In Cold Blood: Objective or Subjective?

In the non-fiction novel In Cold Blood,   Capote suggests sympathy for the murderers. This idea is not clear until section 19, when Capote quotes the criticism of the Clutter family by one of the Holcomb citizens, Myrtle Clare. By voicing her criticism, Capote suggests that the Clutters were not like by everyone. This provides the motive for the murders. Dick and Perry, the pair responsible for the murder of the Clutter family, are portrayed as having a reason for carrying out the murders. Throughout the non-fiction novel, Capote describes what their lives were like and what led to the tragic event. In Cold Blood is a subjective view of the killings and the people who were involved.
Part one of In Cold Blood reveals the issues Perry had with his father. In the scene of a restaurant, Perry is reading the newspaper and sees a section about the crime. “In the solitary, comfortless course of his recent driftings, Perry had over and over again reviewed this indictment, and he decided it was unjust. He did give a damn – but who had ever given a damn about him? His father?” – (pg. 45) As Perry is thinking about what he has done, he realized that he actually felt a little guilty, but then remembered that no one cared about him, so why should he care about four people he never knew? This is his mind-set while he is analyzing what had happened in the Clutter house.

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In part two, Perry rereads a letter he had received from his sister, Barbara, who he despised. He only kept it for one reason – his friend, Willie-Jay, had read it and wrote his own analysis of the letter. Capote included this letter in th enovel because it relates to the way he cared for Perry. Even though Perry hated his sister, it shows that she at one point had cared had cared about him enough to write it, She wrote, “I truthfully feel none of us have anyone to blame for whatever we have done with our own personal lives. It has been proven that at the age of seven most of us have reached the...