Truman Capote Research Paper

One of America’s twentieth century most well-known and controversial author and writer was Truman Capote. Born in New Orleans, Louisiana on September 30, 1924 as Truman Streckfus Persons, he was a son of a small-town girl, Lillie Mae and charming schemer, Archulus Persons. At age four, his parents got divorced, leaving him in the care of his mother’s relatives in Monroeville, Alabama. In Monroeville, he met and befriended Harper Lee, the author of the famous literature novel To Kill a Mockingbird. They were total opposites: Capote was sensitive and was teased by others while Lee was pretty much a tomboy, however that drew them closer. In 1933, he moved to New York City to live with his mother and her new husband Joseph Capote, a Cuban-born

Capote said, “I began writing really sort of seriously when I was twelve. I used to go home from school everyday and I would write for about 3 hours. I was obsessed with it.” In 1935, Capote attended Trinity School in New York City and later went to St. Joseph Military Academy for his mother’s desire for him to become masculine. In 1939, Capote moved to Greenwich, Connecticut where he stood out among the students with his enthusiastic personality and wrote for the school’s literary journal and newspaper at Greenwich High School. However, Capote developed a group of friends who he would often drink, smoke, dance, and go to clubs with. Living in Greenwich, his mother’s drinking escalated which made his life become unstable. Capote returned to New York City where he did not do well in school and had to repeat 12th grade at Franklin School and graduated in 1943. Still a teen, Capote began working as a copyboy at The New Yorker for two years. He then left his job and moved back to live in Alabama with his relatives to write full-time. During this time, he began writing his first novel called Summer

His first lover was Newton Arvin, a literature professor at Smith College. His second lover he met in 1948 was with author Jack Dunphy at a party and they began their thirty-five year relationship. Capote was never the same after his non-fiction novel, In Cold Blood due to digging in dark territory that changed him both psychologically and physically. This led to him drinking more which escalated over the years. Despite his problems, Capote threw what many called the “Party of the Century”, the famous Black and White Ball on November 28, 1966. The event, held in the Grand Ballroom at Plaza Hotel in New York, garnered a huge amount of publicity. Overwhelmed by the rich and lifestyles, Capote started on a project where he explored intimate details of his friends. Several years later, he published the first few chapters of his new novel in Esquire magazine in 1976 and it became a huge scandal. The chapters had lots of his friends’ secrets and hurt by his betrayal, his friends and acquaintances turned their back on him. These negative reactions sent Capote downhill into a spiral of drugs and