Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood is a contradiction.
This journalistic jewel is a story within a story and then a story within that, something that could be merely labeled a chronicle of events in a murder trial but just as easily could be named an investigation into what makes humans so uniquely human. As the reader, you want answers, which eventually will come, but you want those solid, completely true answers, those answers that will define exactly what is good and the way you should feel. You don’t get those answers. You get the facts and you get the chance to decipher those facts and wonder “Why?”. As in, “Why do I care so much about this deceased family of four but equally care about their murderers?”.
Maybe In Cold Blood is this contradiction I named because the writer represented such a contradiction as he wrote it. Truman Capote, a manifestation of high-brow, white collar creativity and a man that called the chaotic, narcissistic penthouses of New York City home, spent six years researching and writing this murder investigation in the town of Holcomb, Kansas. He describes the town in the opening sentence of the book as a place that, “stands on the high wheat plains of western Kansas, a lonesome area that other Kansans call ‘out there’.” On the same note, it makes sense that an openly homosexual man researching both a town and a family that resonated of “Protestant work ethic” (particularly the Protestant part) would create a piece that challenged the mind with contradiction.
Or maybe we, humans, are all contradictions in ourselves.
Capote’s book is like the endless and mountainous swells of waves seen in a deep sea ocean storm, where one constantly reaches the pinnacle of a swell only to be thrust into the valley below moments later. This is the structure of the book. Masterfully, the story is woven together, constantly switching the focus of each chapter while simultaneously progressing the story along. Each chapter serves a purpose, though often indirectly, whether it be explaining the childhood of Perry Smith (one of the murderers), painting a portrait of a local waitress in Holcomb, or listing the interrogation of a victim’s boyfriend. Often to accomplish this, the author uses primary resources--documents written by the characters themselves or interviews done by the police. At times, these accounts are the most powerful and most revealing.
Regardless of the tact taken by the author, the job is accomplished magnificently and this metaphor of a wave does feel fitting. Each section is something both new and old, something that reminds you of a previous chapter but most obviously isn’t the same. Finally, you understand the significance of, say the waitress at the local diner, only to reach the end of the section and move onto a new character or a new twist in the case. You go up and down, comprehending the importance of what you read, only to find something new that you don’t understand.
Continuing this metaphor, the story is choppy. This is not to say that the book doesn’t read well, but in that, you learn everything in bits and pieces. You don’t read one long chapter on what makes Perry Smith the conundrum that he is but in dozens of smaller but telling stories that piece together his complicated past and childish dreams. Likewise, you don’t truly understand Holcomb through the original, traditional history he gives until after you learn about the waitress, the train station, and the friends of the murdered family. Perhaps, Capote’s greatest skill is this ability to weave these literary threads into a complete and masterful tapestry.
However, I would be lying if I said there was never a dull moment. There are, in fact, many dull moments, moments when you beg for the next chapter so don’t have to learn yet another detail about Person X or Event Y. But life is boring and that’s what this book is--life. The sections aren’t brief glimpses into the characters but rather a revealing of what exactly makes up nearly every single person involved. It may be boring at times, but it is a boredom that is required.
Perhaps, the most interesting and most complicated aspect of the entire piece is the reader’s own emotions. As you read, you have these expectations of what a murder mystery is--good family, evil murderers, and a solved case. Technically, you get all three of those in this book, particularly the good family. But the other two leave you feeling uneasy because you feel something. Could it be pity? Are you pitying a killer? And the case is solved, but is it really? Should we reevaluate what insanity really is? Suddenly, your expectations for a murder mystery implode because the expectations turn out not to satisfy you, leading you to a “happy ending” that really doesn’t feel happy at all.
This is a novel, yet is a true story, written by an New York City author in rural Kansas. It is book that doesn’t take you from Point A to Point B and so on but from Point A to a random assortment of points but still ending on the correct point. It’s boringly informative like a documentary you watch in class but riveting enough that you perpetually tell yourself that you will put it down after the next chapter.You feel regret, sorrow, and pity as you read about the shotguns taken to the heads of the beautiful family in Kansas, which mirror the emotions felt as one reads about the execution of the people who shot them.
It is a story of a murdered family, murderers, and the archetypal good versus bad. It is a story that reevaluates evil, insanity, prison, and human nature, in general. Most importantly, it is a story of contradiction, a contradiction that deserves to be read by all.
