IN COLD BLOOD: IMPORTANT QUOTES

"Four shotgun blasts that, all told, ended six human lives."

First case of foreshadowing from Truman Capote's "In Cold Blood" which highlights the brutal and indiscriminate nature of the crime committed by Perry Smith and Dick Hickock, emphasizing the radiating effects of suffering.

"The village of Holcolmb stands in the high wheat plains of western Kansas, a lonesome area that other Kansans call 'out there'"

Introduces Holcolmb and the setting and atmosphere of the novel, conveying isolation and desolation.

"whisper of wind voices in the wind-bent wheat"

This quote captures the eerie and haunting ambiance of the Kansas landscape, illustrating the theme of isolation prevalent in Capote's "In Cold Blood". It evokes a sense of unease and reflects the profound emotional landscape of the characters.

"A family likably high-spirited, yet hard-

working and neighbourly and generous"

This quote describes the Clutter family, emphasizing their positive traits and contribution to the community in Holcolmb, Kansas. It underscores the stark contrast between their idyllic life and the tragedy that later befalls them.

"Six of us riding in an old truck, sleeping in it too."

Highlights the poverty and hardship of Perry’s upbringing, specifically rodeo show caravan life.

"[Dick] wanted to go on to college. Study to be an engineer. But we couldn't do it. Plain didn't have the money."

Dicks denied further education due to financial constraints, highlights the limitations of his upbringing and the impact of poverty on his dreams.

"What it comes down to is I want the diamonds more than I'm afraid of the snake."

This quote reflects Perry's hunger for wealth and success, revealing his willingness to take risks despite potential dangers, which ultimately shapes his choices and actions throughout the narrative.

"Always certain of what he wanted from the world, Mr. Clutter had in large measure obtained it"

This quote encapsulates Mr. Clutter's determination and success in achieving his goals, representing the ideal of the American Dream and the pursuit of happiness.

"All that belonged to [Mr Clutter], Dick, but he would never have it why should that son-of-a-bitch have everything, while he had nothing? Why should that 'big-shot bastard' have all the luck?"

This quote illustrates Dick's intense resentment and envy towards Mr. Clutter's and anybody elses wealth and success, revealing the deep-seated frustration and inequality that drive his actions and motivations.

"They [the Clutters] never hurt me. Like other people. Like people have all my life. Maybe it's just the Clutters were the ones that had to pay for it."

This quote reveals Perry's complex feelings of victimization and betrayal. It suggests that Perry sees that justice had to be dealt and knew the Clutters were not to blame for his suffering, highlighting his internal conflict and the misguided rationale for his actions.

"The murders represent a sudden, horrifying collision of two wildly divergent Americas."

Quote directly addresses the juxtaposition between the American Dream and the American struggle through link to the murders.

"he labored 18 hours a day"

Mr Clutters work day length

"Mrs. Clare raised her voice. "BECAUSE HE'S DEAD. And Bonnie, too. And Nancy. And the boy. Somebody shot them"

Delivery of the death notification Mrs Clare

"Towering bird, the yellow 'sort of parrot' . . . the parrot remained, a hovering avenger."

Perry’s feathery friend in the waiting cells

"Long, long table. You never imagined so much food. Oysters. Turkeys. Hot dogs. Fruit you could make into a million fruit cups. And, listen - it's every bit free."

Lots of food quote

"This is authentic. I've got a map. I've got the whole history. It was buried there back in 1821 - Peruvian bullion, jewellery. Sixty million dollars."

PLANS + DREAMS (PERRY CHILDISH DREAM)

"or in his imagination roam through the house he hoped to have, and through the garden he meant to plant, and under trees yet to be seeded. He was very certain that someday his own oasis of oaks and elms would stand upon those shadeless plains. Someday God willing."

Alvin Dewey’s dream for retirement.

"the dream of settling on his farm had not come true, for his wife's fear of living in that sort of isolation had never lessened."

Alvin Dewey’s dream prior to the murders and the outcome of the dream post murders is a representation of the communities post war anxieties.

