Kahla Wilson pd. 1 In Cold Blood
Capote’s first chapter, ‘The last to see them alive,’ is simply the day before the Clutters die, yet he writes in a way that makes the reader understand each character more than just the few things they did on the last day alive. Capote goes into a whole background check on each of the characters, and gets the reader acquainted with each person’s life and attitude and feelings. When the family is killed and Capote goes into all the gruesome details of the deaths, the reader feels drawn to the deaths and almost sympathetic over the lives lost. In a way, the reader feels like the towns people did, and wants revenge and justice. Yet, Capote has also lets us as readers into the lives of the killers. As the book progresses, we feel more sympathetic to them as well, even though they committed such a crime, and the author presents the townspeople as more of the criminals. The townspeople were frightened for their own lives, which is understandable, but they accused one another. Before the deaths, everyone in town new everyone else’s life and motives, yet after the deaths, people stopped trusting each other, and locking their doors for fear of them being the next victim.
As the story progresses we get to know Perry and Dick, the two murderers, even more as we venture into their private lives and thoughts. By the end, Perry is the round character, who changes from a person that could easily kill anyone, to thinking he’s messed up for what he did and can’t believe he went through with it. Perry blames his childhood a lot on what crimes he commits. He believes that it’s simply in his blood to commit crimes just because his family did. Dick on the other hand is flat. He doesn’t seem to change through out the book at all. Even when he was in prison he sent out letters to try to find anyone who would support him in court, as if he didn’t deserve to be there. As if the crimes he committed didn’t matter. As if he hadn’t taken away four young lives for no profit at all but to just do it and prove that he could. He even wanted to rape poor Nancy, but luckily Perry refused to allow it. Dick’s nickname is ironic in that way, and also because in one part of the book he is having sex with a prostitute, and just in general likes women and has been married twice with children. He also seems to be a little “messed up” since he likes to hit stray mangy dogs on the side of the road when they pass them. Strange as it is, this seems a sport to him, especially when he comments on splashing the dogs’ blood everywhere.
It seems right that Perry had the mental disorder. He seemed to be suffering from something from the childish way he acted throughout the novel. Perry kind of reminds a reader in this way of just a small boy who was beat up on the play ground by everyone who turns around and beats up some other kid. Though, he still strikes the reader as ‘messed up’ he also seems just misunderstood. It was blatantly obvious he had some kind of mental disorder after Capote through in the part about that Perry sees a big bird that comes and saves him whenever he has had his heart broken or someone else has hurt him in some way. This big bird sort of reminds readers of like Big Bird from Sesame Street, just a lovable guy that hugs the little children and comes to their aid and breaks up fights and teaches valuable life lessons. It’s also interesting that though Perry seems to have no Christian outlook on life and seems to be an atheist his role model and mentor was like a priest, by being associated with a chaplain.