Post by kaylaashcraft on Nov 18, 2014 3:05:29 GMT
Literary non-fiction basically means recounting true events as they originally happened, but keeping the reader interested by maintaining the feel of a fictional story. In Cold Blood differs from straight crime reporting because it includes many different perspectives of the crime. Straight crime reporting rarely, if ever, includes insight from the murder's perspective, whereas ICB allows the reader to learn about Dick and Perry's background, personal thoughts/feelings, and most importantly, their motives. This allows the reader to feel more connected with the murders while true crime reports portray the murders as evil, heartless monsters and exclude the important background that Capote strategically includes in ICB to evoke some sympathy for Dick and Perry. True crime reporting is very black and white. They stuck to the proven facts, present them with no bias whatsoever, and express no personal opinions. However Capote dares to embrace the gray area in his novel, which allows him to go beyond the facts and explore different points of view while he includes some of his own views indirectly as well. Additionally, I feel Capote created this new genre by accident. I believe that he might have approached this strange crime just as he did any other, but as he learning more and more details of the crime, he himself became more intrigued and invested in the brutal, seemingly random, murder. Therefore he decided to write about it in a unique way that was meant to captivate his readers while also enlightening them by presenting the facts of the Clutter family murder. Overall, this new approach causes the reader to wonder what is going to happen next as the perspective abruptly switches between the citizens of Holcomb, the murders (Dick and Perry), and the detectives. Lastly, Capote goes an amazing job at building suspense throughout the novel, but also the reader feels a sense of anxiety and fear as they realize that this is not just a story with fictional characters, but it is an actual account of the tragic misfortunes of a typical family.