Thoughts on Capote and Perry Smith

It is fascinating to me, that a man can see the work of the devil, and still worship him.

The man in this case, being Truman Capote, and the devil being Perry Smith.

Smith and his cohort, Dick Hickock brutally murdered four members of the Clutter family in 1959. Capote, an established writer, author of “Other Voices, Other Rooms” and “Breakfast at Tiffany’s”, transplanted himself from his lavish New York lifestyle to the small, country town of Holcomb, Kansas to cover the story.

Capote became a part of the community and along with Nelle Harper Lee, conducted hours of interviews and compiled thousands of pages of notes for his book.

He became fascinated with Smith after interviewing him. He learned that he and Smith had come from very similar upbringings.

“It’s like perry and I grew up in the same house and one day he got up and walked out the back door and I walked out the front,” Capote said.

Capote’s father and mother divorced when he was 4 and he was sent to live with his aunt in Alabama. He later moved to New York to be with his mother and stepfather, who adopted him.

Perry spent his childhood taking care of his alcoholic mother and three siblings, and off and on spent time with his father. He quickly fell into a life of crime and continued on that path until his final arrest.

While journalists typically supposed to insert themselves into their story, Capote could have possibly changed his. He found and paid for new lawyers for Hickock and Smith’s appeal because they had not received a fair trial for the Clutter murders. He also brought in famous fashion photographer Richard Avedon to photograph the murderers.

Capote ushered in a new era of celebrity where everyone is famous, even the criminals.

Not only were the Clutter murders and the subsequent trial a turning point for American journalism, but it changed Capote himself.

No one will ever know what “In Cold Blood” took out of me. It scraped me right down to the marrow of my bones. It nearly killed me. I think, in a way, it did kill me.”

Capote saw the grey area of a human’s good and badness. He saw that while people make decisions, so much of a persons life can determined by where they start. Bad things happen to people and some people let it affect them and others don’t. Everyone is affected, even if it isn’t in some profound way.

Time and time again, Capote challenged the status quo but after “In Cold Blood”, he was a changed man.

“He never finished another book after “In Cold Blood”. It made him rethink the death penalty. It rocked him to his core because he saw himself if he had possibly gone down another path. He became an alcoholic and died at age 59 from liver disease.

Its a sad ending, but maybe that’s what happens when you look beyond good and evil and peer into a mans soul, just to find a barren desert, long since forgotten and buried under years of loneliness and sorrow.

Reference:

• www.amazon.com/Cold-Blood-Truman-Capote/dp/0679745580
• www.biography.com/people/truman-capote-9237547
• www.youtube.com/watch?v=6xxGchy14pE