Rhetorical Analysis Of Letter To Perry

#5- Barbara refutes the nurture debate. In the letter to Perry, she explains how their brother, Jimmy, had the right mindset to succeed: “I remember how he worked & went to school when there was no one to tell him & it was his own WILL to make something of himself” (Capote 140). Even in a bad environment, Jimmy, still strived to do the right thing. His mindset was set to succeed, unaffected to a bad environment. Barbara compares Jimmy to Perry saying that if he can strive for success after a bad past, then Perry can too. Barbara knows Perry can learn to overcome a personality trait by a change of attitude: “Your confinement is nothing to be proud of and you will have to live with it & try & live it down & it can be done but not with you attitude

Those who knew about the Clutter family’s death were miserable: “Mostly, we just drove around in his old Ford. Up and down the highway … The radio was always playing; we didn't have anything to say ourselves” (Capote 94). Susan Kidwell and Bobby Rupp were together and they were described in a depressed way, which set the tone. The kids didn’t live their regular lifestyle after the death, which gave tone to the reading. The characters were sentimental, and mentioning things around town that reminded them about the Clutters: “Everywhere you looked, there was something to remind you” (Capote 94). People in the book kept mentioning things around town that would trace back to the Clutters. For example, the river by the banks wasn’t just a river anymore. It is now a river that is being searched for weapons that would help with the murder case. The characters in the novel did their mourning by seeing and recognizing certain things around town. The mournful tone impacted the reader because the reader is constantly reminded of the tragic murder. In this section of the novel, several different characters talk about how they feel after the death. Many people are mournful and it makes the reader feel empathetic. Without the mournful tone of the section, the reader wouldn’t feel as sympathetic and

In this section, Perry seemed sensitive and even kind at points. I found that suspicious because being a sympathetic murderer didn’t add up to me. Dick recognized that there was something wrong with Perry too: “there was, in Dick’s opinion, “something wrong” with Little Perry … in some ways old Perry was “spooky as hell.” Take, for instance, that temper of his” (Capote 108). Dick has known Perry for a long time and he explained all the peculiar things about him. He says that he’s spooky and has a temper. Those two characteristics stick out to me, and makes me assume that Perry had a lot to do with the murders. Because of his strange personality, I thought Perry was hiding a secret brutal side. As I learned more about Perry’s past, though, I did sympathize with Perry more than I did with Dick. Perry went through abuse and a lot of emotional changes and that makes me think that that’s why he acts in such a spooky, quiet, suspicious way. I didn’t buy Perry’s kind and sensitive characterizations because I thought he was showing people what he wanted us