Striving, Belonging, and Divine Madness

Donna Tartt's novel The Secret History is a loveletter to Greek tragedy, that begins with a dedication from Nietzsche and Plato. Central to the story is the concept of the Dionysian, and the attempt of the main characters to experience the Dionysian. Richard Papen's fatal flaw is his "morbid longing for the picturesque at all costs". His undying quest for a beautiful aesthetic life leads him to become part of an elite clique of students at Hampden College in Vermont. All six of them are under the sway of a charismatic and mysterious professor named Julian Morrow. After his friends accidentally kill someone while attempting a modern-day bacchanalia, Richard finds himself drawn into their crime, as he does everything he can to help them cover it up. This year becomes the defining event of Richard's life, and the story is his retelling of this 'secret history' of how he became what he is. We will examine the novel's use of truth and appearance, and how the Dionysian in this story serves as a "pure fire of being" which burns away the false appearances of the characters in order to unify their appearance and essence, and force each person's nature to draw its final consequences.