The Genesis of William March's "The Bad Seed"

William March’s 1954 runaway best-seller The Bad Seed opened a window for the general public into the etiology and presentation of psychopathy.¹ His portrayal of Rhoda Penmark, an 8-year-old girl, is chilling as he recounts the circumstances of several murders that she committed. Her audacity, boldness, unfeeling, and calculated designs belie the feigned innocence she projects. Preeminent psychopathy researcher Robert D. Hare characterized her as “a budding psychopath” and noted that “this novel is remarkably true to life.” ² Did March’s characterization of Rhoda coincidentally mirror psychopathic traits? Or was he intentionally trying to create a vivid picture of what psychopathy might look like in children?

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Some of Rhoda Penmark’s psychopathic traits

What sort of child was Rhoda Penmark? Her mother noted that she had been “something of a riddle since babyhood.” ³ Already at a young age, she was markedly different from her classmates. On the surface, she was a picture of perfection. Octavia Fern, a teacher and head of the school, tells Rhoda’s mother, Christine, that “Rhoda was one of the most satisfactory pupils the school ever had. She was the only child in the history of the school who’d made a hundred in deportment... and a hundred in self-reliance and conservation, each month... for a full school year.” ⁴

Octavia’s sister, Burgess, however, raises a red flag when she follows this by saying, “The simple fact is that she doesn’t need others the way most of us do.” ⁵ Octavia then warns, “You will not be able to change her.” ⁶

These remarks echoed those from another school the year before that asked for Rhoda to be removed. She was described as a “cold, self-sufficient, difficult child who lived by rules of her own, and not by the rule of others. She was a fluent and most convincing liar… and a quite accomplished little thief.” ⁷

March’s obsession with “planned evilness”

March, a survivor of battles in World War I, suffered trauma, physical and psychological injury from the battle horrors witnessed and endured.⁸ He was a victim of mustard gas attacks. Thereafter, predictably, he was haunted by the interplay of good and evil in the world, as evidenced by human relations. In particular, he focused much attention on “planned evilness,” as he called it.⁹ His archived papers reveal his almost obsessive interest in the details of serial murderers.¹⁰

Dr. Edward Glover’s perspective on the roots of psychopathy

During the mid-1930s, while in London, March began an extensive period of psychoanalysis with Dr. Edward Glover, one of the most renowned psychiatrists of the period.¹¹ Glover had dedicated much of his practice during this period to addressing juvenile delinquency and character disorders of youth. In 1931, he was one of the founders of the Psychopathic Clinic, which was dedicated to the study and remediation of juvenile delinquency.¹² Glover publicly declared that “the violent temper, egocentrism, destructive habits, and sexual impulses observed in the criminal type labeled psychopathic” might, in many cases, be traceable to infancy.¹³ This suggested the possibility of some genetic component.

March’s reliance on Dr. Glover’s theories in writing The Bad Seed

As a patient of Dr. Glover, March was undoubtedly very much aware of the work and reputation of Glover with delinquents. This appears to have been the genesis for his concept of a serial-murdering child that otherwise could appear innocent and above reproach. He spoke to a colleague as early as 1938, 16 years before the publication of The Bad Seed, to say that he was considering writing a book about a homicidal little girl.¹⁴ Years later, while writing the story in 1952, he remarked, “I’ve had a frightening day. I’m writing the story of a very wicked little girl, and she is beginning to terrify me.” ¹⁵

The story reveals an inter-generational link to psychopathy through Rhoda’s maternal grandmother, which even her mother had not been aware of until near the end of the book.

March was afraid of the little girl he wrote about, working for one year on his novel that would go on to shock the world. Its commercial success was because it was so shocking—no one could believe that a little girl could be evil. What is worse, “As far as he was concerned, it was practically all heredity….¹⁶ If, as Glover had suggested, and as Marsh wrote, heredity matters, then it was possible the child was that way from birth—a little baby could be the bad seed. Now that is shocking!