Essay Revised

In the Exorcist, the blend of religion and psychology provide a limitless contrast of the context which cannot be scientifically or religiously justified simultaneously but it is described beautifully by William Peter Blatty. Blatty has used amazing convincing and writing styles and techniques to show the emotional ties among characters. He has shown how emotions can produce an impact on the life of people. For example, the infinite love between the main character Chris and her daughter Regan makes them to not let the parameters of gain and loss impact their decisions and relationship. They are pillars of love and strength for each other. In this story, Regan has encountered a strange disease that brings her hallucinations and continuous pain. The author has described the reaction of her mother and the power of parental love which can bring both happiness and suffering to people.

To support his argument, Blatty has utilized the contrast method. He has utilized the words with a completely different meaning to make a conflict through the article to show the complex emotions of characters at some point. For example in the sentence “Karras slowly climbed the steps, Smelled an odor like cooking, Like warm, damp, rotted sweetness” (Blatty 50) “Warm” suggests that Karras missing the warmth of the love from his mother and at the same time “rotted” hints about that the love between Karras and his mother slowly turned into something else and their relationship became sour. In this way, Blatty defines the Karras’ entangled thinking and puts an argument that his love for his mother brings him happiness and suffering at the same time. However, Karras’s guilt has been set to be preliminary.

Blatty has used the environmental description to reflect the emotions and feelings of characters. He argues that environment description is important for the role of characterization. “Felt uneasy. There was a strangeness in the house. Like settling stillness. Weighted dust” (Blatty 64). In reality, dust does not carry any weight but Blatty describes it as “weighted” which signifies the heavy and entangled feelings of Chris. Chris is always worried about the condition of her daughter and in this state she cannot concentrate on other things. This environmental description represents the repressed atmosphere of the house and makes audiences deeply feel the heavy pressure felt by Chris.

           Blatty is also adept in depicting the reaction of the characters to the other character. For instance, in the following reaction, he explained how Chris felt “So haunted. The tone so despairing and disproportionate to her condition. For a moment Chris felt shaken and confused” (Blatty 73). This sentence describes how Chris reacted after hearing the “despairing and disproportionate” tone of his daughter that he felt helpless. The pressure felt by his daughter in reality also induced pain in Chris. As a mother, Chris empathizes with the pain her daughter is suffering at a moment. The infinite love between Chris and Regan is visible and can be felt through the writing of Blatty.

In his writing, while expressing someone’s feelings or emotions, Blatty does not directly write what he is trying to state, rather he suggests or implies it with the help of emotions. For example, he wrote “In the middle of the night, Karras awakened in tears. He had dreamed of his mother. Standing at a window high in Manhattan…as he pictured her helpless and bewildered in a maze of tunnels beneath the ground” (Blatty 91). In this paragraph, Blatty suggests that Karras is feeling guilty about his mother through the dream. He saw a depressive scene in a dream which depicts that Karras’s mother failed to find Karras and Karras failed to retain his mother at the same time. It implies that Karras has abandoned his mother and now he has to face the negative implications which were his own mistake. Blatty makes his audience feel about Karras’ grief through the psychological explanation. 

He wrote “She huskily murmured” (Blatty 105) at another instance. This is the detailed description of Chris’s tone and her expression when she asked the doctor for some good news. The audience could imagine and feel that she murmured with an upset face, and they could understand the feeling of a mother when she realizes that her daughter is in trouble. 

Blatty describes the burden of Chris throughout the novel via a detailed description of her language, manner, and action to make the audience feel what Chris has gone through. She did not suffer less than her daughter in her journey. On several occasions, she explained how Chris's feelings and emotions got affected by the condition of Regan. Blatty utilized this manner to deliver his message to audiences that love and connections among people could be proved and tested in reality when they encounter difficulties or any accident. Similarly, she explained how the personality of characters evolved throughout the novel, for example, the way Chris evolved into a mother with strength and love from the helpless woman over the condition of Regan. 

Blatty has used the metaphorical explanation and exaggeration to express the emotions and feelings of characters. For example, he wrote that “He awakened in torpor, with the memory of loss draining blood from his brain” (Blatty 92). Blatty used the phrase “loss draining blood” to describe how much pain did Karras feel. He reminds his audience of bloodshed and bleeding, by which audience can imagine Karras’s negative and distressing feelings and mood, which evokes the perceptual sympathetic response of the audience, in response. This part of the description also partly reflects Karras’s love for his mother and how he is missing her. It also makes him feel pain. Blatty once again reinforces that love could bring people both happiness and pain, and weakness and strength.

How he explained the actions of character reflects the emotions and feelings that they are facing at the time. He mentions “Chris burst into convulsive sobbing. Klein moved to the bar, poured a glass of water from the tap and walked back toward Chris…she sighed tremulously, wiping at her eyes with the knuckle of a finger” (Blatty 120). He did not explain her emotions, rather describes her action which reflects her feelings. Chris asks for “cigarette” which is normally used by people to calm them down. Chris needs a cigarette to overcome her negative emotions, which can be realized by the audience that how heavy she felt at that time. Blatty also utilizes the words like “convulsive sobbing” and “sighed tremulously” to show the great mood swings of Chris.

Blatty beautifully draws the picture in the mind of the audience through his writing.  Throughout the novel, the audiences can feel the anxiety and stress. There is a continuous shift in the personalities of the character and at the same time, the whole environment is filled with horror and doubt which could be felt by the audience because of the exact and real depiction by the author.