FILE 7

Breakfast at Tiffanys

Restless
wandering

TASK 1 Adapt the novella for the cinema

p. 120

or
TASK 2 Imagine a few pages
from Hollys scrapbook

RECAP
Prepare an oral overview
of Breakfast at Tiffanys

p. 120

p. 120

Voyage, parcours initiatique, exil

tude
dune

uvre

A poster for the movie Breakfast at Tiffanys, directed by Blake Edwards (1961)
109

Warm up

A writer and his work

Truman Capote (1924-1984)
was born Truman Streckfus Persons, in New Orleans, Louisiana. His parents led an
unstable life and largely neglected him. Capote spent much of his young life in the care
ofhismothers relatives in Monroeville, Alabama. It was there that he went to school with
andbefriended Harper Lee. Dill, one of the characters in Lees Pulitzer-Prize-winning
novel To Kill a Mockingbird (1960), is modelled on him. Capote left school at 15
andbegan working as a copyboy at The New Yorker in 1943.

Writing career
He published his first novel, Other Voices, Other
Rooms in 1948. This work and the two that followed,
A Tree of Light (1949) and The Grass Harp (1951),
assured him a place among the prominent postwar
American writers. Capote adapted the latter for the
stage and had the costumes designed by his close
friend Cecil Beaton, who was to become Queen
ElizabethIIs official photographer.
Always fascinated by the rich and famous, Capote
never hid his taste for celebrity. He enjoyed being
part of the fashionable elite and was a popular

figure in such circles. Several scenes and characters

in Breakfast at Tiffanys (1958) evoke New-York
socialites, their style and way of life. Capote wrote
that eccentric and unconventional Holly Golightly
was his favourite character.
Capotes next work, In Cold Blood (1966), was an
instant best-seller and brought him acclaim from
literary critics. It is considered as the original nonfiction novel, a new literary genre that depicts
historical figures or events with the story-telling
techniques of fiction.

About Breakfast at Tiffanys

New York, New York
The city of New York figures pretty prominently in the
story. It is the magic place where runaway brides from
Texas and nameless would-be writers from nowhere can
meet and become friends, the place where Holly is adamant she will return with her children Because yes, they
must see this, these lights, the riverIlove New York,
even though it isnt mine [] because I belong to it.
Much of the action takes place in or around an old
brownstone apartment building where both Holly and
the narrator live. It is a little world in a class of its own with
its own life and creatures. After Holly, leaves the narrator
has to move because the building is haunted just as he
is himself haunted by the memories he keeps of Holly.

110

FILE 7

Breakfast at Tiffanys

Heres a toast to Tiffanys

Craig Wilson
USA Today, October 29, 2008

S
5_

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et during World WarII in an

Upper East Side brownstone
lled with eccentric tenants, the
book revolves around Golightly, a
charmer, a deceiver, a woman who
relied on the kindness of strangers,
mainly rich men.
Two New York institutions were
not impressed with the tale. The
New Yorker brushed it off, calling
it empty nostalgia. [] William
Goyen in The New York Times
Book Review dubbed Capote, who
was 34 when Tiffanys was published, perhaps the last of the oldfashioned Valentine makers and
accused him of dwelling in a doily
story-world.

Norman Mailer*, however, fa20_ mously defended Capote, calling

him the most perfect writer of my
generation and added he would
not have changed two words in
Breakfast at Tiffanys. He also said
25_ it would become a small classic.
He was right. According to Random House, the book remains a
steady seller: for years, about
30,000copies have sold every year.

The store Tiffanys

in New York City
30_

Vintage/Anchors managing editor,

Stephen McNabb, came up with
the idea of reissuing Tiffanys for
its 50thanniversary. I recently
reread the novel and was struck by
35_ how easily I was able to identify
with the time and the place and the
characters, with New York as
Capote describes it, he says. And
how kids, young adults, new40_ comers relate to the city, and we
all hope always will. We all know
people like Holly Golightly, maybe
because theyve been inuenced
by her, but I think because Capote
45_ created a powerful character out
of a universal type.

50_

55_

this fall and says it stands the test

of time. Its a wonderful comedy
of manners set in its time. Its
great for what it is. Trumans writing is evocative, exact, without
being pretentious. It flows so
easily.

