Truman Capote (In Cold Blood, Breakfast at Tiffanys) was born Truman Streckfus Persons on September 30, 1924, in New Orleans. He was an accomplished short story writer. He is rarely mentioned with other New Orleans literati. Damn shame. Don't have to tell you he was an excellent writer.
I recently read his short story collection, The Early Stories of Truman Capote, and enjoyed it very much.
When In Cold Blood came out, I was in high school and remember my English teacher describing the book as a non-fiction novel. We call it true-crime today. Years later, my father casually mentioned he worked on the Clutter Case. An army CID Agent at Fort Riley, Kansas (The Clutter murders were in Finney County, Kansas), he and other CID agents assisted the Kansas Bureau of Investigation (KBI) because one of the killers left a bloody boot print on the scene. It was an army combat boot. They found no connection to any soldiers at Fort Riley, but one of the killers, Perry Edward Smith was a US Army veteran, having served in the Korean War, as did my father. Small world.
It's been reported that the acerbic Gore Vidal, when learning of Capote's death, called it "a wise career move." Such are the wages of celebrity.
That's all for now.
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What a splendid cover for the Penguin edition
ReplyDeleteI remember reading "In Cold Blood" as a young teenager and just being stunned at the sheer brutality of the crime; as if the killers had showed up at the Ingalls house in the Little House books and slaughtered them all. Stunning.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, his short stories were very good, too.