Customer Reviews

A Bridge of Childhood: Truman Capote's Southern Years

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Essentially the recollections of Truman Capote's cousin, Jennings Faulk Carter, this book recounts the childhood years that Truman spent in Monroeville, Alabama growing up with Jennings and Nelle Harper Lee, author of "To Kill a Mockingbird." It contains descriptions of actual events that appear in Capote's later writings, and thus will be of interest to readers of his fiction, but the writing is pleasurable in its own right.

Fascinated by the number of good writers who have come out of such a small town (there are others), I drove two hours each way to visit Monroeville while on a business trip to Mobile several years ago. Even though it has grown substantially since Truman grew up there, it remains a lovely southern town, with wide verandas, shade trees and a courthouse that is not to be missed.

I was drawn to this book because the man who provided these anecdotes about Capote's early years to the author, Marianne Moates, is my first cousin, Jennings Faulk Carter. He is Capote's first cousin also. The stories told by Carter mostly came on summer visits to his Alabama home by young Truman Capote who was partly raised by divorced parents in New Orleans and New York and his eccentric aunts and uncles in Monroeville, Alabama. There are many accounts of the childhood experiencenes of the threesome-Jennings Carter, Truman Capote and Nell Harper Lee("To Kill a Mockingbird") Although some of the stories are hilarious, there is an underlying theme of brokenness, divorce, and alcohol abuse that shaped young Truman Capote into a talented but confused, effiminate, alcoholic homosexual. The book was more interesting to me for the simple fact that it deals with some of my relatives and some of my childhool memories. I am saddened, however, that many of Truman Capote's adult problems seem to have come from a childhood full of strife, mistrust, conflict, substance abuse and family instabiliy.

While I am not particularly a fan of Truman Capote's writing, I found this book to be highly entertaining. It gives a true and accurate account of life in small-town Alabama and is filled with humorous tales of the escapades of three young friends during the Great Depression. It is also a moving and poignant tale of a young boy's struggle to belong, and offers insight into the eccentricities of Mr. Capote. The stories are short, so this book makes for good reading when time is short (like during break-time at work!). I think this book would be entertaining to people from small towns as well as large cities, and Capote fans as well as non-Capote fans.