Week 4 Question

[gabrielle]

Literary nonfiction is a genre of writing that uses literary styles and techniques to create factually accurate narratives. In Cold Blood differs from straight crime reporting because it gives readers insight into the people's lives who committed the crime, which allows readers to get a more in depth understanding for why those people committed the crime. In In Cold Blood, readers get to see all the things that Dick and Perry did before the murder of the Clutter family. Capote created the story in the point of view of third person omniscient so the reader would get to see into the lives of Dick and Perry. This creates a sort of sympathy from the reader. For example, when you find out that Perry was made fun of when he was in prison because he wet the bed. This lets the reader see some of the hardships Perry has gone through throughout his life. Another example of how the reader gets to see into Dick and Perry's lives is when it talks about what they did after they murdered the Clutter family and their future plans. They planned to go to Mexico right after it happened, after stopping to get some money illegally along the way. While this is happening the reader also sees what is happening with the people trying to figure out the crime, which creates a sort of suspense because you don't know what's going to happen next. This makes the reader start to question is they want Dick and Perry to go to jail or not.

[catschnier]

Why do you feel that the author does this? I feel that it is used to create sympathy for both parties. Also this is another reason that it is literary nonfiction, because normally it would have no feelings in a crime report. This is very unlike In Cold Blood.

[oliviawhite]

Do you think that literary nonfiction keeps the same credibility and a fictional piece? or do you believe that it weakens the factual evidence presented in the story?