Pathos In Truman Capote's In Cold Blood

In Cold Blood Rhetorical Analysis Typically upon hearing about a murder, especially a brutal and unwarranted one, we find ourselves feeling a great sense of disgust for the murderer or murderers who committed these crimes; however, in Truman Capote’s novel In Cold Blood, the lives and experiences of the murderers, particularly Perry Smith, are displayed in a way the makes you feel pity for him as well as the victims. When comparing Capote’s Novel to a typical news article on a similar topic it is easy to see the that Capote's style varies from typical journalism. An article written by Frances Robles and Nikita Stewart titled “Dylan Roof’s Past Reveals Trouble at Home and School,” discusses the childhood and background of Dylann Roof, a twenty-one

Pathos emotionally connects with the reader. Outliers shows many examples, one would be the story of 12-year-old Marita living in a one-bedroom apartment with her mom. To reach her success “I wake up at five-forty-five a.m. to get a head start, I brush my teeth, shower. I get some breakfast at school, if I am running late…” (Gladwell, 264).

Pathos is “the quality of speech or written work that appeals to the emotions of the audience.” For instance, “plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.” The words ravaged, and destroyed are emotional words to describe the unjust actions the king did to them. Also it is demonstrated in, “Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.” This proves the colonists opinions on the king, showing how he is not worthy to lead their uprising nation.

Capotes creates sympathy for Detective Dewey by allowing the reader to think about what it would be like to have family member who is extremely involved in work about the

Pathos is a rhetorical device used for providing emotion to the reader. He wants the reader to feel sympathetic towards the mistreatment of African-Americans. In the introduction, the first rhetorical device he introduced is pathos. Coates present pathos when he introduced Clyde Ross. He titles the first chapter as, “So that’s just one of my losses”.

Patrick Henry, a Virginian lawyer, made himself known for the speeches supporting American democracy. He is known as the "Orator of Liberty." In 1775, American colonists were still under Great Britain’s power. Many were hoping to be able to work out their disagreements and remain British subjects. Patrick Henry had had enough of cooperating with the British.

Truman Capote’s novel, In Cold Blood epitomizes the shifting sentiments related to the murder of the Clutter family which range from terror, to sorrow, to pride, and all mixed emotions in between. Yet through Capote’s particular descriptions about each character, the connection between their feelings and their actions become further clarified. In effect, the readers experience feelings of sympathy for the victims, their friends and family, the investigators, and even the brutal murders of the innocent family. In order to craft this association, Capote employs a pathos appeal to amplify the audience’s ability to sympathize with each and every character.

For example, Mr.Gilmer uses Pathos when making Mayella explain what happened on the supposed day Tom abused and took advantage of her, the reasoning is that in the book it says “Mayella stared at him and burst into tears. She cover her mouth with her hands and sobbed. ”lee241 When this scene happened Mr.Gilmer was questioning Mayella. This showed a negative holistically in the argument; Pathos was strengthened because of the reason it appealed the audience emotion making them feel bad for her, this helped the argument because the audience felt emotion when Mayella was crying this might cause an unbiased audience to feel and think that Tom could possibly be guilty. Also, Mr.Gilmer used Ethos appealing to the audiences good morals for this reason

Throughout In Cold Blood, Truman Capote hints at his own opinion of the death penalty, yet lets the readers decide for themselves what they believe Hickock and Smith's punishment should have been. When the murderers are being hanged, a conversation occurs between a reporter and an investigator about what it might feel like to be hanged: "'They don't feel nothing. Drop, snap, and that's it. They don't feel nothing.' ' Are you sure?

How crazy would it be to interview criminals who murdered 4 people in cold blood? Well that’s exactly what Truman Capote did in this chilling book. In the novel In Cold Blood, Truman Capote used different rhetorical strategies to create sympathy and influence the idea that there are always two sides to every story. Some of the mainly used rhetorical strategies throughout the novel were imagery, diction, tone, and pathos. Furthermore, Capote also illustrated sympathetical emotion towards both types of characters, the protagonists and antagonists.

Perry’s erratic spontaneous outbursts is what caused him to go through with the murders and slit Mr. Clutter’s throat which put him on the killing frenzy that ended the rest of the Clutters lives. Capote highlights Perry’s sociopathic tendencies by comparing them to that of Dicks Psychopathic tendencies which exemplifies how when put together they are at each others fault for the

The definition of pathos is the quality or power in an actual life experience or in literature, music, speech, or other forms of expression, of evoking a feeling of pity, or of sympathetic and kindly sorrow or compassion. In other words, it is a way that authors and/or writers get to the audience’s emotions. Spurlock uses pathos by affecting the emotions of his audience with children. The beginning of the documentary shows kids singing and dancing. That automatically affects people’s emotions.

Katha Pollitt, in her essay, “Marooned on Gilligan’s Island: Are Women Morally Superior to Men?” addresses the topic of how difference feminists actually weaken women. Difference feminists believe that women are morally superior to men. Pollitt was invited to sign a peace petition, but realized it was actually demeaning to women.

Capote demonstrates his purpose through the use of extraordinary syntax. During the introduction of the novel, the sentences are lengthy and structurally complex, in the same manner

Pathos is when the speech appeals to the audience’s emotions. President Abraham Lincoln uses pathos is this speech to console the audience for the losses that the country has endured during the Civil War. Lincoln uses pathos to convey sadness when he says, “The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract.” When saying this Lincoln appeals to the people’s emotions by explaining that their loved ones struggled there and he also appeals to the feeling of pride they feel for their loved ones who dedicated their lives to their cause. Another example of pathos in this speech is, “...that from these honored dead we take increased devotion-that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain…”