I should also clarify that it was not the 'pursuit of something real' that caused Bateman to become pure evil, but that it was his situation and society that caused him to see the only escape being something so far removed from "sanity" (ironically, it was also society that had lost sanity and their own ways of life could be compared to that of murder, rape, and all the other savage things that Bateman found himself doing).
It was represented in a physical way. He felt blood and flesh in every was possible. It's only implied in the novel that Price/Bryce found 'something real' through spirituality, coming back with his knowledge of how the world truly works; (almost) everything is a lie and (almost) everyone is a liar.
And it seems the same thing can be observed in The Dark Knight Rises. Bane has pursued what I'll call 'the real,' in both directions. Bane is out for blood and at the same time seems to have somewhat of an understanding of the world around him. However, the expectation of him being a revolutionary is subverted by the revelation that he is in fact engaging in a form of double-think quite like Adolf Hitler and the National "Socialist" Party (a comparison can be made to 1984, in which Ing-Soc stands against everything that socialism stands for) and in actuality is a patsy for the underground Reich with his only goal being detonating the bomb in order to excuse and reign in marshal law in the States (Calverhall, Serpent's Walk).