Language Specificity as Pattern of Redemption in The Thanatos Syndrome

Redemption is the central theme of Walker Percy's novel, 'The Thanatos Syndrome.' Dr. Tom More, the story's hero, unsuccessfully tries to cure patients of the fictitious psychiatric condition in the book's title, which is the inability to speak in sentences more than a few words long. More continues to attempt to help his patients achieve redemption by discovering a sense of self but fails to understand his own need for wholeness.