Perry Smith quotations

"He preferred root beer. Three aspirin, cold root beer, and a chain of Pall Mall cigarettes" (12)

addict, chronic pain, cigarettes = nervous

"He was with all his worldly belongings: one cardboard suitcase, a guitar, and two big boxes of books and maps and songs"

itinerant, studious/hoarder, sophisticated, sentimental

"He was no taller than a twelve-year-old child"

childish, out of proportion, opposite to Mr Clutter

"His mother had been a full-blooded Cherokee; it was from her that he inherited his colouring"

"He had been intent on improving his companion's grammar and expanding his vocabulary ever since they had celled together at Kansas State Penitentiary"

Willie Jay: "You are a man of extreme passion, a hungry man not sure where his appetite lies, a deeply frustrated man striving to project his individuality against a backdrop of rigid conformity"

"But Dick became convinced that Perry was that rarity, "a natural born killer""

"When he was seven years old, a hated, hating half-breed living in a California orphanage run by nuns - shrouded disciplinarians who whipped him for wetting his bed"

"He was in some measure a prude"

"The oversized torso supported by the undersized legs"

"Now Mexico, a new chance, "a really living life""

" 'Know what I think?' said Perry. 'I think there must be something wrong with us. To do what we did.' "

" 'But a n*gger,' said Perry. 'That's different.' "

"His mother, an alcoholic, had strangled to death on her own vomit"

"(Perry was 'ashamed' to take off his trousers... for he was afraid that the sight of injured legs would 'disgust' people... He hadn't once gone in the water)"

"And in one of his dreams, a tall yellow bird had hauled him to heaven"

Perry's dad: "Perry is no Angel (sic) he has done wrong many times same as many kids"

"Perry does not have much schooling I don't either... (sic)" (Perry's father)

"Only Dad wouldn't help me. He told me to be good and hugged me and went away"

"The queens on ship wouldn't leave me alone"

"(My hands): 'They wanted to choke him (my dad) to death'"

"He cries so easily... he used to cry because he thought a sunset was so beautiful... He can make you feel sorry for him." (sister Barbara speaking)

"The terrible destinies that seemed promised the four children of Florence Buckskin and Ted John Smith..."

"A sign of approaching panic - "Bubbles in my blood" "

"He had 'no respect for people who can't control themselves sexually' "

"As a child he had often thought of killing himself"

"Anyway, he couldn't see that he had 'a lot to live for'. Hot islands and buried gold, diving deep in fire-blue seas towards sunken treasure - such dreams were gone. Gone, too, was "Perry O' Parsons"..."

"Goodbye, Perry. Dick was sick of him - his harmonica, his aches and ills, his superstitions, the weepy, womanly eyes, the nagging whispering voice. Suspicious, self-righteous, spiteful, he was like a wife that must be got rid of"

"It was Perry. I couldn't stop him. He killed them all" (Dick)

"I never killed any n*ggers"

"Dick, and all his talk about a rich man's safe, and here I am crawling on my belly to steal a child's silver dollar. One dollar. And I'm crawling on my belly to get it"

"Dick was plotting something I wouldn't stand for" (With regard to the Clutter girl)

"Now that's something I despise. Anybody who can't control themselves sexually. Christ, I hate that kind of stuff. I told him straight"

"I didn't want to harm the man. I thought he was a very nice gentleman. Soft-spoken. I thought so right up to the moment that I cut his throat"

"Then I aimed the gun. The room just exploded"

"Then I could have judged for myself how gentle Mr Smith was" (Josie Meier)

"It (the table) was where he sat when he sketched portraits of Red, drew flowers, and the face of Jesus, and the faces and torsos of imaginary women" (Josie)

"Drove like hell, Dick driving. I think we both felt very high. I did. Very high and relieved at the same time. Couldn't stop laughing, neither of us; suddenly it all seemed very funny - I don't know why, it just did"

"Throughout his life - the yellow bird, huge and parrot-faced, had soared across Perry's dreams, an avenging angel who had savaged his enemies or, as now, rescued him in moments of mortal danger"

"My mother was always drunk, never in a fit condition to properly provide and care for us. There was no rule or discipline, or anyone to show me the right from wrong"

"Perry said, "Priests and nuns have had their chance with me. I'm still wearing the scars to prove it" "

"And it wasn't because of anything the Clutters did. They never hurt me. Like other people. Like other people have all my life"... "life... Maybe it's just that the Clutters were the ones who has to pay for it"

"Maybe we're not human"

"By the way, it was like picking off targets at a shooting gallery"

"He seems to have grown up without direction, without love, and without ever absorbing any fixed moral values..." (Dr Jones' potential but unheard testimony)

"Perry Smith. My God. He's had such a rotten life." (Logan Green)

"They both laughed loudly, and a cameraman photographed them. The picture appeared in a Kansas newspaper above a caption entitled: "The Last Laugh?" "

"But Smith, though he was the true murderer, aroused another response, for Perry possessed a quality, the aura of an exiled animal, a creature walking wounded, that the detective could not disregard" (Alvin Dewey)

"The dwarfish boy-man seated in the metal chair, his small booted feet not quite brushing the floor"

"But Perry - there was, in Dick's opinion, "something wrong" with Little Perry"

"There was this one nurse, she used to call me "ngger" and say there wasn't any difference between nggers and Indians. Oh Jesus, was she an Evil B*stard" Incarnate. What she used to do, she'd fill a tub with ice cold water, put me in it, and hold me until I was blue."

"I finished the third grade," Perry recalled, "which was the finish""

"From this time on I started to realize the importance of an education. This only added to the hatred and bitterness I felt for others. I began to get into fights"

"You think I like myself? Oh, the man I could have been! But that bastard never gave me a chance. He wouldn't let me go to school. O.K. O.K. I was a bad kid. But the time came I begged to go to school. I happen to have a brilliant mind. In case you don't know. A brilliant mind and talent plus. But no education, because he didn't want me to learn anything, only how to tote and carry for him. Dumb. Ignorant. That's the way he wanted me to be"

"There's much I haven't said that may interest you. I have always felt a remarkable exhilaration being among people with a purpose and a sense of dedication to carry out that purpose"

"Dick wore bathing trunks, but Perry, as in Acapulco, refused to expose his injured legs - he feared the sight might "offend" other beach-goers - and therefore sat fully clothed, even wearing socks and shoes"

"Happy disposition - yes and no, very serious if mistreated he never forgets" (Perry's father)

"If he sees that the Boss appreciates his work he will go out of his way for him. Tell him in a pleasant way how you want it done. He is very touchie [...] How well I know that Perry is goodhearted if you treat him rite" (Perry's father)

"Dad snatched a biscuit out of my hand, and said I ate too much, what a selfish, greedy bastard I was, and why didn't I get out, he don't want me there no more. He carried on like that till I couldn't stand it. My hands got hold of his throat. My hands, but I couldn't control them. They wanted to choke him to death"

"I told him [Herb] it wasn't long till morning, and how in the morning somebody would find them, and that all of it, me and Dick and all, would seem like something they dreamed. I wasn't kidding him. I didn't want to harm the man"