Truman Capote is currently my favorite writer. The poetic fashion in which he brings a novel to life is extraordinary and I hope he can continue to impress me. He introduces his characters in a perfect order, and they are people you want to know more about. The only drawback to this book, his first novel, is that he assumed I understood where he was going at every turn, and I didn’t. I wanted a big ending that made we want to start the book over from the beginning. I didn’t get it.

I read this many years ago, and remember liking it, but not much else. I suppose I considered it well written, and wanted to read everything Capote had done, as I really loved IN COLD BLOOD, and was fascinated by the little man with the squeaky voice that I saw on television. In interviews, he was fearless, and said the most shocking things he could think of, because he loved the attention.

This time around though, I think it's one of the saddest things I've ever read. Semi-autobiographical, it's a first novel from a 23 year old who simply wants to be loved for who and what he is. He said himself that he wrote the novel to exorcise some demons. Reading between the lines after knowing a little about his life, now makes this not just a novel from gifted author, but an explanation of the man he became in later years.

One of the best characters, Idabell Thompkins, was based on the real life Harper Lee, a childhood friend. I think it explains a lot about her demons as well. Many thanks to the voters of On The Southern Literary Trail for choosing this as this month's selection. I enjoyed every beautiful word.

4.5⭐️

Wau

I recently read, of Japanese novels, that 'exquisite' is a back-handed compliment since it potentially suggests an artful gewgaw, something of little substance polished to a high, deceptive shine. But I can't think of a more apposite word for Capote's debut, which is both exquisite and uncompromising about coming of age and shedding childhood like a snakeskin. The sentences are heavily-worked, lapidary wonders, but for this reader what they encapsulate and signify is as durable. Majestic, tragic and essential.

What a trip! Truman Capote, even as a young man, knew he had power...knew he could write rings around others. He created a southern gothic story with his very first try. Haunted houses, dreams, eccentric, strange characters who could only inhabit a novel set in the South. And stretches of prose that are amazing. Precious. Overblown. Everything we think of when we think of adult Capote.

Nelle Harper Lee is here...in the character of Idabel, a fierce tomboy with her big dog and her fearless ways. One reviewer said she was 'a child with personality to burn.' She's one of the first people Joel meets, and she is hard to forget.These two could never truly get shed of each other...If this is a veiled memoir, then Capote is Joel, hustled from family member to family member, not necessarily likable, but entertaining. Joel watched his mother die, and now he's at Skully's Landing, supposedly on the invitation of his long-lost father. But nothing at the house is as it seems, including the ghost Joel sees in the top window.

Joel is a fussy teenager who works hard to keep his city clothes clean and unwrinkled as he learns the ways of the folks in the 'Skull'. The cook, Zoo and her uncle Jesus Fever. His stepmother, Amy, who chases and kills a lost bird in his room the first morning, and her cousin, Randolph -- a preview of the caricature that older Capote would become.

Part three of the novel was challenging to follow, and I thought it might be because I was reading it late at night, and I was tired. But as I searched for reviews, I learned we all struggle with the final section of the book...it's dreams and nightmares and hauntings. And soaring language. But very little plot. Rereading this morning, I just let the words wash over me.

Ambitious, atmospheric, written to make a splash. Ambiguous about most characters' sexuality, including Idabel and Joel. Leaving more questions than answers. Experimental. Daring. Everything we now associate with this author.

In my search, I found a total gem...a contemporary review of the book at publishing: https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytim...

Nothing is as it seems...and everything is seen through that humid haze that is part of the Deep South. This shows all the promise we would expect of this author.

In 1935, at an early age of 11, Capote began writing. The first novel that he attempted to write was Summer Crossing but one day, while he and a fellow southerner and writer Carlson McCullers, the author of The Heart is a Lonely Hunter (1940), were walking in the woods, he got inspired to write something about the rural life in the South. So, he set Summer Crossing aside and wrote this book. This then became his first published book (1948) when Capote was 24 years old. The style is Southern Gothic and it is semi-autobiographical.

This is semi-autobiographical because what he wrote was mostly based on his actual experiences in Monroeville, Alabama where he grew up with the 1961 Pulitzer winner, Harper Lee, author of the modern classic To Kill a Mockingbird. Capote and Lee were best of friends so they made each other as character in their own respective novels. Harper Lee's character called Dill was based on Truman as a boy and Capote's Idabel Thompkins in this book was based on the tomboyish Harper Lee when she was a young girl. This 1948 book did not win Capote any award but it stayed in the New York Times Bestseller list for 9 weeks. After 13 years, Harper Lee came up with her only novel To Kill a Mockingbird and it did not only win her a Pulitzer but also the hearts of many people around the world.