"Perry urged Dick to fish 'we may never have another chance' . . . moments later Dick had forgotten his pain . . . Perry had hooked 'a big one'. Ten feet of soaring, plunging sailfish, it leaped, arched like a rainbow, dived, sank deep, tugged the line taut, rose, flew, fell, rose."

PLANS + DREAMS (P+D'S MOMENT OF LIVING THE DREAM)

"(this was during the Depression)"

CHILDHOOD (PERRY'S)

"there was this one nurse, she used to call me '*****' and say there wasn't any difference between *****s and Indians. Oh Jesus, was she an Evil Bastard! Incarnate. What she used to do, she'd fill a tub with ice-cold water, put me in it, and hold me under till I was blue. Nearly drowned."

CHILDHOOD (PERRY'S)

"to be murdered. To be murdered. No. no. there's nothing worse. Nothing worse than that. Nothing"

HOLCOMB (REACTION)

"But Dick always said if the chance of a real big score came up, he could rely on Perry Smith to go partners."

RELATIONSHIP (DICK + PERRY)

"Concussed his head in a car smash-up. After that, he wasn't the same boy."

Statement from Dicks father in the trial aiming for insanity plea.

"Dick never stopped asking me about the family. How many was they? What ages would the kids be now? Exactly how did you get to the house? How was it laid out? Did Mr. Clutter keep safe? . . . Next thing I knew, Dick was talking about killing Mr Clutter. Said him and Perry was gonna go out there and rob the place . . . how him and Perry was gonna tie them people up and gun them down."

CRIMINALITY (FAGEL)

"Perry O'Parsons', the name invented for the singing sensation of stage and screen."

PLANS + DREAMS (PERRY O'PARSONS)

"Perry O'Parsons had died without having ever lived"

Perry’s stage name, death

"But now that it was deprived of the late owner's dedicated attention, the first threads of decay's cobweb were being spun, A gravel rake lay rusting in the driveway; the lawn was parched and shabby . . . the abulances had driven across the tyre trcks were still visble"

Clutter house post murders, degrades much as their bodies would in the ground.

"The master of River Valley Farm, Herbert William Clutter"

PLANS + DREAMS (CLUTTER WEALTH/FARM)

"he was not as rich as the richest man in Holcomb . . . he was, however, the community's most widely known citizen"

WEALTH (MR. CLUTTER)

"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"

WEALTH (SILVER PENNY)

"I didn't realise what I'd done till I heard that sound. Like somebody drowning"

CRIMINALITY (PERRY)

"two thin grey toms . . . prowled the square, stopping to examine the cars . . . the cats were hunting for dead birds caught in the vehicles' engine grilles . . . 'because most of my life I've done what they're doing. The equivalent.'"

Perry likens himself to cats, a scavenger.

"he'd unscrewed the bulb, broken it, and with the broken glass cut his wrists and ankles . . . 'the walls of the cell fell away, the sky came down, I saw the big yellow bird"

PLANS + DREAMS (PERRY/BULB)

"throughout his life - as a child, poor and meanly treated, as a foot-loose youth, as an imprisoned man - the yellow bird . . . soared across Perry's dreams, an avenging angel who savaged his enemies or, as now, rescued him in moments of mortal danger"

Motif of the yellow bird used to tie together the suffering of Perry’s past, present and dreams.

"Hickock, too, was sharply dressed in clothes provided by his parents: trim blue-serge trousers, a white shirt, a narrow dark-blue tie"

WEALTH/BACKGROUND (DICK)

"Only Perry Smith, who owned neither jacket nor tie, seemed sartorially misplaced. Wearing an open-necked shirt (borrowed from Mr Meier) and blue jeans rolled up at the cuffs, he looked as lonely and inappropriate as a seagull in a wheat field"

Perry’s trial appearance, similie emphasises how out of place Perry looks in his relaxed clothing being tried for such a criminal act near all the people dressed so smartly.

"he woke up shouting, 'the bird is Jesus!'"

PLANS + DREAMS (PERRY/JESUS)

"Hickock, 33 years old, died first, at 12.41 a.m.; Smith, 36, died at 1.16 . . ."

Time and age of deaths, Perry and Dick.