But he acknowledges that the

now-classic was only moderately
successful in its time. Not a op,
but not a big best seller. Clarke,
60_ 71, who became a close friend of
Capotes, brushes off the original
bad reviews and says book reviewers are often the most obtuse.
They didnt appreciate it, as is
65_ often the way. But then the movie
Gerald Clarke, author of Capote:
came along. And movies change
A Biography, also reread the book
everything. 
* Norman Mailer (1923-2007), an American novelist, journalist, essayist, poet,
playwright, screenwriter, and film director. He is considered as one of the
most important innovators of creative non-fiction, or New Journalism

Before reading Breakfast at Tiffanys

1. Have a look at the documents on these pages. From what you have learnt
about the author and his work, say what sort of story you expect to read.

2. Start reading the story until you reach the beginning of the passage p.112
of this book (Text1).
What is the narrator going to do now? What literary device is used?
111

Text 1
Miss Holiday Golightly, Travelling

d been living in the house about a week when I noticed that the mailbox belonging
to Apt.2 had a name-slot tted with a curious card. Printed, rather Cartierformal, it reads: Miss Holiday Golightly; and, underneath, in the corner, Travelling.
It nagged me like a tune: Miss Holiday Golightly, Travelling.
5_

One night, it was long past twelve, I woke up at the sound of Mr Yunioshi calling
down the stairs. Since he lived on the top oor, his voice fell through the whole house,
exasperated and stern. Miss Golightly! I must protest!
The voice that came back, welling up from the bottom of the stairs, was silly-young
and self-amused. Oh darling, I am sorry. I lost the goddamn key.

10_

You cannot go on ringing my bell. You must please, please have yourself a key
made.
But I lose them all.
I work, I have to sleep, Mr.Yunioshi shouted. But always you are ringing my bell

15_

Oh, dont be angry, you dear little man: I wont do it again. And if you promise not
to be angryher voice was coming nearer, she was climbing the stairsI might let
you take those pictures you mentioned.
By now Id left my bed and opened the door an inch. I could hear Mr.Yunioshis
silence: hear, because it was accompanied by an audible change of breathe.
When? he said.

20_

The girl laughed. Some time, she answered, slurring the word.
Any time, he said, and closed the door.

25_

30_

35_

I went out into the hall and leaned over the banister, just enough to see without
being seen. She was still on the stairs, now she reached the landing, and the ragbag
colours of her boys hair, tawny streaks, strands of albino-blond and yellow, caught
the hall light. It was a warm evening, nearly summer, and she wore a slim cool black
dress, black sandals, a pearl chocker. For all her chic thinness, she had an almost
breakfast-cereal air of health, a soap and lemon cleanness, a rough pink darkening
in the cheeks. Her mouth was large, her nose upturned. A pair of dark glasses blotted
out her eyes. It was a face beyond childhood, yet this side of belonging to a woman.
Ithought her anywhere between sixteen and thirty; as it turned out, she was shy two
months of her nineteenth birthday.
She was not alone. There was a man following behind her. The way his plump hand
clutched at her hip seemed somehow improper; not morally, aesthetically. He was
short and vast, sun-lamped and pomaded, a man in a buttressed pin-stripe suit with
a red carnation withering in the lapel. When they reached her door she rummaged
her purse in search of a key, and took no notice of the fact that his thick lips were
nuzzling the nape of her neck. At last, though, nding the key and opening the door,
she turned to him cordially: Bless you, darlingyou were sweet to see me home.
Hey, baby! he said, for the door was closing in his face.

40_

Yes, Harry?
Harry was the other guy. Im Sid. Sid Arbuck. You like me.
I worship you, Mr.Arbuck. But good night, Mr.Arbuck.

112

FILE 7

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Breakfast at Tiffanys

Mr.Arbuck stared with disbelief as the door shut rmly. Hey baby, let me in baby.
You like me baby. Im a liked guy. Didnt Ipick up the check, ve people, your friends,
I never seen them before? Dont that give me the right you should like me? You like
me, baby.
He tapped on the door, gently, then louder; nally he took several steps back, his
body hunched and lowering, as though he meant to charge it, crash it down. Instead,
he plunged down the stairs, slamming a st against the wall.
Truman Capote, Breakfast at Tiffanys, Penguin, p.16-18.

