Arkham Asylum
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The Elizabeth Arkham Asylum for the Criminally Insane,
a fictional psychiatric hospital and prison:
part of the DC comics and first appearing in Batman #258, 1974,
referred to as the Arkham Asylum situated in the area of Gotham City:
originally the family home of Elizabeth Arkham and her son, the founder.
(Elizabeth died by suicide but actually her son Amadeus murdered her.)
Dr. Amadeus Arkham, a man who eventually also becomes mentally ill,
it is a tall spiralling castle-like structure with narrow halls:
consisting of rooms, padded cells, treatment rooms, and labs,
and is located on an island along a river inside Gotham City;
surrounded by slums called The Narrows eventually uninhabitable.
(But, in all the different comics, books, films it explained differently.)
It has a long and brutal history beginning with the architect,
who hacked his workers to death with an axe:
patients are tortured, drugged, and used for sadistic experiments,
it has a multi-layered and intricate history with different points of view;
patients range from insane to those with odd treatments required.
The founders wife and daughter were raped, mutilated and murdered there,
by Mad Dog Hawkins - but Dr. Arkham found him:
and electrocuted him calling it an accident, there were lots of accidents,
the asylum appears in many DC comics, Graphic Novels, films and games;
there are even stories of patients reverting to cannibalism.
The majority of Batman's adversaries ended up at Arkham,
Joker, Riddler, Penguin, Mr. Freeze, Emerald Empress:
Mad Dog Hawkins, Scarecrow, Two Face, Doctor Destiny, Poison Ivy,
Clayface, Nocturna, Junkyard Dog, Mad Hatter, Great White Shark;
Dr. Amadeus Arkham, Dr. Jeremiah Arkham, and many others.
(Batman had a hidden cave in the sub basement called NW Batcave.)
The asylum throughout the different versions is damaged,
demolished, ad destroyed many times only to be rebuilt, reborn:
is featured in numerous stories with different names and histories,
but always a place for the criminally insane and mentally unwell;
always a place of unimaginable evil, horror and death.
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December 21, 2022
Poetry/Narrative/Arkham Asylum
Copyright Protected, ID 12-1510-311-21
All Rights Reserved, 2022, Constance La France
Written for the Premiere contest, Arkham Asylum
sponsor, Robert James Liguori, Judged 01/14/2023
First Place
Copyright © Constance La France | Year Posted 2022
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