"Dewey had watched them die"

DEATHS (DEWEY)

"the sudden rain rapped the high warehouse roof. The sound, not unlike the rat-a-tat-tat of parade drums"

DEATH

"'nice to see you,' Hickock said with his most charming smile; it was if as he were greeting guests at his own funeral"

DEATH (DICK'S LAST WORDS)

"the hangman coughed - impatiently lifted his cowboy hat and settled it again, a gesture somehow reminiscent of a turkey buzzard huffing, then smoothing its neck feathers"

DEATH (DICK)

"the trap-door opened, and Hickock hung for all to see a full twenty minutes before the prison doctor at last said, 'I pronounce the man dead"

DEATH (DICK)

"Smith recognized his old foe, Dewey . . . and grinned and winked at Dewey, jaunty and mischieous"

DEATH (PERRY)

"I don't believe in capital punishment"

DEATH (PERRY)

"it would be meaningless to apologise for what I did. Even inappropriate. But I do. I apologise"

DEATH (PERRY'S LAST WORDS)

"steps, noose, mask; . . . Dewey shut his eyes; he kept them shut until he heard a thud-snap that announces a rope-broken neck"

DEATH (PERRY)

"Dewey was certain that capital punishment is a deterrent to violent crime"

DEATH (DEWEY/CAPITAL PUNISHMENT)

"Hickock, who seemed to him 'a small-time chiseler who got out of his depth, empty and worthless.' 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"

DEATH (DEWEY'S VIEW)

"[Dewey] remembered his first meeting with Perry . . . - the dwarfish boy-man seated in the metal chair, his small booted feet not quite brushing the floor. And when Dewey now opened his eyes, that is what he saw: the same childish feet, tilted, dangling."

Perry’s death scene recountment as seen by Alvin Dewey maintains the juxtaposition of the two super structures of Perry, a child and a man, self expression and self destruction.

"Dewey had imagined that with the deaths of Smith and Hickock he would experience a sense of climax, release, of a design justly completed."

DEATH (DEWEY + CLUTTERS)

"Deaths, births, marriages - why, just the other day he'd heard that Nancy Clutter's boyfriend, young Bobby Rupp, had gone and got married"

FINAL (BOBBY)

"the graves of the Clutter family, four graves gathered under a single grey stone, lie in a far corner of the cemetery."

FINAL (GRAVES)

"This is my junior year at KU"

FINAL (SUSAN)

"Nancy and I planned to go to college together. We were going to be room-mates. I think about it sometimes. Suddenly, when I'm very happy I think of all the plans we made."

FINAL (SUSAN + NANCY)

"a pretty girl in a hurry, her smooth hair swinging, shining - just such a young woman as Nancy might have been."

FINAL (SUSAN)

"Whisper of wind voices in the wind-bent wheat"

FINAL (CONCLUSION)

"The village of Holcomb stands on the high wheat plains of Western Kansas"

HOLCOMB (OPENING LINE)

"the streets, unnamed, unshaded, unpaved"

HOLCOMB (ISOLATED)

"thickest dust into the direst mud"

HOLCOMB (JUXTAPOSE + DESCRIPTION)

"Near by is another building with an irrelevant sign" 'flaking' 'failed' ramshackle'

HOLCOMB (BANK + ADJECTIVES)

"not a man to ever raise his voice"

MR. CLUTTER (PERSONALITY)

"he wore rimless glasses and was of but average height"

MR. CLUTTER (DESCRIPTION)

"man's-man figure. His shoulders were broad, his hair had held its dark colour, his square-jawed confident face "

MR.CLUTTER (DESCRIPTION)

"Ordinarily, Mr Clutter's mornings began at six thirty; clanging milk pails and the whispery chatter of the boys who brought them"

MR. CLUTTER (ORDINARY MORNING)

"the handsome white house, standing on an ample lawn of groomed Bermuda grass, impressed Holcomb"

Description of Rivervalley farm

"if you caught a hired man drinking, out he'd go"

MR. CLUTTER (HIRE)

"A real Southern Belle"

NANCY CLUTTER (DESCRIPTION)

"Nancy, prepared the family meals."

