Summary Of Truman Capote's In Cold Blood

Although in Truman Capote’s book In Cold Blood, the author is illustrating the points of view of Holcomb, Dick, and Perry after the murder of the Clutter family, his prime motive is to exploit the devastation felt by the community; therefore, he accomplishes this by emphasizing the agony, confusion, and panic experienced by a loss. Capote uses tricolon to help convey the dark blanket of emotions that overcame Holcomb after the murders, which one can see from the perspective of Agent Alvin Dewey’s family. One night after the death of the Clutter family, Mrs. Dewey hears one of her normally untroubled sons crying in his room, and again at their breakfast table the next morning: “His mother had not needed to ask him why [he was crying]; she …show more content…
A few days after the tragedy, she visited the funeral home with Nancy’s boyfriend, Bobby Rupp, to see and say goodbye to the deceased, and caught a glimpse of them--a glimpse that sickened her. While the Clutters were nicely dressed, “the head of each was completely encased in cotton, a swollen cocoon twice the size of an ordinary blown-up balloon, and the cotton, because it had been sprayed with a glossy substance, twinkled like Christmas-tree snow” (Capote 95). His imagery, used to describe the largeness and shininess of the cocoons elicit multiple, often clashing thoughts. On one hand, pleasant and reminiscent feelings at the thoughts of Christmas trees and balloons emerge, while on the other, feelings of discomfort and dismay arise when one realizes there are horrifically disfigured human heads encased inside those “cocoons.” These feelings provide insight to how Susan felt when she saw this sight, and the juxtaposing ideas clash together creating a confusing and frightening scene like one out of a horror