The majority of the world would agree that random murder is unethical and deserves severe punishment, especially if this murder is committed against an innocent and kind family. However, there is much debate about how much punishment random murder deserves. Should capital punishment be allowed? How much is human life worth and who has the authority to declare it? In the nonfiction novel In Cold Blood, author Truman Capote fully characterizes the victims, the Clutter family, using external dialogue and description to help the reader more fully understand the family's loss and murder and to ironically humanize the killers Dick and Perry using parallelism; this is done to subtly suggest Capote's belief that capital punishment is wrong. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay As the reader gets to know the members of the Clutter family through dialogue and outside description, the characters become more real to the reader, so their deaths feel more personal. First, we read a description of Nancy, “a beautiful girl…[whose] eyes…made her immediately likable, [they] at once announced her lack of suspicion” (Capete 19). Nancy's eyes stand out, especially because they reflect her innocence. Here she is personified as a doe-eyed gazelle unaware of the hunter, or as an innocent lamb to be slaughtered. This makes the reader feel more sympathy for Nancy, as the damsel in distress is a familiar character and the damsel who wasn't saved is by far a tragic story. Second, the reader sees Mrs. Ashida's opinion of Herb, as she tells him, "I can't imagine you being afraid. No matter what happened, you'd talk your way out of it" (Capete 36). Herb is the father figure. He should protect his family. Ideally, he is practically invincible. With Herb's murder, the reader sees the hero's failure, and thus further understands the loss of family. Finally, we see the nature of Bonnie and Kenyon. In one of her breakdowns, Bonnie tells Wilma, "I'm missing out... The best years, the kids, everything... And how will he remember me [Kenyon]? Like some kind of ghost" (Capete 30) . All Bonnie hopes for is the chance to connect with Kenyon, who is in every sense "Bonnie's son, a sensitive and reticent boy" (Capete 39). However, with the murder of the Clutter family, any possibility of a close relationship is taken away with the brutality of chance and a gun. In all these cases the author plays on the reader's sympathies by using intertextuality, as familiarity with the character types helps to further understand the characters' loss and the value of human life. Furthermore, Capote uses stock characters to develop the reader's expectations, and then changes the narrative from the traditional role of the stock character to further emotionally engage the reader. Since Capote continually mentions and refers to the Clutters throughout the book, he also characterizes the murderers. . Then, as the reader gasps listening to Perry's testimony of Nancy's last cries, which sounded like, "Oh, no! Oh, please. No! No! No! No! Don't do it! Oh, please don't do it! For favor !" (Capete 245), the reader also feels a pang of sympathy upon hearing of the immense abandonment and abuse suffered by Perry (Capete 130-136). As Capote himself said, "If [Perry had] had any chance in life, things would have been different..." The author uses parallelism to humanize the;.