Truman Capote

Truman Capote

Major Works

Novels

Capote published his first novel in 1948, Other Voices, Other Rooms, when he was twenty three years old. In 1965, after consuming more than six years of his life, In Cold Blood was published.

Short Stories

In 1945, Miriam was published in the magazine Mademoiselle. In 1980, Music for Chameleons was published.

Plays and Screenplays

Capote wrote the screenplay for The Innocents, filmed by Henry James. The Grass Harp was turned into a play, but not successful.

Others

A musical, House of Flowers, was written in 1954 with the help of Harold Arlen.

Biography

Capote was born in New Orleans on September 30, 1924 to Archulus Persons and Lillie Mae Faulk (Persons) with his birth name being Truman Streckfus Persons. The name Streckfus derived from the Streckfus Company that his father was currently employed with. He was born in the Touro Infirmary. During that time his parents lived in the Monteleone Hotel in New Orleans (Long 133). He died August 25, 1984 , in Los Angeles at Joanna Carson‘s home, previous wife of Johnny Carson. He adopted the Capote surname when his mother divorced Archulus Persons and remarried Joe Capote. He had a difficult childhood with a great absence of love (Grobel 47). His mother committed suicide on January 4, 1954 by overdosing on Seconal (Clarke 64). Capote and his mother both admitted that she was not suited for motherhood. In the late 1970’s, Capote was treated for a drug and alcohol addiction and suffered from tic doloroux. Capote had written a lot of Answered Prayerswhile under the influence of cocaine. He stopped abusing cocaine when he realized that it made him too nervous to continue writing (Grobel 221). Capote’s best friend growing up was his neighbor, Nelle Harper Lee, the author of To Kill a Mockingbird. Lee based Dill Harris’s character upon Capote. He had previously based the character of Idabel Tompkins in Other Voices, Other Rooms on Nelle Harper Lee. At the age of seventeen, Capote went to work for two years at The New Yorker. During those two years he wrote his first unpublished novel, Summer Crossing.

Awards

• 1946 - O. Henry Memorial Award - established in 1918 to be given to the best stories published in magazines - for the short story Miriam.

Timeline

• 1924 - On September 30, Truman Streckfus was born in New Orleans, LA, to Lilie Mae Faulk and Archulus Persons .

• 1942 - After dropping out of a high school in Greenwich, CT, Capote went to work for The New Yorker. "He started out in the accounting department, was transfered to the art department where he catalogued cartoons and clipped newspapers, and then was moved up to write items for the column 'The Talk of the Town' (Garson 3). In the same year, at the age of seventeen, he got his first stories accepted for publication.

• 1946 - Capote was accepted into Yaddo, a writers’ colony in New York (Plimpton 51); won the O'Henry Award for the short story "Miriam".

• 1948 - The year Capote's first novel - Other Voices, Other Rooms - was published. Despite the opinions both in favor and agaisnt it, the novel became a success and it instantly brought fame to its author, who was then only in his early twenties.

• 1949 - A Tree of Night and Other Stories was published. Capote labels it as the beginning of the second cycle in his development as a writer.

• 1954 - The first important film work, a screenplay Beat the Devil, was written in collaboration with John Huston, a Hollywood director.

• 1958 - Capote reader's most favorite story - Breakfast at Tiffany's, which ended the ten-year period of the sencond cycle - was published.

• 1966 - In Cold Blood appeared in print. It was an innovative hybrid of journalistic fact and creative fiction. This novel marked the peak in Capote's career. Capote hosted a masked ball for approximately five hundred of his closest friends in New York at the Plaza Hotel.

• 1975 - He allowed Esquire magazine to print portions of his unfinished novel, Answered Prayers as an attempt to prove that he was still alright and was not an alcohol and drug addict.

• 1980 - Capote published the last work of his life entitled Music for Chameleons.

• 1984 - The writer died in Bel-Air, CA, on August 25.

Additional Reading about the Author

• Capote : A Biography by Gerald Clarke
• Conversations with Capote by Lawrence Grobel

Works Cited

• Garson, Helen S. Truman Capote. New York, Frederick Ungar Publishing Co. 1980.
• Grobel, Lawrence. Conversations with Capote. New York: New American Library. 1985.
• Krebs, Albin. “Truman Capote Is Dead at 59; Novelist of Style and Clarity.” New York Times 26 Aug. 1984, sec. L1+
• Long, Judy. Literary New Orleans. Georgia: Hill Street Press. 1999.
• Plimpton, George. Truman Capote: In Which Various Friends, Enemies, Acquaintances, and Detractors Recall His Turbulent Career. New York: Doubleday Dell Publishing Group. 1997.