What makes psychopaths, as characterized in modern psychiatry and portrayed in literature and film, such fascinating figures? What is it about their evident lack of morality that transfixes our imagination as it chills our souls? To describe them, as they were once described, as moral imbeciles, does not even begin to convey the peculiarity of their condition. Though amoral, they appear nevertheless to be capable of reasoning, weighing evidence, estimating future consequences, understanding the norms of their society, anticipating the blame and condemnation that result from violation of those norms, and using these cognitive skills to make and carry out their plans. Some have been described as highly intelligent and socially adept, people whose gift for facile, ingratiating conversation can beguile even those already alerted to their pathology. The swiftness of their thought plainly does not fit with the ideas of stupidity and feeblemindedness that the older description carries.

Nor are psychopaths well described as maniacs, pyro-, klepto-, homicidal, or otherwise. They are persistent wrongdoers, to be sure, but they are not or not necessarily driven to commit their misdeeds. No inner compulsion or violent emotion is essential to their disorder. Think of Richard Hickock as depicted in Capote's In Cold Blood, or Bruno C. Anthony, brilliantly portrayed by Robert Walker in Hitchcock's Strangers on a Train.