous world” by becoming the “greatest perfumer of all time”
Süskind, Patrick. Perfume: The Story of a Murderer. Tr. John E. Woods. New York: Vintage
This world has been exposed to the concepts of many monsters, such as mythical creatures and mythic humanoids. These monsters' goal is to either protect or kill with purpose,and there exists the concept of one monster that murders innocents , with the purpose of creating scents. In the novel Perfume by Patrick Süskind, the author portrays this monster as Grenouille. Süskind has this character that intentionally murders many people for their scent, regardless of their age, or maturity. Grenouille is a monster as he misuses the power of scent to escape worldly problems and attract love. He bears a grudge against of humanity that not only affects characters from young girls to his own mother. Grenouille is portrayed as a monster because he is the cause of death for most characters in the novel, misuses the power of scent, and hates humanity.
Patrick Süskind truly attempts to persuade the reader of his novel, Perfume, that power corrupts people and that humans are flawed in that they are greedy and deceptive. Süskind develops these themes through many characters in the novel – including Madame Gaillard, Monsieur Grimal, Giuseppe Baldini, and the marquis de La Taillade-Espinasse – but most importantly through Jean-Baptiste Grenouille. By showcasing the corruption brought about by power and the flaws present in the characters of Perfume, the author does in fact persuade the reader that power is corruptive and humans are inherently flawed.
The amoral protagonist of Das Perfume, Grenouille was created to beget sympathy and empathy from the readers. The effects of this were used to support the theme of morality and these effects were achieved through understanding of the immoral character, Grenouille. The theme of morality is supported by the Suskind’s use of bildungsroman, characteristics of the minor characters, plot events and narration (third person point of view) to raise doubts in the reader’s judgments towards the protagonist’s action and the norms of society he lives in, and finally, to persuade readers to question the morality of the characters through various means of persuasion.
Patrick Süskind, a German author, wrote Perfume: the Story of a Murderer in 1986 and sets the novel in eighteenth century France. Süskind dehumanizes children in order to remove emotion from death. He fulfills the concept by using aspects that tend to develop the beliefs and perspectives of a child. During a child’s life, they obtain influences from religion, abuse, self-value, and other children. All the aspects reflect in a child’s life and in Perfume, dehumanization links to those factors and eventually leads to the absence of sensitivity to death.
Suskind, Patrick. Perfume, The Story of a Murderer. Trans. John E. Woods. New York: Vintage
For this, Grenouille collects the scents of many young women by encasing their odor in a waxy oil substance after he murders them. These scents are used as the key building blocks for his ultimate scent. This procedure is an example of collectivism in the novel. This concept is shown in other ways in the novel. The primary instance is that when Grenouille is first learning the ways of perfumery. He discovers that it takes thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of individual rose petals to create a diminutive sized volume of concentrated essence of perfume. This, along with endless hours of hard labour, he learns, is all required to create this almost trifling yet potent amount of essence. This essence absolue is described by Grenouille when he states that it “no longer had a sweet fragrance. Its smell was almost painfully intense, pungent, and acrid. And yet one drop, when dissolved in a quart of alcohol, sufficed to revitalize it and resurrect a whole field of flowers”(177). It is a reflection of Grenouille’s goal to formulate an all encompassing human scented perfume and therefore a classic example of collectivism. This idea of collectivism is portrayed as a
“So close that I could smell his aftershave—it was a delicious, fruitlike smell that day” (pg.7)This quote is a clear indication of Balram’s, more than friendly response to Mr. Ashok. His use of the words “that day” show that it wasn’t the first time he intentionally took a whiff of Ashok’s aftershave. Perfume has been used in many different cultures as a way to seduce and grab the attention of someone of interest. When Balram inhaled Mr. Ashok’s aftershave, he, in a sense, took bits of Mr. Ashok inside of him. “ The cologne from his skin—a lovely cologne—rushed into my nostrils for a heady instant while the smell of my servant’s sweat rubbed off onto his face”(pg. 65-66). Once more, Mr. Ashok’s smell crawls into Balram, however this time it is a combination of skin, sweat, and cologne. The mixture is something that neither men can ignore nor bother to forget. It was in this instance that the inconvenient attraction between both men began.