In Cold Blood Character Analysis

Every person has been an outsider at one point or another. Many nonfiction writers such as John Berendt, author of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil and Truman Capote, author of In Cold Blood, use outsiders as characters in their stories.These type of characters help the writer to convey the argument they are trying to get across to the reader. In these nonfiction novels, outsiders play a critical role in the communities that they enter.
Outsiders bring change to the communities that they enter. In Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, John Berendt is a writer from New York. He visits a town called Savannah,in Georgia. Berendt stays in Savannah for eight years. Over this span of time, many events occur in this town that the people wouldn’t believe would ever happen in their community. An example of such an event is the death of Danny Hansford. Danny Hansford was a friend and lover to Jim Williams, a wealthy antique dealer who lives in Savannah. Jim Williams is the one who is accused of killing Danny. Joe Odom,
a friend of Berendt’s, makes this statement to Berendt about the accusation, “Sometimes I think you Yankees come down here to stir up trouble,” “ I mean, look at Jim Williams. A model citizen. Minds his own business. One success after another. Then you come along, and the next thing we know he’s killed somebody. I mean really!”(Berendt,180). Town residents even believe that Berendt’s arrival is the cause of all of this commotion. Berendt brought change to Savannah. Berendt played a crucial role in the town’s change of pace. His arrival caused people to start talking which in turn caused them to do things differently.Joe even mentions that Berendt’s arrival had “aroused a fair amount of curiosity”(Berendt,48). Outsiders are unknown so people naturally have many questions about them. In turn, people begin to act differently because they want the outsider to get a certain impression of them.
Outsiders break the balance of the communities they enter.
In the novel, In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote, two characters named Perry and Dick play the role of the outsiders. In the novel, Perry and Dick murder the Clutter family in their own home, in the town of Holcomb,Kansas. “Well, I took one look at Mr.Clutter, and it was hard to look again. I knew plain shooting couldn’t account for that much blood”(Capote,66). This murder destroyed the balance of an entire community. This was due to the fact that the Clutters were very well known in the community, “Everything Herb had he earned with the help of God. He was a modest man but a proud man, as he had a right to be. He raised a fine family, he made something of his life”(Capote,79). The Clutters were liked by almost the entire town. By murdering this family, Perry and Dick had changed the town completely. Before, people didn’t lock their doors at all. After the murders, residents were quick to do
so.
When outsiders enter a community, they eventually take on a role that in turn changes that community. John Berendt, entering the city of Savannah, became a big influence on the way the people changed the way they acted. Perry and Dick,entering the town of Holcomb, caused a once happy town to become sad and resentful. All in all, outsiders always cause changes in the groups that they enter. Whether these changes are good or bad is left for interpretation.