The meaning of book titles

¶ … Cold Blood

An Analysis of the Meaning Capote's Title, "In Cold Blood"

A conversation late in Truman Capote's true-crime novel in Cold Blood reveals the thoughts of various third party persons, whose concern for the fate of the two men (Dick Hickock and Perry Smith) convicted of murdering the Clutters ranges from acute sympathy to pitiless antipathy. It is a particularly telling moment for it brings into focus the two opposing sentiments regarding the murders and the men convicted of committing them. The side of sympathy is voiced by a young reporter from Oklahoma and the side of hard justice is voiced by Richard Parr of the Kansas City Star. These two onlookers during the trial frame Capote's examination of what it means to be cold-blooded. This paper will analyze the meaning of "In Cold Blood" and show that what it actually relates to is the overall state of life in America, lived within the confines of a kind of reptilian social system whose only warmth comes from a sickly sweet sentimentality -- and when that fails, so too does the system and its ability to keep the cold (or the crime) out of the warm-blooded American.

On hearing Prosecutor Green's address to the jury, which hammers home to the jurors their responsibility to see that Hickock and Smith are sent to the gallows, the young Oklahoman journalist and the (seemingly) seasoned reporter Parr comment to one another on the nature of Green's words. The Oklahoman is rather shocked by them: he finds in them no degree of mercy, no sense of sympathy or human empathy. He calls Green's speech "rabble-rousing, brutal," (Capote 306). Parr retorts with apparent coldness, "He was just telling the truth…the truth can be brutal" (Capote 306).

Parr's words are compelling not so much for what they are, but rather for how they come across. They are wholly aligned and in agreement with the Prosecutor's tone, which is as vindictively cold as the murders for which the men are on trial. Thus, the true-crime novel reveals another dimension of what at first appears to be the simple story of a mass-murder. It reveals a dimension in which everyone and everything is tainted by this coldness, as though ice has crept into the veins of all mankind. The fact is that the abhorrent chill, which allowed Smith to say with a cold matter-of-factness when relating the events of the murder to Capote: "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 I cut his throat" (Capote 244) is equally existent in Parr's condemnation of the man. There is no hint in it of pity or fear -- two elements which tragedy is meant to evoke. (it may be argued that the novel is not a tragedy, even if the events are somehow tragic, but even the ability to relate to a murderer is absent). For example, one finds it possible to relate to Raskolnikov in Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment -- but in Capote's Kansas, one finds little of the sort.

The Oklahoman, however, has something of it: he laments the coldness of the Prosecutor's words, and expresses pity for Smith: "Perry Smith. My God. He's had such a rotten life -- " but this display of feeling is out of keeping in the American system of cold-blooded justice and sentimental love. Parr represents that system when he responds: "Many a man can match sob stories with that little bastard. Me included. Maybe I drink too much, but I sure as hell never killed four people in cold blood" (Capote 306).

Here, one senses that it is not the killing that is despised so much as the fact that it was committed "in cold blood." It may be said, then, that what Parr objects to is not the murder but the way it was done. The fact that it was done in such an unfeeling manner is what troubles him -- for it reflects his own unfeeling sensibility. He has to object to it to keep from confronting it in himself. The Oklahoman is not so cynical, however, for he immediately grasps hold of Parr's contradiction and cries out, "Yeah, and how about hanging the bastard? That's pretty goddam cold-blooded too" (Capote 306). The Oklahoman objects to the murder, which he views as a product of that coldness which he hears in Parr's words. The Oklahoman may represent a kind of outsider, not yet tainted by the American thirst for blood and sentimentality. To save the killer, he is willing to grant mercy, if only it will help put an end to the coldness.

At this point another man, the Reverend Post, interjects his thoughts. He seems to understand something of mercy, but at the same time he despairs of ever seeing it: "Well,' he said, passing around a snapshot reproduction of Perry Smith's portrait of Jesus, 'any man who could paint this picture can't be one hundred percent bad. All the same it's hard to know what to do. Capital punishment is no answer: it doesn't give the sinner time enough to come to God. Sometimes I despair'" (Capote 306). The Reverend's inability to reconcile sin with redemption is evident: he tries to place the reconciliation in terms of time, which does not exist for God, Who may be said to be outside of time. Thus, when he laments that the gallows may not give Smith enough time to repent and be saved, he makes a sadly childish and sentimental argument. Capote suggests that Smith has already repented in his attempt to accept responsibility for all four murders and spare Dick's mother the grief of seeing her son executed.

Thus, the man convicted of cold-blooded murder is actually portrayed at the end of the novel as having more warm blood than many of those who walk around free, like Parr or the Reverend (who, in spite of his sentimental faith, lacks the kind of warmth needed to place him in the same category as the Oklahoman -- whose pity is real, and whose plea for mercy reflects a kind of divine warmth).