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PENGUIN READERS Teacher’s notes LEVEL 3 Teacher Support Programme Psycho Robert Bloch Marion a room. He offers her dinner at his house, but Marion hears the argument between Norman and his mother. In the end, Marion eats with him in the office in the motel, and he talks about his mad mother. After talking with Norman, Marion decides to return the money. While she is having a shower, someone attacks and kills her. Chapters 7–9: Norman sees the blood on his mother’s clothes and the body of Marion. He puts the body and her belongings (including the money) into the car, and he pushes the car into the swamp. A week later, Marion’s sister Lila, Sam and a detective called Arbogast start to look for Marion. Arbogast finds the Bates Motel and asks About the author Norman questions about Marion. Robert Bloch was born in Chicago in the United States in Chapters 10–12: After phoning Lila about his 1917. He started writing science fiction and horror stories conversation with Norman, Arbogast goes to the house for magazines, and his first story was published in 1934. behind the motel. He sees a shadow of an old woman, but His first novel, The Scarf, was published in 1947 and he then Arbogast is murdered, too. Lila and Sam find out became a prolific and well-known writer of horror stories. that Norman’s mother died ten years ago. Lila and Sam go He also became a scriptwriter for movies and television, to the motel and quickly search the room Marion was in. but did not write the script for Psycho, his most famous Chapters 13–15: Lila asks Sam to talk with Norman so novel, himself. He won the Hugo Award (for outstanding that in the meantime she can go to the house and look for achievement in science fiction) in 1959 and again in Norman’s mother. Lila finds the body of an old woman in 1984. He became friends with a lot of the Hollywood the cellar. After being attacked, Lila and Sam find out the personalities at the time he was living and writing there. truth – Norman is the killer. It is revealed that Norman He died in 1994 in Los Angeles. has had a split-personality disorder since he killed his Summary mother and her lover ten years ago. was written in 1959 by Robert Bloch. It was Psycho About the movie inspired by the actions of the demented Wisconsin killer, The movie of Psycho was directed by Sir Alfred Hitchcock Ed Gein. Psycho tells the story of Marion Crane, a young and released in 1960. Starring Janet Leigh and Anthony woman who steals money from her employer in order to Perkins, it is generally thought to be the best movie which be able to marry her lover. On the way to the town where Alfred Hitchcock directed. It is also considered to be the her lover lives, she stops at a motel and meets the strange forerunner of modern-day ‘slasher’ movies, such as the young motel owner, Norman Bates. After talking to him, Halloween series and the Friday 13th series. The famous she decides to return the money, but from this point the shower scene in Psycho is one of the most copied scenes in story plunges into murder and insanity. the history of cinema. Although critics disliked the movie Chapters 1–3: Marion Crane from Phoenix, Arizona is when it first came out, it was an immediate box-office having a secret relationship with Sam Loomis, who lives success and was nominated for four Oscars. There have in Fairvale, Texas. She wants to marry him, but he wants been two sequels: Psycho II in 1983 and Psycho III in 1986. to pay off his father’s debts first. Marion’s boss asks her to Neither of these is considered to be as good as the original take $40,000 to the bank, and she decides to steal it to pay one. her lover’s debts. It is a long journey to Fairvale. Marion Sir Alfred Hitchcock was born in London in 1899. He gets stopped by a policeman, manages to change her car, started his career in the United Kingdom and made his and she finally finds a place to stay – Bates Motel. name as a ‘master of suspense’ with The Lodger in 1926. Chapters 4–6: Marion sees a large old house behind He moved to the United States in 1939, where he made the motel. Norman comes down to the motel and gives most of his famous movies, such as Rebecca (1940), Rear c Pearson Education Limited 2008 Psycho - Teacher’s notes 1 of 3 PENGUIN READERS Teacher’s notes LEVEL 3 Teacher Support Programme Psycho Window (1954) and Vertigo (1958). He was knighted in she has resolved to return the money and when the water 1980 and died in the same year. of the shower is symbolically washing away her sin. It is also ironic that she is punished at the point when she Background and themes could have been redeemed from the moral failure of her Split-personality disorders: Psycho is a study of insanity, relationship, as her lover had just made the decision to in particular split-personality disorders. This is most marry her. This theme of punishment for moral failure obvious in the character of Norman Bates, who clearly is continued in the novel when we realise that Bates struggles through the novel against the two personalities in killed his mother and her lover ten years ago, again for his psyche: his own and that of his mother. The stronger conducting an ‘inappropriate’ relationship. The ending personality, his mother’s, wins in the end. Bates has the of Psycho is rather bleak: although Bates is caught, he is true split personality, but the idea of different characters condemned to insanity, and a number of people have died living in one person is also seen in Marion Crane. Her in vain. behaviour in stealing money from her employer is really ‘out of character’ and not part of her true personality, Discussion activities and that she suffers, for a short time, from a mild form Chapter 1 of insanity. The narrative itself is also ‘split’. For the first Before reading third of the book and movie, we experience the action 1 Predict: Have students look at the picture on the from the point of view of Marion Crane and we are front cover and the pictures on pages 2, 4 and 7. Put led to believe that she is the heroine of the story. Then, students into small groups, and have them discuss the before the story is even halfway through, she is suddenly following questions. • Is the story a love story, an adventure story or a murdered and our viewpoint has to change dramatically. frightening story? What do you think? This is a very unusual technique, and it forces the reader • Describe the front cover. What is this woman doing? to reassess their interpretation of the story so far. In Psycho What do you think she is saying? What does the red the reader has to find another character to sympathise part of the picture mean? with and the uncomfortable choice is likely to be Norman 2 Discuss: Talk about the movie and the story. Ask students if they have seen the movie Psycho. Then Bates. divide the class into two groups: Group A is for the Good and evil: Another theme of Psycho is that of the students who have seen the movie, and Group B is for conflict between good and evil in society. Again, there those who haven’t. Have them discuss the following questions. are two conflicts here: that of the dual personality of Group A: Norman Bates with his own character (representing good • Who are the main characters in the movie? to his own mind) battling against the character of his • Who directed the movie? mother (evil); and that of Marion Crane, basically a good • Did you enjoy the movie? Why? / Why not? person who turns briefly to evil. In the first conflict, evil Group B: • What can you see in the pictures in the book? wins when the personality of Bates’s mother takes him • What do you think is going to happen in the book? over. In the second conflict, good wins when Marion decides to return the money she has stolen to its owner. After reading 3 Discuss: Talk about the relationship of Marion and Unfortunately, it doesn’t win for long as the evil in Bates Sam. murders Marion before she has the chance to redeem Have students work in small groups to talk about herself. what they think of Marion and Sam. Ask them who they sympathise with more. Punishment: Although Marion decides to return the money, she is still punished for her crime, by death. In Chapters 2–3 Psycho we are led to wonder whether it is actually the After reading crime that is punished or Marion’s moral failure: the 4 Discuss: Talk about money and happiness. secret relationship she was conducting with her lover at Tommy Cassidy tells Marion Crane, ‘Money can’t buy happiness, but it can stop unhappiness.’ What is your the beginning of the story. It is particularly poignant that opinion on this? Discuss with a friend. she is punished at the moment of her redemption – when c Pearson Education Limited 2008 Psycho - Teacher’s notes 2 of 3 PENGUIN READERS Teacher’s notes LEVEL 3 Teacher Support Programme Psycho Chapters 4–5 After reading Before reading 13 Role play: Have students work in groups of three 5 Predict: Have a whole-class discussion using the to act out the conversation between Arbogast and following question.