The Corner

Chapter 4 - The Corner

The Corner - the phrase for those who have gone to the execution stage. -"gone to The Corner."

In Chapter 4, Dick and Perry are sentenced to death by hanging. Hangings were seen as family events, so the people of the era would crowd around the gallows and watch - as if they were going to see a movie.

Hickock was first, when he got to the top of the gallows, a “delicate black mask was tied around his eyes”. The concept of delicacy before death is almost ironic, as if to put the coat on the cow before slitting its throat, as if to paint the house before demolishing the land.  Capote uses this to add relief to Dick’s death. 

Perry is hung, the story is much more different. Capote doesn’t have a reporter’s monologue, but a change in scene – like old friends seeing each other after a few years. Capote also uses mirror imaging and visional expression to portray the girl at the end of the book, “as Nancy would have been” – this gives us the idea of Nancy being the focus of the book, as well as her dad, the cyclical structure is based around Nancy.

Perry is strong in the beginning of the book, as Capote wants to depict the stature of the character, but also his mental state and backstory to why he is how he is. When the end of the book dawns, the focus is put more towards Dick and Nancy than towards Perry. When Perry dies, life goes on as normal, as in a revert in events. 

However, when Dick died, people were talking about him, us as readers felt empathy for Dick, but Capote presented Perry’s death as an optional part of the event that you could see.