Old Brownstone apartment buildings in New York City

Guidelines
1. Draw a portrait of Holly. What kind of person is she?
2. What do you make of her name? Can you link it to
restless wandering?

3. Focus on the narrator. What can you say about him?

Read on
Read on, until you reach the beginning of
the passage p.114 of this book (Text2).
Find out how the relationship between
the narrator and Holly develops.
113

Text 2
The mean reds

H
5_

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es still harping? she said, and cast across the room an affectionate
look at Berman. But hes got a point, I should feel guilty. Not because
they would have given me the part or because I would have been good: they
wouldnt and I wouldnt. If I do feel guilty, I guess its because I let him go on
dreaming when I wasnt dreaming a bit. I was just vamping for time to make
a few self-improvements: I knew damn well Id never be a movie star. Its too
hard; and if youre intelligent, its too embarrassing. My complexes arent
inferior enough: being a movie star and having a big fat ego are supposed
to go hand-in-hand; actually, its essential not to have any ego at all. I dont
mean Id mind being rich and famous. Thats very much on my schedule, and
some day, Ill try to get around to it; but if it happens, Id like to have my ego
tagging along. I want to still be me when I wake up one ne morning and have
breakfast at Tiffanys. You need a glass, she said, noticing my empty hands.
Rusty! Will you bring my friend a drink?
She was still hugging the cat. Poor slob, she said, tickling his head, poor
slob without a name. Its a little inconvenient, his not having a name. But
Ihavent any right to give him one: hell have to wait until he belongs to somebody. We just sort of took up by the river one day, we dont belong to each

A still from themovie Breakfast at Tiffanys (1961)

114

FILE 7

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Breakfast at Tiffanys

other: hes an independent, and so am I. I dont want to own anything until

Iknow Ive found the place where me and things belong together. Im not quite
sure where that is just yet. But I know what its like. She smiled, and let the
cat drop to the oor. Its like Tiffanys, she said. Not that Igive a hoot about
jewellery. Diamonds, yes. But its tacky to wear diamonds before youre forty;
and even thats risky. They only look right on the really old girls. Maria
Ouspenskaya 1. Wrinkles and bones, white hair and diamonds: I cant wait. But
thats not why Im mad about Tiffanys. Listen. You know those days when
youve got the mean reds?
Same as the blues?

30_

No, she said slowly. No, the blues are because youre getting fat or maybe
its been raining too long. Youre sad, thats all. But the mean reds are horrible.
Youre afraid and you sweat like hell, but you dont know what youre afraid
of. Except something bad is going to happen, only you dont know what it is.
Youve had that feeling?
Quite often. Some people call it angst 2.

35_

All right. Angst. But what do you do about it?

Well, a drink helps.

40_

45_

Ive tried that. Ive tried aspirin, too. Rusty thinks I should smoke marijuana,
and I did for a while, but it only makes me giggle. What Ive found does the
most good is just to get into a taxi and go to Tiffanys. It calms me down right
away, the quietness and the proud look of it; nothing very bad could happen
to you there, not with those kind men in their nice suits, and that lovely smell
of silver and alligator wallets. IfIcould nd a real-life place that made me feel
like Tiffanys, then Id buy some furniture and give the cat a name. Ive thought
maybe after the war, Fred and I She pushed up her dark glasses, and her
eyes, the differing colours of them, the greys and wisps of blue and green, had
taken on a far-seeing sharpness. I went to Mexico once. Its wonderful country
for raising horses. I saw one place near the sea. Freds good with horses.
Truman Capote, Breakfast at Tiffanys, Penguin, p.39-41.

1. a popular Russian
actress who achieved
fame inHollywood
toward the end of
hercareer
2. derived from
German, used
toname anxiety
anddespair

Guidelines

Read on

Focus on Holly

Read on, until you reach the beginning of

the passage p.116 of this book (Text3).
Find out if Holly can find a real-life
place that [makes her] feel like Tiffanys
(lines43-45 in the text above).

1. Define the means reds in your own words.

2. Explain what Tiffanys means to Holly.
3. What psychological image do you get of Holly?
Focus on the cat

4. In your opinion, how is he related to Holly?

115

Text 3
Un-Holly-like

t is only a question of grieving, he rmly declared. When the sadness

came, rst she throws the drink she is drinking. The bottle. Those books.
A lamp. Then I am scared. I hurry to bring a doctor.

