Barbara Johnson In Cold Blood Quotes

In the novel, In Cold Blood by Truman Capote we are introduced to many characters who help shape the themes of the book and a character who helps to do so is Barbara Johnson, who is Perry Smith’s only living sister. We are presented with the idea that a traumatic childhood can make success in adulthood almost impossible to achieve. Barbara shows this in the aspect in many ways which help to shape her character.

We first meet Barbara in a letter that she writes to Perry while he was imprisoned. She begins by telling him about her children and how much they have grown and changed. But that rapidly changes the subject when she begins to criticize the lifestyle he has chose and tells him all that he has failed throughout life.Barbara also brings …show more content…
Barbara is traumatized with how her parents marriage ended and what had happened after that. Barbara and the rest of her siblings lived an impoverished life and itinerant childhood until their parents separated and went down different paths. Perry is her only surviving sibling because both Jimmy and Fern committed suicide. This ties with the idea that she is afraid of losing it all just like each and everyone of her siblings had before. Their mother, Flo Buckskin, was an alcoholic or as Tex John Smith refers to “took to whiskey,” (264) and then later took off to San Francisco taking the children with her. Perry was the one to finally return to his father while the rest of the siblings didn’t have that. Barbara wanted to have a relationship like the one Perry and her father shared which is her reason to be angry at Perry for acting that way towards her father. In her second letter to him she writes, “Now I don’t say that you owe him undying gratitude or your life but you do owe him RESPECT and COMMON DECENCY.”(141). This helps to show that although she didn’t have the childhood she expected she is still able to recognize who her father is and what he has done for her brother that could have really helped her shape a better future with success instead of a life of fear of losing it

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