Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in American Psycho, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Materialism and Consumption
Identity and Isolation
Monotony and Desensitization
Vice and Violence
The Truth
Summary
Analysis
This chapter is a first in a series that will re-occur several times throughout the book. Bateman addresses the reader directly to tell them about one of his all-time favorite bands: Genesis. He’s been a fan since the release of their first album, Duke, and has continued to follow all of their records closely, as well as the solo career of the band’s front-man, Phil Collins. Over the course of a few pages, Bateman walks the reader through each of the band’s albums, giving his opinion on each album’s individual songs and drawing a line between the evolution of the band’s music and their collaborators.
These chapters demonstrate not only Bateman’s intellect and interest in valuable pop culture, but also display an obsessive and relentless capacity for learning and retelling facts, which is not unlike his earlier speeches about food and politics. More importantly, we’ll see that these chapters come as (rather jarring) breaks in the action after pivotal moments in the novel. This first one comes after Bateman’s first “on-screen” act of violence. In a way almost of dissociating, he leaves the story after this shocking event and talks on and on about something mundane and completely different.
Themes