5_

But why? I wanted to know. Why should she have a t over Rusty? If Iwere
her, Id celebrate.
Rusty?
I was still carrying my newspaper, and showed him the headline.

10_

15_

20_

25_

30_

35_

40_

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116

Oh, that. He grinned rather scornfully. They do us a grand favour, Rusty

and Mag. We laugh over it: how they think they break our hearts when all the
time we want them to run away. I assure you, we were laughing when the sadness came. His eyes searched the litter on the oor; he picked up a ball of yellow
paper. This, he said.
It was a telegram from Tulip, Texas: Received notice young Fred killed in action
overseas stop your husband and children join in the sorrow of our mutual loss
stop letter follows love Doc.
Holly never mentioned her brother again: except once. Moreover, she stopped
calling me Fred. June, July, all through the warm months she hibernated like
a winter animal who did not know spring had come and gone. Her hair darkened,
she put on weight. She became rather careless about her clothes; used to rush
round to the delicatessen wearing a rain-slicker and nothing underneath. Jos
moved into the apartment, his name replacing Mag Wildwoods on the mailbox.
Still, Holly was a good deal alone, for Jos stayed in Washington three days a
week. During his absences she entertained no one and seldom left the apartmentexcept on Thurdays, when she made her weekly trip to Ossining.
Which is not to imply that she had lost interest in life; far from it, she seemed
more content, altogether happier that Id ever seen her. A keen sudden unHolly-like enthusiasm for homemaking resulted in several un-Holly-like purchases: at a Parke-Bernet auction she acquired a stag-at-bay hunting tapestry
and, from the William Randolph Hearst estate, a gloomy pair of Gothic easy
chairs; she bought the complete Modern Library, shelves of classical records,
innumerable Metropolitan Museum reproductions (including a statue of a
Chinese cat that her own car hated and hissed at and ultimately broke), a
Waring mixer and pressure cooker and a library of cook books. She spent whole
hausfrau afternoons slopping about in the sweatbox of her midget kitchen:
Jos says Im better that the Colony. Really, who would have dreamed I had
such a great natural talent? A month ago I couldnt scramble eggs. And still
couldnt, for that matter. Simple dishes, steak, a proper salad, were beyond her.
Instead, she fed Jos and occasionally myself outr soups (brandied black tarrapin poured into avocado shells), Nero-ish novelties (roasted pheasant stuffed
with pomegranates and persimmons), and other dubious innovations (chicken
and saffron rice served with a chocolate sauce: An East Indian classic, my
dear.) Wartime sugar and cream rationing restricted her imagination when it
came to sweetsnevertheless, she once managed something called Tobacco
Tapioca: best not describe it.
Nor describe her attempts to master Portuguese, an ordeal as tedious to me
as it was to her, for whenever I visited her an album of Linguaphone records

FILE 7

50_

Breakfast at Tiffanys

never ceased rotating on the phonograph. Now, too, she rarely spoke a sentence
that did not begin, After were married or When we move to Rio Yet Jos
had never suggested marriage. She admitted it. But, after all, he knows Im
preggers*. Well, I am darling. Six weeks gone. Idont see why that should surprise you. It didnt me. Not un peu bit. Im delighted. Iwant to have at leastnine.
Truman Capote, Breakfast at Tiffanys, Penguin, p.73-75.

Guidelines
1. Recall who Fred and Jos are.
What is Hollys state of mind?

2. Explain what Un-Holly-like means

(interms of physical appearance, social life,
interests).

3. Would you say that Holly has turned into

acompletely new person? Why or why not?

* pregnant,
expecting a child

4. Keeping in mind your answer to

question3, would you say that Holly can
now have a breakfast at Tiffanys?

