Truman Capote - In Cold Blood - Book Critique Book Review

Cold blood is one of the best classical non-fiction books and was written by Truman Capote in the year 1966.This author is one of the best in screen writing. Many of his short stories, plays and nonfiction have for years been recognized like novella breakfast at Tiffany’s. In that era the American justice and legal system was heavily biased and only few writers were ready to criticize these acts. In this book, Capote goes into details about the murder of Hubert clutter who was a farmer from Holcomb and also how his two of the four children and wife were killed. Truman learnt of the murder before the capturing of the killers and so he decided to travel in time to write about the crime. In his journey he was accompanied by Harper lee who was a fellow author and also a child hood friend. Together they were able to go round and interview the local residents and went ahead to the investigators who had been assigned to deal with the case. Though the murderers were arrested Capote did not quit and for the next six years he would work on the book. In it he was able to examine about two paroles that had together committed murder. He goes further and shows the lives of these victims and the impact that the killings brought in the community where the victims lived. This paper tries to analyze and come up with a full comprehension of the book like the journalistic and novelistic techniques that the author applies, investigative techniques and the sources used, brief summary by referring to the book before considering if it’s a legitimate form of journalism.
The book is divided into four sections and each of them is like a vignette these are “The last to see them”, “persons unknown”, “answer” and “the corner”. The book brings in the art of non-fiction novel by the missing information which the author fills. Truman tries his best to deliver a good job by recreating the happening before the actual murder took place. He gives a subjected view concerning Holcomb in the introduction, but he makes sure that he has described it skillfully and tries to bring out the differences considering the quiet town and the events which were to take place there. The author does an extensive research and comes up with a good formulated picture of the events that happened that day. He tries a technique where he splits the story into two and then moving from one scene to another like from the clutter family next to the murderers. With this kind of order ,the reader is allowed to constantly follow or be aware of what is taking place and also where the act happened which leaves them wanting to more after every scene.
Capote also uses a third person which is considered as an omniscient point of view when writing novel and non-fiction to be specific. In this type of view he is able to convey what the character has in mind or their thoughts. This in turn allows the reader to be inside the mind of the character making them experience first-hand emotional experience of each scene. An example show the conversation of a dead girl called Nancy Clutter is reconstructed. Any time she appears in the narrative she has witnesses to what she does or say like phone call or conversation. The In cold blood can be seen to be much more effective when it modifies the truth. This is because these little bits of added information are the reason behind changing the tragic occurrence in what might be referred as a gripping story. Truman has developed new journalism; this is a new style of writing that is a cross between literature and new journalism. The epitome of his new found genre is his book in the blood where he begins unusual style of interviewing. In this Truman told the subject a certain amount of information which was about him, this then reverses the role and gives the subject the feeling of wanting to be the interviewer. After this the subject loses the inhibition and shares the story with Truman. From this Truman idealizes a writing style which has a unique formula. With this Capote is able to identify at least for common narrative techniques that may be able to characterize the style like construction of the scene to detail, instead of using subjective quotes it’s alternated with a complete dialogue from interview, point of view variation and details of the characters in the story.
In some parts of the book journalistic tools can be seen being used by Truman this through observation. By him visiting Holcomb, Kansas and opting not to read about it helps him in trying to paint a visual for his readers to understand. One example of the technique in the book reads,” most of the locals had accents which were barbed with a prairie twang, many of the men wore narrow frontier trousers, Stetsons and had boots which were high heeled with pointed toes”. The most important journalistic technique seen in the book is research. Truman does ascertain the factual information which comes out as the backbone of the entire story. Truman also uses investigative technique. It’s first seen when he interviews people in the town. He also goes ahead to gather his evidence by interviewing the individuals who involved in the case directly, such as smith and Hickok who are witnesses to the crime that had been performed. Capotes also investigates by collecting documents from the court and even other journals.
According to the writing of the book it can be categorized as a legitimate journalism. This is because Capote uses reporting which is one of the journalism techniques and how he sets up the novel to have timeless quality concerning the causes of the events. He shows again this technique when he chooses murder as a theme which he will not darken with time. He also uses other skills of journalism such as research and observation; he goes to the scene of crime and collects information. This is to the extent of interviewing the residents and investigators of the case. He also observes even how the town is affected this is evidence that this is a form of legitimate journalism.
In conclusion the book is an end result of investigation which involved visiting the affected communities, interviewing people and observing .Truman has proven that it’s a true non-fictional novel by using third persons but also goes straight to showing the reader facts .Journalism techniques are seen coming out strongly through research which he does in length and again shows reporting skills by how he wisely chooses his themes which have endless time. The book also can be categorized as legitimate journalism since Truman capote has shown most of the journalism techniques.