Content Warning: This guide discusses explicit usage of illegal drugs, depictions of drug addiction, depictions of mental illness, depictions of violence (sexual, domestic, racial, and graphic), as well as stereotypes of racial and ethnic minorities. This guide references language from the text concerning race and addiction which may be considered offensive. This study guide quotes and obscures the author’s use of the n-word.

Requiem for a Dream demonstrates the pervasive impact of addiction on individual lives, relationships, and aspirations. It also demonstrates the way that addiction affects people across racial and socioeconomic divides, as is depicted in the diversity of the main characters. The novel serves as a harrowing exploration of the destructive force of substance abuse, illustrating how the pursuit of dreams and the escape from reality can lead to tragic consequences. In this way, the theme of addiction is closely related to the theme of The Unattainable American Dream: Selby Jr. argues that it is the unattainable nature of this dream that causes people to chase tempting distractions to fill voids in their lives. Selby Jr. himself was no stranger to the ravages of opioid addiction; consequently, his depiction of Harry, Tyrone, Marion, and Sara’s life-ruining downward spiral, while dark and brutal, is not judgmental.