- Born
- Died
- Birth nameMary Patricia Plangman
- Patricia Highsmith was born on January 19, 1921 in Fort Worth, Texas, USA. She was a writer, known for The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999), Strangers on a Train (1951) and Deep Water (2022). She died on February 4, 1995 in Locarno, Switzerland.
- ParentsStanley HighsmithMary CoatesJay Bernard Plangman
- Spent much of her later life in solitude on a 200-year old farmhouse near Locarno, Switzerland, surrounded by books and cats.
- Although she was quite open about having had several lesbian relationships in her life, mostly short-lasting, she did at one time seriously consider marrying British writer Marc Brandel, although they agreed to abandon the idea eventually.
- Disliked being classified as a 'crime writer'. She is perhaps better described as an author of psychological thrillers, often examining people put into harrowing situations through seemingly innocuous catalysts.
- Used the pseudonym Claire Morgan for the novel The Price of Salt (later retitled Carol) because of its autobiographical lesbian theme, to avoid pigeonholing.
- Raised by her grandmother in Greenwich Village, and taught to read at the age of two.
- [on film versions of her novels]: Really, I don't mind too much if they take liberties with my plots, because they're trying to do something quite different from a book, and I think they have a right to change the story as much as they wish. I couldn't write a book with the idea in my mind that it was going to be a film. That would be like thinking of a statue when you're painting a picture.
- In view of the fact that I surround myself with numbskulls now, I shall die among numbskulls, and on my deathbed shall be surrounded by numbskulls who will not understand what I am saying ... Whom am I sleeping with these days? Franz Kafka!
- Murder is a kind of making love, a kind of possessing.
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