The Description Of The Book "The Price Of Salt" By
Patricia Highsmith
Human relationships play a major and important role in our lives, they teach us important
lessons and help us grow as human beings. In The Price of salt, Highsmith is able to capture
the complexities of relationships beautifully. Jealousy, lust, love, anger etc. are intrinsic to being
human.
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The story starts out, introducing, Therese Belivet, a young girl of nineteen, who works at a
department store, selling dolls. She was orphaned after her dad died and her mother
abandoned her. Her relationship with her mother was extremely toxic, and she felt that her
mother didn’t care for her. Hence, being resentful towards old women, like Mrs. Ruby
Robichek, who worked with her, came easy to her as they reminded her of her mother. She was
at the time dating a man named, Richard, who she didn’t love and neither did she enjoy the
sex. Her life, was quite lonely, even though she was surrounded by people.
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One day, during Christmas, Therese noticed a woman, “she was tall and fair, her long figure
graceful in the loose fur coat that she held open…. her eyes were grey, colourless, yet dominant
as light or fire”. Therese fell in love. Carol was going through a bad divorce; she felt that her
husband, Harge, didn’t love her. In her time, marriage was something that women did naturally.
But soon Carol’s, past Lesbian relationships surfaced and tension grew between her and her
husband. To make things more complex, she had a daughter and was fighting for custody over
her. Carol felt disliked not just by Harge but also his entire family. Carol felt very controlled by
him and all of this put her in a state of mind where she felt very lonely. So when she received a
Christmas card from Therese, she agreed to meet with her. They met a few more times, and
Therese fell madly in love with Carol. At the same time her relationship with Richard grew tense.
She becomes resentful towards his life style and careless attitude. Her only reason to be with
him was societal pressure to get married.
Soon, Therese was introduced to Abby Gerhard, who was Carol’s best friend and and ex-lover.
Their closeness made Therese extremely jealous. She believed that she would never have what
Carol and Abby had. Soon Abby becomes aware of the fact that Therese and Carol care for
each other a lot, and she starts to patronize Therese. Its likely that Abby felt threatened,
knowing Carol had a soft spot for Therese. The jealousy between Abby and Therese grows and
Abby warns Therese, not to be too attached with Carol. Abby also mentions to Therese to stay
away from a road trip on which Carol is planning to take her. Through all these complications
and communication gaps between Carol, Therese and Abby, eventually Carol and Therese get
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into a relationship. Therese who was in a conflicting relationship with Richard slowly becomes
more distant from him.
The fact that these two were women had a huge age difference was not the only thing that
made their relationship unique. They were also separated by class, which brought an interesting
dynamic to their relationship. This significant class difference often brought tension in their
relationship. For example, they planned to take a holiday together to the West. Therese
declines at first as she does not have enough money. Carol immediately writes her a cheque,
and also gifts Therese an expensive suitcase. Both these gifts, Therese declines, though she
agrees to go on the Road trip. But Richard, who was still somewhere in Therese’s life was
certain that Therese would not go for the road trip.
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When she decides otherwise, Richard meets Carol for the first time on a three some dinner date
with Therese. He tries to win her over again but Therese declines, and tells Richard she would
rather go home alone than go to a concert with him. Their arguments get Carol to feel
sympathetic about Richard and she tells Therese to think about others feelings as well. The
relationship between Carol and Therese goes through many such complicated communications
before they finally learn to trust each other. Carol receives a telegram from Abby, informing her
that Harge had sent a detective who is perhaps following them. Harge is already suspicious
about Therese and Carols’ relationship and was very desperate to have full custody of their
daughter.
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Soon they find a recording machine in their room and realize that the detective has been
recording them all through this time. Carol confronts him and they make a deal with him, that he
would not follow them any longer and in exchange Carol agrees to go back to New York.
Therese decides to remain in the West, as per Carol’s suggestion, but soon she starts to feel
lonely again in the hotel room. Carol rarely called her and when did, she seemed to talk to her
coldly. She started to worry that Carol would never be hers again. Once again Richard comes
back into her life, but only to tell her how disgusted she made him feel. This does not worry
Therese as she is only concerned about her relationship with Carol that she cared about deeply.
She is worried about Carol.
One day, as she decides to go to the Library, she sees a painting that reminds her of Carol. The
painting seemed to be coming alive. “The mouth smiled and the eyes regarded her with nothing
but mockery", Therese is so shocked that she literally runs out of the library, trying to catch her
breath. This excessive feeling for Carol, leads her to starts resenting Carol, as she misses her a
lot and yet had not heard from her in a long time. She decides to meet her friend, Danny, for
dinner, who tells her that she has become more mature. He asks her if she would ever get back
with Carol, or in fact start a relationship with a woman. Therese says no, she would never get
back with Carol. She was so heartbroken that thinking of Carol made her angry. She felt used.
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Then back in New York, she finally does meet up with Carol.
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Carol tells her that she lost everything in the divorce, including custody of her daughter. But she
decided not to make any promises and not to fight, because she worries her daughter wouldn’t
want to see her anyway. She asks Therese if she wanted to join her in her furniture business
that she is starting. Therese shows no interest and declines the offer as she was scared that
Carol would betray her again. After this meeting with Carol, Therese goes for a party, where she
meets this woman named, Genevieve Cranell. She starts flirting with her and she is immediately
reminded of Carol. Then she realizes that she can't stop thinking of Carol, so it's Carol she
should be with. She leaves the party and finds Carol at a restaurant instead. She looks into her
grey colour less eyes and walks towards her.
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