This book may not have made an impact as strong as Mockingbird but Capote's writing is as good, if not even better, than Harper Lee's. The only thing missing here, I guess, is that it did not tackle social and racial inequality issue but rather focused on those minor themes that are also present in Mockingbird such as courage, compassion, decadence and isolation. Both books have Gothic southern elements but Lee used it for humor while Capote used it for mystery if not to actually scare. So, overall, I agree that Mockingbird is a notch higher than this debut novel of Capote.

The story revolves around a 13-y/o boy Joel Knox whose mother has just died. One day, he receives a letter from his father inviting him to live with him in a place called Skully's Landing. Joel does not know his father because he was an infant when his father abandoned him and his mother. Left with no choice, he travels all by himself from New Orleans to his father's house. Before seeing his father, he meets all the other people in the town including the sisters Florabel and Idabel Thompkins. They become his friends particularly Idabel. Towards the end of the novel, Joel finally meets his father and he is shocked to find out his father's condition. Prior to that meeting he had high expectations on what his life would be with his father even writing rosy pictures to his friend back in New Orleans.

My favorite scene is one of those first few encounters of Joel Knox (Capote) and Idabel Thompkins (Harper Lee). Idabel asks Joel if he has been snakebit. Joel says no but he has survived being ran down by a car. Florabel (Idabel's sister) says "now Idabel will think of having herself run down by a car." This reminded me when I was young and I got to argue with my playmates who had a better toy or who had the richer father or who had gone to a farther place - city or town, etc. That scene made me laugh imagining how the tomboyish Idabel would have been behaving considering the very vivid descriptions Capote spent in his prose for that girl.

This is the last Capote book on my bookshelf. I am not yet his completist as far as his novels are concerned because I could not find a copy of The Grass Harp (1951). But as far as those that are available, here are they - fully read with many of their pages now dogeared (proof that I enjoyed reading them):

4 STARS (I really liked these!):
n  n and n  n

3 STARS (I liked these!):
n  n,n  n,n  n and n  n

Now, I just have to hunt for this book:
n  n.
THE GRASS HARP

...then I will be his completist.

¿Alguna vez te has sentido fuera de lugar, como si el mundo hablara en un idioma que tú no entiendes?

Bienvenido a Otras voces, otros ámbitos, la primera novela de Truman Capote, donde cada página es un susurro desde una habitación en penumbra, y cada personaje parece mirarte desde el otro lado de un espejo deformante.

La historia nos presenta a Joel Knox, un niño de trece años que, tras la muerte de su madre, es enviado a una mansión sureña para conocer a su padre, un hombre al que nunca ha visto. Pero lo que encuentra en esa casa no es exactamente un hogar. Allí está Miss Amy, su madrastra, una mujer que parece manejar la casa con la precisión de una administradora más que con el afecto de una madre. Randolph, su primo, es un personaje alucinado y teatral, con una voz melancólica que parece susurrar secretos a medio entender. Y más allá de la mansión, en los caminos polvorientos del sur, una galería de personajes excéntricos como las mellizas Idabel y Florabel, cómplices en aventuras infantiles que parecen sacadas de un sueño febril. También están Jesús Fiebre y Pequeño Luz de Sol, dos figuras envueltas en el misterio del folclore sureño, hechiceros de un mundo donde lo real y lo fantástico se confunden.

Esta es una novela donde la identidad se siente como un eco lejano, donde los personajes parecen espectros atrapados en un limbo de deseos no dichos y recuerdos a medio formar. A algunos les podrá recordar los relatos de Mark Twain, pero hay una clara influencia de Carson McCullers y Tennessee Williams, o incluso del propio Faulkner, en la construcción de este mundo sureño, con sus figuras extravagantes y su carga de angustia existencial. Pero lo que hace especial a Otras voces, otros ámbitos es su tono febril, esa forma de Capote de envolverlo todo en un halo de ensueño, como si el lector estuviera mirando la historia a través de un velo de calor sureño y melancolía infantil.

