With the writer's acumen, in 1959, a massacre in a small town in Kansas, USA, was written by Truman Capote into a new novel, "Cold Blood", which shocked the American literary world. But in the five-year writing process, Capote "falls in love" with one of the protagonists of the novel, the murderer Perry Smith, a death row inmate with the same background as himself, leaving a classic for Capote At the same time of writing, it also left a hell of eternal life.
Truman Capote, a sweet-talking, orchid-fingered, feminine gay, a genius with an amazing memory, a sensitive, neurotic alcoholic, a writer—a, an artist!
I remember Charlotte once asked Goethe why he was always surrounded by the smell of "living sacrifices", Goethe said, "You used one of my favorite metaphors - that is moths to a fire." Every artist, in essence, is an emotional parasite, they are vampires, they devour everything that is alive around them, in the eyes of artists, the "love" for the opposite sex or the same sex is just the nourishment for their creation After all, through "love", a chemical catalyst, artists corrode the living "parasitic objects" and turn them into materials for their creation. Once their artistic creations are completed, their parasitic objects, their Nourishment is meaningless to them - being abandoned is their only end. In "Rodin's Lover", Rodin's "love" for Camilla is nothing more than the desire that the latter can bring to Rodin's sculpture creation, which can inspire him to create more unique sculptures. In "Instinct", Catherine, played by Sarah Stone, also used one lover after another to enrich her life experience and increase her creative materials. Those "living people" became victims of the red flame of the artist, becoming "Sacrifice".
Perry Smith in "Capote" is the creative nourishment that Capote uses, his background, his personality, his murder, his everything is so tempting to Capote , as a writer, Capote smelled it all with his leopard-like nose, and he took the initiative to court Smith, doing his best to convince the latter that he was his friend, and after Smith was transferred to the cell, he fought to the right to visit the latter. Capote stretched out his sharp claws and gnawed at Smith little by little. He carefully scratched his skin, but told Smith that he had broken it himself. He slowly sucked Smith's blood, But he told Smith that the blood was poisonous, and he was cleaning him up, as if he was bewitched. Under the catalyst of "love", Smith was gradually tamed, told his life experience, handed over his diary, and betrayed him. Almost all privacy, and in the end, the murder of that night - the ultimate nourishment for Capote's creation, and finally Capote completes his creation and Smith becomes worthless.
When Goethe said to Charlotte, "You used one of my favorite metaphors—that is, a moth to a fire", Goethe seemed triumphant, without the slightest shame or remorse. So, as artists, do they really hold the privilege given to them by God, and can erode and play with the emotions of others without any scruples? Based on the law of equality, the answer to this question is obviously no. When Goethe said "moths to fire" to Charlotte, Goethe did not claim that he was a flame and others were moths. As an artist, Goethe believed that if others were moths, the artist was fire and moths.
When Capote tempted Smith a little bit to tell his story, Capote suffered pain along the way, even though his novel was called "Cold Blood"; even in social situations, he pretended to be talkative and poisonous. Don't invade, as a gay, he can even joke about niggas and gays without any scruples, but when he is alone, glass after glass of beer, one after another with bitter expressions that seem to be lost, and lonely backs one after another Betrayed him mercilessly, betrayed his heart - even if the artist needs to use other people's emotions, but in essence, the artist is an individual, not a veritable cold-blooded animal, when the artist uses others again and again and then throws away the material , the artist actually turned into a "moth" that was burned by himself. It should be said that the purpose of the artist to parasitize others is not for himself, but for his works of art. Therefore, when the emotions of others are turned into the flesh and blood of works of art, the artist "burns" the experience of others and turns them into works of art. This experience can be: exciting, happy, helpless or painful. When artists "sell" their emotions, they also become victims of art. Therefore, Goethe can say his "vile" behavior is so "noble", Because he is a victim himself.
• Artist
So, the question now becomes, how can one become an artist?
The artist must be sharp enough to find the "prey"; the artist must have the parasitic ability to "eat" the emotions of others; finally, the artist must be absolutely strong and brave, and dare to sacrifice himself. After losing his lover, Rodin was able to endure the lack of true love, so he continued to create sculptures; Catherine killed one lover after another, and continued to hunt the victims as usual; however, Capote, in "Killing" After the death of Smith, he had a nervous breakdown, and he couldn't bear this "pain of loss of love". Therefore, after "Cold Blood", Capote did not complete any other works. So, what is the difference between the three? Or, because Capote is the weakest?
In my opinion, Rodin sacrificed true love, Catherine sacrificed life, Capote sacrificed faith.
From a spiritual level, a person must have beliefs in life, and ideals and love are rooted in beliefs.
The belief here does not refer to religious belief in a narrow sense, but a basic judgment of one's right and wrong, ethics and morality, the distinction between black and white, and the firmness of right and wrong. A person who distinguishes right from wrong, a person whose standard of righteousness and evil is constantly changing, the pursuit of ideals and love will also become illusory and floating. Rodin's judgment on good and evil is not mentioned in "Rodin's Lover", but we can see that Rodin has never lost his ideal - to create the best sculpture art, so although Rodin sacrificed his love , but this sacrifice is premised on another kind of spiritual satisfaction-ideal, so his artistic sacrifice can motivate him to continue to struggle. In "Instinct", it is difficult to say who Catherine really fell in love with. The purpose of her being with her lovers is more to enrich her life experience, that is, for her own novels. In her opinion, her lover's "death" It's not the lack of love, but just the demise of the individual life, but the individual life is just a "human". In the eyes of ordinary people, the act of "killing" for artistic inspiration is of course an "evil", a kind of "evil" and should be punished by everyone. However, Catherine's belief is different from that of ordinary people, she regards her behavior as "evil" "Justice", or at least not evil, so, driven by this belief, she pursues her ideal of "novelist", and she is also constantly making art. However, Capote's belief in life was shaken when he met Perry Smith, and Capote lost his ability to judge right and wrong.
