Comparing Psycho And The Shadow Of The Wind

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A child while it is born to live its own life, that life is tainted by the sins of the child's parents. Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho and Carlos Zafón's The Shadow of the Wind are both windows into how the sins of parents impact the lives of their children. In Pyscho, Hitchcock's male lead Norman Bates is trapped inside his own mind for his mother has controlled him so much that at her death he took own her persona. Then in The Shadow of the Wind, Zafón's character inspector Fumero is evil and tormenting the people of Barcelona due to the abuse he endured as a child from his parents. In both works the authors' characters are led to murder because of the sins the parents inflicted upon them. Inspector Fumero in Zafón's…show more content…
When Marion and Norman have dinner together Norman shares with Marion some aspects of his life. "You know what I think? I think that we're all in our private traps, clamped in them, and none of us can ever get out. We scratch and, and claw, but only at the air, only at each other. And for all of it, we never budge an inch... I was born in mine. I don't mind it any more" (Psycho). Norman is referring to how when he was born, he was born into his own personal trap. That personal trap coming about because of the abuse his mother inflicted on him since she was alone. Leading him to a life that he is trap inside of and wishes to "scratch" and "claw" out of but he is unable to. His mother's sin is the abuse she inflicted upon Norman which led to further hardships on Norman. At the end of the story once questioned by the psychiatrist it is apparent he is not himself and in fact his mother. The psychiatrist notes, "now to understand it the way I understood it, hearing it from the mother, that is, from the 'mother' half of Norman's mind, you have to go back ten years to the time when Norman murdered his mother and her lover. Now he was already dangerously disturbed, had been ever since his father died. His mother was a clinging, demanding woman, and for years, the two of them lived as if there was no one else in the world. Then, she met a man and it seemed to Norman that she threw him

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