Red Dragon: The Introduction to Hannibal Lecter (and the Tooth Fairy)

 Red Dragon by Thomas Harris

The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed with the Sun by William Blake, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

I’m not sure why I never read Thomas Harris’s book Red Dragon previously. Maybe it was because I had seen Silence of the Lambs so many times, but I forgot that the film was based on a book and that there was another book before Silence that introduced Hannibal Lecter through his connection to the Tooth Fairy, Francis Dolarhyde. I absolutely loved this book. It was exciting and interesting to read. Harris delved into the psychology of Dolarhyde, a man born with a physical impairment who gradually overcomes this limitation and other’s perceptions of him to reinvent himself. Finding a connection with William Blake’s Great Red Dragon painting, I really enjoyed reading about Dolarhyde’s self-mythology and invention and how he became somewhat megalomaniacal. However, with his background and growing up with an abusive and totalitarian and terrifying grandmother, it’s kind of understandable how his views of humanity would develop. This book was so compelling and hard to put down. I found myself continuing to read, staying up late to find out what would happen next in the story between Will Graham and Dolarhyde. It was surprising to learn that this book was written in the early 80s, in an era when FBI profiling was relatively new. However, Harris’s story and the clues that Graham analyzes to make sense of the seemingly random tooth fairy murders are compelling and creative. I ended up watching both Manhunter and Red Dragon after reading this. I personally liked Manhunter better, but Red Dragon was also interesting to watch and gets a little more into Dolarhyde’s background. Overall, though, I really enjoyed this book and thought that it provided a more in-depth psychology of Dolarhyde and his repressive background.