In Cold Blood

2. In Cold Blood • A work of creative non-fiction • Written like a novel, but true. • Not necessarily chronological • Told from alternating points of view

3. Truman Capote • Born 1925 • Childhood friend of Nell Harper Lee • Novel first serialized in The New Yorker in 1965 • Novel launched his career to the high society circles • Died 1984

4. Capote first learned of the murders through an article in the New York Times

5. Invention • After reading that article, Capote was interested in how crime like this would affect a small, American town like Holcomb. • Convinced his current employer, The New Yorker, to send him to Kansas to investigate • Harper Lee helped with the interviews • Uses accounts told by others prior to meeting those involved with the case, as well as accounts of his own personal interviews with the murderers

6. The New Journalism • Journalism that is characterized by the reporter’s subjective interpretations and often features fictionalized dramatized elements to emphasize personal involvement. • Term coined by Tom Wolfe who wrote the book entitled The New Journalism • Capote’s In Cold Bloodis considered to fall into this category although he called it a “nonfiction novel” • Said to “dethrone” the novel as the #1 literary genre at the time. • First reaction from many was that it wasn’t factual

7. Law and Order

8. Setting

9. The road to the Clutter home

10. The village of Holcomb stands on the high wheat plains of western Kansas, a lonesome area that other Kansans call “outthere.” Clutter Family Home (as it stands today)

11. Law… • The Victims • The Criminals • The Witnesses • The Investigators

12. The Victims

13. Herb Clutter • Head of the Clutter household • Well-liked, respected member of the Holcomb community • Fairly prosperous

14. Bonnie Clutter • Wife of Herb Clutter • Mother of four • A recluse

15. Nancy Clutter • Daughter of Herb and Bonnie Clutter • Well-liked and popular • Bright, energetic, responsible • Dating Bobby Rupp

16. Kenyon Clutter • Son of Herb and Bonnie Clutter • Quiet and reserved • Enjoys working with his hands • Fifteen years old

17. The Criminals

18. Perry Smith • Convicted thief • Sentenced to Kansas State Penitentiary • Met Dick Hickock in jail

19. Dick Hickock • Inmate in Kansas State Penitentiary • Friend of Perry Smith • Learned of Clutter family from fellow inmate Floyd Wells

20. Floyd Wells • Past employee of Herb Clutter • Tells Hickcock that the Clutters are wealthy • Connects Hickcock and Smith to the deaths of the Clutters

21. The Investigators KBI

22. Alvin Dewey • Main detective in the Clutter investigation • Acquaintance of Herb Clutter

23. Other Investigators KBI Supervisor Al Dewey, County Attorney Duane West, Sheriff Earl Robinson, and KBI Agent Clarence Duntz. (left to right)

24. “At the time not a soul in sleeping Holcomb heard them – four shotgun blasts that, all told, ended six human lives. But afterward the townspeople, theretofore sufficiently unfearful of each other to seldom trouble to lock their doors, found fantasy re-creating them over and again – those somber explosions that stimulated fires of mistrust in the glare of which many old neighbors viewed each other strangely, and as strangers.” ~~In Cold Blood p.5