Perry is in fact a very unique character as identified by Truman Capote. It seems that Perry actually is a very deep thinker and is trying to make sense of things. One of the things in this book I have confusion on is on page 92 and 93, Perry mentions a dream he often has. The dream begins in Africa (if that has any importance) in a jungle and he’s alone. There in front of him is a tree that smells terrible but it’s “beautiful to look at” (foul and fair?). This tree has diamonds the size of oranges and Perry is there to take a diamond. The only problem is that as soon as he reaches for a diamond a snake will jump on him. And slowly the snake starts devouring him. But then (an important part) a yellow ‘sort of parrot’ saves him. And this parrot seems to come often to save Perry like when the nun in his orphanage comes and beats him. This dream confused me while I was reading because I couldn’t really tell the relevance to the problems at hand. In this part of the book, Perry was getting worried that they were going to get caught for killing the Clutters and he argues he has a premonition. If we were to take the first part of story into hand it makes sense. The Clutters and their supposed money was the diamonds on the tree but then a huge snake falls on him (no money in the Clutters house) and the snake slowly starts swallowing him (he slowly gets caught buy the police) but where does the parrot fall into this?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Although what Sunjeev says can somewhat be connected to the murders, I don't think that the dreams were connected to just the murders particularly. They can be connected to what happened or going to happen to Perry throughout his life. Perry has been having the same snake dream since he was a kid. I think the diamonds on the tree represent the finer things in life that Perry desires, or if connected to the murder than the diamonds represent the money the Clutters' were supposed to have. The snake that falls on his head and him wrestling the snake shows a struggle or a downhill battle. That can be represented as Perry trying to do good in life but constantly having to defend himself, or the murdering of the Clutters. The snake slowly swallowing him can represent him being in jail slowly waiting for his death to come. The dream about the big "hovering avenger" yellow parrot can be symbolized as Perry's guardian angel. This dream is more spiritual than the snake dream. I think this dream seems more like it should be his afterlife. The parrot saves him from all the turmoil in his life and takes him to "paradise". Paradise might symbolize heaven or a better afterlife.
ReplyDeleteLike Sunjeev, I too was confused while reading this part of the book. Someone mentioned to me the parrot is supposed to be like a Jesus figure for Perry possibly, which could make sense like how the parrot saves him but I felt as though that was not the real reason Capote told us about this parrot. While reading I noted that the yellow bird is his savior, and I added “Capote?” this, I suppose was in relationship to the movie because Perry did think that Capote was trying to help him out of jail, I thought that Capote was trying to show us that maybe he would be thought as a savior for Perry. But that still wasn’t making sense, why put it in the book, other than Capote trying to insert his opinion. When I got to page 130, that’s when the connection for the yellow parrot made sense. It was Perry’s letter from his dad while he was in the Kansas jail (before he’s caught). His dad says “he loves his Freedom” (130); I think that Capote put in the bird to stress how much Perry really wanted out. Perry wanted to be out of the world he lived in now and into a better place, somewhere that I think Perry knew he probably wouldn’t ever go. Many of us want this place of paradise and freedom and so maybe by Capote expressing how passionate Perry is for this paradise of his it help to humanize Perry more as a regular person. Another thing that I thought about this parrot was possibly that for Perry the temperature of his environment was indirectly related to his happiness. It’s just that Perry seems ok when he’s in the extreme cold of Alaska with his father, “how well I know that Perry is goodhearted if you treat him rite”(130), and he seems ok in the extreme heat of Mexico, he has a picture that’s described as looking like “was Perry’s expression, his look of unflawed fulfillment, of beatitude, as though at last, and as in one of his dreams, a tall yellow bird had hauled him to heaven”(120). In both cases Perry is out of trouble and doing well, but in the moderate temperature of Kansas he loses it easier than that of the other climates, killing four people and whatever his previous crime was. I’m not sure if this helps with understanding the dream but I do think that after the description of Perry in the picture being compared to him finally reaching his paradise, it has got to be all downhill for Perry from here because it seemed his life goal was to get the paradise and now that he had it what else is there for him to do?
ReplyDeleteI don't think that the dream is as connected to the actual story or what happened to Perry as it is to his personality and tendencies, which then in turn influence the story. The dream is used by Perry to help explain to Dick how Perry often sees things coming, yet seems to ignore his knowledge. Perry knows that the snake will bite him, yet he still grabs at the diamonds. Perry seems headstrong in this, he knows there are consequences but he doesn't care. It seems like he is almost greedy to the point of being childish, uncaring about what happens next. Or as Perry puts it, "What it comes down to is I want the diamonds more than I'm afraid of the snake." (92) However in the end there is always that yellow parrot. I think this may symbolize something as simple as chance. It isn't deep or significant, but it just seems like in the past Perry has always had chance bail him out of bad situations. In all of the examples like the nuns, there surely isn't a real life bird that slaughtered the nuns and literally carried Perry off to freedom. Perry is probably saying that he dreamt of the parrot and then moved somewhere else, or something along those lines. It seems like this goes to the point where Perry may expect the bird to intervene. This may help explain why he was willing to go along with Dick, who was clearly more enthusiastic. It is (from nurture through experience, not nature) a trait of his to expect some parrot to save him. When he and Dick murdered the Clutters expecting to gain money out of it, Perry thought that there would be something to get him out of the ensuing trouble, which he knew would happen. Now through premonition Perry knows that the cops are on to them, yet he may still expect chance to help him. We know that in the end he and Dick are caught and eventually executed, and perhaps as Ja'nae mentioned he really did still have a parrot in death. Or perhaps his downfall could be because of this, which goes back to the nature vs. nurture argument. But it seems to me like Perry does after repetitive luck start to expect luck, and this is part of why he goes along with Dick and is eventually executed.
ReplyDeleteI think that this dream that Perry describes in detail, tells the readers a lot about who he is as a person. What makes me mention this is the part in particular where he is describing the tree and the diamonds, and knowing that a snake is going to fall from the tree when he reaches for them. He proceeds to say, "What it comes down to is, I want the diamonds more than I'm afraid of the snake" (92). I think that this simple sentence sums up Perry's actions and thoughts very nicely when compared to the Clutter murder and related to a previous comment on his premonition. Perry, knowing that something is going to happen, would rather risk it for the benefit. When he describes that, in the end he wants it more than he's scared of what will happen, I think that reflects his rationale behind the Clutter incident. What he and Dick got from the Clutter household, which Dick hints to in saying, "we scored. It was perfect" (90), was worth the punishment he is foretelling. I also think, like Nicole mentioned, that maybe he's waiting for something, this "bird" figure to save him. That always in his dreams, just when he's in a dire situation, he is rescued. What or who this bird represents is something that I have not discovered yet. In his dream explanation however, Perry is revealed as an ambitious, thoughtful person who is not blind to consequence, but determines it's importance or ability whether or not to stand in the way of what he wants.
ReplyDelete