Y es que Capote, con solo 23 años, logra hacer algo que no todos los escritores se atreven: meter todo un universo dentro de algo tan pequeño como un libro de menos de 250 páginas, aunque quizá quisiera meter demasiado simbolismo que para muchos resulte complicado de entender. Aquí no estamos ante una novela fácil de leer. Más bien, cada palabra parece estar diseñada para hacerte pensar, reflexionar, y si eres suficientemente astuto, descubrir las capas ocultas entre los pliegues del texto. De hecho, lo que el lector ve al principio no es lo que realmente es. Es uno de esos libros que te pide una segunda lectura para captar todos los secretos que quedaron enterrados en las primeras páginas. Porque Capote no solo cuenta una historia, nos obliga a diseccionarla. Esa es una de las maravillas de esta obra: el misterio no es solo un tema, es la manera en la que se presenta el mundo, como un rompecabezas de pistas dispersas que solo se conectan cuando ya crees que todo está resuelto.

Decir que esta novela es autobiográfica es, probablemente, quedarse corto. Capote no solo pone su infancia en estas páginas, la destripa y la deja latir a la vista de todos. Este es su retrato del sur: decadente, sensual, desquiciado. Un lugar donde el despertar de la identidad no es un tránsito suave, sino un choque contra paredes invisibles. Aquí, la soledad pesa. La identidad se enmaraña. La realidad se tuerce en reflejos distorsionados.

Es fascinante leer Otras voces, otros ámbitos sabiendo lo que Capote llegaría a ser. Aquí tenemos a un joven escritor de 23 años que ya maneja la prosa con una ambición desbordante, con ese estilo hipnótico y envolvente que será su marca personal. Pero si lo comparamos con sus obras más maduras, se nota que aún está explorando los límites de su talento. Su lirismo es exuberante, casi barroco, y a veces uno siente que la belleza de sus frases amenaza con devorar la historia. Si en A sangre fría pulirá su precisión hasta lograr una narración precisa y contenida, aquí todavía lo vemos disfrutando del exceso, dejándose llevar por el sonido de las palabras. Es un Capote más libre, más salvaje, pero también menos medido. No hay aquí la fría maestría con la que diseccionará la psicología humana en su obra cumbre, pero hay algo igual de valioso: el deslumbramiento de un genio en formación.

Es un estilo que no solo te exige atención, te pide que saborees cada frase como si fuera una joya extraída de una mina inagotable. Y es que, la prosa de Capote tiene algo de ostentoso, como si el autor quisiera demostrar, desde el principio, que su talento no solo era prometedor, sino audaz. Aquí no hay sitio para lo fácil. Cada capítulo comienza con la urgencia de algo cinematográfico, y cuando te das cuenta de lo que está pasando, ya es tarde: has sido atrapado en su mundo. Un mundo donde lo surrealista es lo que te mantiene despierto, donde la línea entre lo que es un sueño y lo que es real se difumina con una facilidad aterradora. Y los personajes, ¡madre mía!, ¿quién no se sentiría un poco inquieto al encontrarse con alguien como Miss Amy o con Randolph? Hay algo casi caricaturesco en su manera de moverse por la historia, una exageración que, en lugar de restarles profundidad, los vuelve aún más fascinantes. Los animales tienen nombres humanos, los humanos tienen nombres de animales, y todo se mezcla hasta que ya no sabes si lo que ves es una exageración de la realidad o la pura verdad escondida bajo capas de ficción.

Porque Otras voces, otros ámbitos no es solo un relato de iniciación, es un descenso a un mundo donde la infancia es una casa embrujada y la búsqueda de uno mismo siempre deja cicatrices. A pesar de su complejidad, su prosa es cautivadora y mantiene al lector en un estado constante de intriga. Sin embargo, la densidad simbólica y los giros narrativos pueden generar confusión, lo que podría hacer que algunos se sientan desconectados o insatisfechos con la historia.

No es una novela amable. No es una historia que se lea con la sensación reconfortante de estar en manos seguras. Es más bien como entrar en una casa desconocida y darse cuenta, demasiado tarde, de que las sombras en las esquinas están observando.

Si alguna vez has sentido que perteneces a otro mundo pero aún no sabes cuál, este libro te entenderá antes de que tú mismo lo hagas.