Smith had the same miserable childhood as Capote. He lost the love of his parents when he was a child. People around him did not understand him. Smith's strong appearance concealed a lonely and isolated heart, but Capote could understand him because He himself is a man who has been called a "freak" since childhood.
Smith's evasive eyes reveal his helplessness and helplessness, and his clear, pure and transparent gray eyes hide a conscience that is unknown to outsiders; behind his tattoos, he hides a fragility that is extremely vulnerable and afraid of loneliness. soul. All this was captured keenly by Capote after the conversation with Smith. Seeing his own shadow, Capote was both surprised and scared. In the process of slowly swallowing Smith's emotions and slowly sucking his "blood" , Capote's faith has been threatened again and again. With perception, Capote knows that Smith is actually a good person, but in fact, Smith and another murderer killed a family of four for money. They are absolute devils , In this process of inability to distinguish between good and evil, Capote has always been supported by Smith's guilt creed, because Capote believed that no matter what Smith was, the crime of murder was unforgivable, so every time When struggling with contradictions, Capote asked Smith time and time again about the murder that night, and tried to convince the latter to tell the truth, because Capote believed that as long as he knew the truth of how Smith killed, he would Smith's use became reasonable, without the slightest guilt. However, to Capote's surprise, when Smith revealed the reason for the murder, the balance of justice in Capote's heart was seriously tilted-Smith and the others originally wanted to let the innocent family of four go, even if they were not found. Wanted 10,000 yuan. However, the eyes of the father in that family made Smith lose his senses - there was fear in his father's eyes - the fear of a bad person, a wicked person, which made Smith, who always thought he was a "good person" completely lost. With the psychological defense line in place, he killed the killer in his absence—after all, the reason for Smith's murder was that he wanted to be a good person, a good person! How ironic, how distressing, also makes Capote's balance of justice lean toward Smith's side, so, is his use of this murderer correct? So, what is right and wrong? When his beliefs were shaken, the artist actually lost the ability to continue writing—so he never finished that story, and even after knowing the truth about the murder, he couldn't continue his own story, he said, He won't finish his story until Smith dies, he said, he. . . . . . .
In fact, the real loss of Capote's faith was not the moment he learned the truth of the murder - at that moment, it was only shaken, and the real lack of judgment of good and evil stemmed from Smith's "death penalty".
When Smith and the others were finally sentenced to death by the Supreme Court and the sentence was set on April 14, Capote was reluctant to go to the scene in person, but he could not resist Smith's "only friend" remark, so he , he went. The scene of the execution was extremely cold and miserable. The large blue and black color blocks shaped the execution field into a hell on earth. Smith was put on a hood, his whole body was trembling, the support under his feet suddenly disappeared, and he was in free fall, struggling feebly. Two clicks, three clicks, and then, no movement - life that was alive a second ago is calm in this second - simple, like the three shots that Smith fired at first - "bang bang bang", simple ended three lives. Seeing this, I thought of Kieslowski's "Killing Ring" and returned to that ancient and broad proposition - ethics and law.
In the first half of "Killing Ring", the murderer (forgot his name, hehe) murdered the taxi driver, and in the second half, he was punished by the law - the death penalty, so he was hanged, this kind of plot and "Capo" The content of "Special" is very similar. In "Killing Ring", Keille raised such a question - the same murder, why is the former illegal and the latter legal? For the sake of the law, such a judgment is accurate. However, for the sake of ethics and morality, killing life is also wrong, killing life, and there is no difference between legality and illegality. No one has made a final answer to this ancient and broad proposition, only Discuss, discuss. In "Capote", the creator borrows the story of such a famous character to ask the same question implicitly. When Capote witnessed Smith's execution, he did not have the answer to this ethical and legal question. The judgment of right and wrong is completely lost. Without belief, there is no so-called ideal and love. Capote lost the courage to continue to create and sacrifice himself for artistic ideals. In the end, his artistic path ended here.
• Faith • Ideal • Love
Faith, ideal, love, when faced with these three words, many people choose
ideal or love without hesitation. The three words seem to be equally insubstantial, but people insist that belief is a dispensable thing, and they even firmly believe that they can live without belief. However, when a person has no standards of right and wrong and does not believe in anything, do they still have the ability to love and ideal?
When Danny Brown's "The Da Vinci Code" came out, he reduced Jesus to an ordinary person and "sullied" the faith of Christians; when the human flesh bomb in Palestine repeatedly forged himself as a Muslim, and even flew to "93" When the name of "God" was shouted on the flight "; when after the "Munich Massacre", when Israelis who believed in Judaism desperately took revenge on the Palestinians who deprived their homes, all ideals and love could be abandoned because of this !
When you believe that murder is a crime, you are not destined to be a novelist like Catherine;
when you can't tell right from wrong, you may become a second Capote. . . . . . .
06.08.09
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