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A Capote Collection

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Truman Capote's gift for the written word brings marvel even in comparison to great literary geniuses. While "The Grass Harp" may not be the best exhibition of his talent, it is a brush stroke in his overall masterwork. The centerpeice of this particular book is "The Grass Harp", an odd book which brings to mind Steinbeck's Cannery Row. As an odd tale about simple people in a small town, the main characters are merely looking for a place to lay their head at the end of the day. Even if living in a tree is the best possible shelter for a time, it is the ideal retreat from the forces that trouble them. The short stories that follow also have a few gems. I recommend a tale of disapproving in-laws called "My Side of the Matter", the mysterious "Miriam", and the tale of an idiot savant in "Jug of Silver". With some of the other short stories in the collection, I am not as sure of where Capote was going as clearly. Perhaps rereading the others at a later date will draw greater appreciation from me. Capote's ability to choose and arrange words alone makes reading his work a real treat. If only modern writers had half of his talent and insight. Even though this is not his best collection, it is a treasure to fans and admirers.

A Word Portrait	Customer Rating:
This early Novella by Truman Capote clearly demonstrates his ability to put together a word portrait. As an example: "... I would hear the tantalizing tremor of their voices flowing like sapsyrup through the old wood." The characters are richly portrayed in this gem of Southern fiction.

A Great and Touching Novel

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Capote found his full voice in this, his second novel. It is a fantasy based on characters from his own life, including himself, his aunt Sook Faulk, to whom the book is dedicated "in memory of affections deep and true", another aunt, and their servant. Capote's prose is beautiful and lucid as it carries the reader through the book at a swift pace, and this novel achieves the rare combination of ease of reading with depth of thought and emotion.

A Miracle of Writing: Capote's Genius at Full Throttle

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[I wrote this review in 1999 as "A Reader." I hope more people read it and read this book.] For years I've known about this work but never read it until now. I've been fishing about in contemporary fiction, looking for something entertaining, enlightening, and superbly well written, but my search ended entirely when I finally read this novel, written in 1951. Set in the South, in the countryside, this story brilliantly draws you into its magical surroundings. Its three main characters, Dolly, Collin, and Catherine, are real presences that emerge from the lush southern environs as complex, blooming beings whose lives take time to develop and understand. There is nothing slick about this writing; it's just classically elegant and clear. The story is packed with interesting people and proceeds as if inspired by Twain. It is entertaining, poetic, and meaningful all at once. I found myself rereading the opening pages, picturing the scene, and feeling how brilliant the writing was in its elegiac and inspired imagery. The story is simple: a young boy, orphaned, lives with his two eccentric aunts in a small town in the South. One aunt is mean-spirited and selfish, and the other is sweet, other-worldly, and gentle. When the mean aunt tries to exploit the sweet one by mass producing a folk medicine remedy the sweet aunt learned about from a traveling gypsy woman, the sweet aunt runs away from home with the orphan boy and her best friend, a strange Indian woman. They don't run too far, however, just to a tree house in a nearby China tree. From that point on, everyone learns something about themselves. This southern world is a generous place to Truman Capote, and it has mercies to give and lessons to be learned. In fact, it's something of a magical world, almost a precursor of the magical realism of Marquez and others. But as the characters learn about themselves, so we the readers learn too, about what love is, about change, and about what we accept in life. For Capote to have written this book at the age of 26 is truly a miracle. This book alone puts him in league with the literary giants. I highly recommend "The Grass Harp" to anyone looking for that one great book to read and treasure.

An Often Overlooked Gem

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TRUMAN CAPOTE's wrote THE GRASS HARP early in his career and it is an often overlooked gem. This sweet, eccentric, moving and decidedly southern tale is the leisurely paced story of the repercussions that ensue when three townfolk decide to up and run away to live in a treehouse on the outskirts of town. Three quickly becomes five and eventually swells to even more as the makeshift home becomes a sort of paradise and refuge where stories are shared, closeness is established, and love blooms....think FLANNERY O'CONNOR meets SWISS FAMILY ROBINSON with a dash of STEEL MAGNOLIAS. Themes of finding one's place and path and making oneself known are skillfully woven into the narrative. It has the feel of a fantastic and utterly charming myth. Primary assets are the "thick as molasses" southern mood and syntax as well as a bevy of unforgettable characters.