Truman Capote's Other Voices, Other Rooms is more of a raising yourself through experiences and colored glasses- green, red, rose, purple, the whole over the rainbow spectrum- world views than coming of age. The painful growth into what you think you are, and who you really are. I'm more and more irritated with "coming of age" tag these days, since I can't accept that there's this point where one comes to this point, and then you're done. It's more like stops and starts, backwards and forwards, all mixed together confusion, isn't it? It can't just be me? We aren't always grown up in memories, anyway, despite that 20/20 hindsight some people supposedly have (it'd help to have Capote's 100% conversational recall). I'm still little, sometimes.
I love this book. I get the feeling that the people I've met who've read Capote don't feel this kinda gratitude that I feel towards him. Like maybe they wanna say, "Dude, Mariel, it's just a book" and back away slowly and then run away as fast as they can. I kinda did raise myself through movies and stories and stuff (probably still do), and I feel strong connections to characters, as if they were real people. I relate to how Joel made up these fictions to get by, like about the deadbeat father, or his dying mama. How he does the same with the new people he meets, most of whom are living their own fictions. All in Capote's humanist way that doesn't care about the bullshit. He sees them without judgement or sorrow. "You do know they aren't real, Mariel?" I've been (to my mind, snottily) asked fairly often. But they are! Someone wrote them. And aha! In the case of Other Voices, Other Rooms, Idabel was based on the same little girl whom Harper Lee based Scout from To Kill a Mockingbird on. Capote and Lee grew up with her. So she is real *smug*. (I'd not have forgotten about this girl either.)
This story is kinda sick feeling in the can't look away possibly impending disaster of the future, and more than in just the southern gothic way of the times that uses background for inherent creepiness (I'm from southern usa so it will either feel like home or trying too hard for me). I'm haunted by this shedding your skins feeling and rejecting yourself, and losing fantasies you made for yourself to hide from ugly realities, and getting lost in the pretensions and ugly realities of those other people, in all those other places. I can understand memories feeling like the sick hot days like these. Hear the doom drumbeats of all those original people doing their thing to their own drums. Watching other people like this. It took me twice as long as the usual coming of age story to not feel skinless. I'm grateful to Capote for writing this book that can relate to that feeling of being lost. And for feeling like we're in together. Yeah, I know it's just a book. I don't care.

Soy una adoradora de Truman Capote. Eso ya se sabe y es uno de mis escritores de referencia. Y cuando andaba en la biblioteca y vi que la primera novela que publicó mi querido muchacho (tenia 23 años en 1948) estaba disponible me lancé rápidamente a leerlo.

Esta curiosa historia nos cuenta como un jovencito de 13 años Joel Knox, viaja desde su casa en New Orleans hasta un pueblito perdido en otro estado sureño a buscar a su padre: Mr. Sansom. Al perder a su madre, Joel no encuentra su lugar y cuando por fin llega a su destino, en el desembarcadero de Skully se encuentra una casa grande y ruinosa y unas curiosas personas que habitan en ella. Su extraña madrastra Amy, el hermano de ella, el enfermizo Randolph y la curiosa criada negra Missouri y el abuelo de ella (el experto en conducir carretas dormido) el anciano centenario Jesus Fever. Además de unas gemelas vecinas pelirrojas, Florabel e Idabel (mi favorita con diferencia). En este lugar tan desolado como extraño Joel descubrirá varias cosas que cambiarán su visión del mundo y de su destino.

Reseña completa: http://rapsodia-literaria.blogspot.co...

Gothic to the point of being grotesque. This is one of the most evocative and complex novels I’ve ever read. 3 ½ stars

I didn’t know much about this novel before reading it. I did note before starting that it was Capote’s first novel. It felt like a first novel to me. Some of the writing was excellent, but some of the descriptions seemed longer than necessary and at times felt oddly integrated with the narrative. I very much liked the characters of Idabel, Zoo and Jesus, but did not have strong feelings for the protagonist Joel Knox. The Southern Gothic nature of the novel, represented in the characters of cousin Randolph and stepmother Amy, as well as the circumstances of Joel’s father, did not grab my interest. I was much impacted by what Zoo encountered in her attempted departure from Skully’s Landing.

Upon finishing the novel, I was surprised to find how high the GR rating was and that the novel stayed on The New York Times’ bestseller list for nine weeks. I recognize some of the novel’s reception was the result of its notoriety as one of the few American novels in the first half of the 20th century to deal directly and positively with homosexuality, but still felt I must have missed something. Ultimately, I felt the quality of the writing was very uneven and so was the overall reading experience. I was pleased that the novel was as short as it was.

Elegante, entretenida, alucinante. Me sorprende la gran cantidad de similitudes con la novela latinoamericana del XX.