The First Paragraph

I have worked and worked on my first paragraph and I believe that it is ready. My paragraph is being workshopped tomorrow, so enjoy!

… Although Patricia Highsmith strays from the traditional lesbian pulp fiction format by ending The Price of Salt happily, she still depicts lesbianism as a disease to reinforce it as harmful and contagious.

            Patricia Highsmith does more than simply label lesbianism as a disease; she explicitly portrays how lesbianism harms young women. How? Through her protagonist, Therese, who exhibits a common symptom of a “sordid and pathological” love: mental instability. In the earlier parts of the book, Therese retains a calm demeanor, yet shortly after meeting Carol, Therese’s mind deteriorates. Highsmith demonstrates this deterioration with Therese’s sudden mood swings, such as when she experiences a shift of having “anger” to feeling “vulnerable and defenseless” in a scene with Abby (112). Some argue that this example, however, only shows Therese being deeply in love, but on the other hand, the kite scene displays Therese’s acquired instability spilling over into everyday life, such as when she, an adult, ends up hysterical and “shrill with tears” over a lost kite (92, 93). Understanding lesbianism as harmful to the mind explains how the mid-1900s society could not believe that someone would be a lesbian out of her free will. Instead, that society believes that lesbians are damaged and unable to make rational choices, and Patricia Highsmith only contributes to the misunderstanding.

I would love some feedback!

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Farhan Khan