NANCY (DESCRIPTION)

"Nancy was a pretty girl, lean and boyish agile"

NANCY CLUTTER (DESCRIPTON)

"short bobbed-hair shining chestnut hair (brushed a hundred strokes each morning, the same number at night)"

NANCY CLUTTER (DESCRIPTION)

"she felt it her duty to be available when younger girls came to her wanting help with their cooking, their sewing, or their music lessons - or, as often happened, to confide"

NANCY CLUTTER (HELP)

"'practically run that big house' and be a straight-A student, the president of her class, a leader in the 4-H programme and the Young Methodists league, a skilled rider, an excellent musician (piano, clarinet), an annual winner at the county fair (pastry, preserves, needlework, flower arrangement)"

NANCY CLUTTER (DESCRIPTION)

"Nancy, popular and pretty"

NANCY (DESCRIPTION)

"Eveana, married and the mother of a boy ten months old, lived in northern Illinois but visited Holcomb frequently"

Eveana, child of Bonnie and Herb Clutter had moved out of home, but greatly loved her family and so made the trip. Furthers how well liked the deceased Clutters were.

"Kenyon, who at fifteen was taller than Mr Clutter"

KENYON (DESCRIPTION)

"His crew-cut hair was hemp-coloured, and he was six feet tall and lanky"

KENYON (DESCRIPTION)

"here he could be alone, free to bang, saw and mess with his inventions"

KENYON (INVENTIONS)

"the town darling, Nancy"

Nancy Clutter is framed in a positive light in most descriptions.

"Bonnie out in public, nervous but nonetheless smiling"

Capote describes Bonnie as putting on a brave face as was common for home makers to do out in public to smile through their anguish and Capote represented Bonnie as a troubled individual.

"Mr Clutter liked Bobby [. . .] most dependable and gentlemanly"

BOBBY (MR. CLUTTER)

"the pattern of postnatal depression repeated itself [. . .] it lingered like a cloud that might rain or might not"

BONNIE CLUTTER (DEPRESSION)

"she was nervous and suffered little spells"

Capote describes Bonnie as…

"poor Bonnie afflictions"

BONNIE CLUTTER (DEPRESSION)

"- the tensions, the withdrawals, the pillow-muted sobbing behind locked doors, all due to an out-of-order back bone?"

Bonnie Clutter solution to her condition was a back bone and she was weeks away from what would fix her depression before she died.

"he was no taller than a twelve-year old child [. . .] like a retired jockey, overblown and muscle-bound."

PERRY SMITH (DESCRIPTION)

"it was a changeling's face [. . .] now ominous, now impish, now soulful."

PERRY SMITH (DESCRIPTION)

"Every time you see a mirror you go into a trance, like. like you was looking at some gorgeous piece of butt. I mean, my God, don't you get tired?"

PERRY SMITH (DESCRIPTION)

"oh beauty put away the comb"

PERRY SMITH (DESCRIPTION)

"imperfectly aligned features were the outcome of a car collision in 1950"

RICHARD HICKOCK (DESCRIPTION)

"an athlete constructed on a welterweight scale. The tattooed face of a cat, blue and grinning, covered his right hand; on one shoulder a blue rose blossomed"

RICHARD HICKOCK (TATTOOS)

"Blue-furred, orange-eyed, red-fanged, a tiger snarled upon his left biceps; a spitting snake, coiled around a dagger, slithered down his arm and elsewhere skulls gleamed, a tomb stone loomed, a chrysanthemum flourished"

PERRY SMITH (TATTOO)

"Scrubbed, combed, as tidy as two dudes setting of on a double date"

PERRY SMITH (GAY)

"his face [. . .] seemed composed of mismatching parts. It was as though his head had been halved like an apple"

RICHARD HICKOCK (DESCRIPTION)

"the left eye being truly serpentine, with a venomous, sickly-blue squint that [. . .] seemed [. . .] to warn of bitter sediment at the bottom of his nature"

RICHARD HICKOCK (DESCRIPTION)

"Nancy Ewalt says I did - screamed and screamed"

CRIME

"'she's dead!' [. . .] 'it's true, Daddy! Nancy's dead !'"

Nancy Ewalt tells her dad Nancy Clutter is dead

"something radically wrong over at the Clutter place"

CRIME

"There's been some kind of accident"

Death notification of the Clutters to the wider community