Read on
Imagine and discuss what will happen now.
Read on until you reach the beginning
ofthe passage p.118 of this book (Text4)
andfind out.
117

Text 4
Will let you know address
when I know it myself

B
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10_

ut the cat was not at the corner where hed been left. There was no one,
nothing on the street except a urinating drunk and two Negro nuns herding
a le of sweet-singing children. Other children emerged from doorways and
ladies leaned over their window sills to watch Holly darted up and down the
block, ran back and forth chanting: You. Cat. Where are you? Here, cat.
She kept it up until a bumpy-skinned boy came forward dangling an old
tom by the scruff of its neck: You want a nice kitty, miss? Gimme a dollar.
The limousine had followed us. Now Holly let me steer her towards it. At the
door, she hesitated; she looked past me, past the boy still offering his cat (Halfa
dollar. Two-bits, maybe? Two-bits, it aint much), and she shuddered, she had
to grip my arm to stand up: Oh, Jesus God. We did belong to each other. He
was mine.
Then I made her a promise, I said Id come back and nd her cat: Ill take
care of him, too. I promise.

15_

20_

She smiled: that cheerless new pinch of a smile.

But what about me? she said, whispered, and shivered again. Im very
scared, Buster. Yes, at last. Because it could go on for ever. Not knowing whats
yours until youve thrown it away. The mean reds, theyre noting. The fat
woman, she nothing. This, though: my mouths so dry, if my life depended on
it I couldnt spit. She stepped in the car, sank in the seat.
Sorry driver, lets go.

25_

30_

35_

40_

118

tomatos tomato missing. And: drug-case actress believed gangland

victim. In due time, however, the press reported: fleeing play-girl traced
to rio. Apparently no attempt was made by American authorities to recover
her, and soon the matter diminished to an occasional gossip-column mention;
as a news story, it was revived only once: on Christmas Day, when Sally Tomato
died of heart attack at Sing Sing. Months went by, a winter of them, and not a
word from Holly. The owner of the brownstone sold her abandoned possessions, the white-satin bed, the tapestry, her precious Gothic chairs; a new tenant
acquired the apartment, his name was Quaintance Smith, and he entertained
as many gentlemen callers of a noisy nature as Holly ever hadthough in this
instance Madame Spanella did not object, indeed she doted on the young man
and supplied let mignon whenever he had a black eye. But in the spring a postcard came: it was scribbled in pencil, and signed with a lipstick kiss: Brazil was
beasty but Buenos Aires the best. Not Tiffanys, but almost. Am joined at the hip
with duhvine Seor. Love? Think so. Anyhoo am looking for somewhere to live
(Seor has wife, 7brats) and will let you know address when I know it myself. Mille
tendresses. But the address, if it ever existed, never was sent, which made me
sad, there was so much I wanted to write her: that Id sold two stories, had read
that the Trawlers were countersuing for divorce, was moving out of the brownstone because it was haunted. But mostly, I wanted to tell about her cat. Ihad
kept my promise; I had found him. It took weeks of after-work roaming through
those Spanish Harlem streets, and there were many false alarmsashes of
tiger-striped fur that, upon inspection, were not him. But one day, once cold

FILE 7

45_

Breakfast at Tiffanys

sunshiny Sunday winter afternoon, it was. Flanked by potted plants and framed
by clean lace curtains, he was seated in the window of a warm-looking room:
Iwondered what his name was, for I was certain he had one now, certain hed
arrived somewhere he belonged. African hut or whatever, I hope Holly has, too.
Truman Capote, Breakfast at Tiffanys, Penguin, p.98-100.

Guidelines
1. Lines 1 to 21: explain what Holly is doing
and what her feelings are.

2. Explain the press report.

3. Where is Holly now?

4. Explain what the narrators state of mind

is.
Now that you have read the whole book,
say what in your opinion the novella is
about.
119

Over to you!

Speaking
Adapt the novella for the cinema
A new film version of Breakfast at Tiffanys has been planned,
and you are thedirector.
Choose the time, the place and the settings
Consider the characters (age, physical appearance, personality)
and choose the actors
Present and explain your choices to the class
In groups, create a movie poster.

Writing
Imagine pages from Hollys scrapbook
A scrapbook tells the story of memorable times; it also describes, explains
andcomments. It can contain all types ofmemorabiliaphotos, postcards,
tickets, invitations, small notes anything that can be glued on a page.
In groups:
Decide on a theme for each page: places, events or people
Decide what moments or anecdotes in Hollys life you want to preserve
Choose pictures to illustrate them. You can use some of the illustrations from
the previous pages or provide your own.
Remember the details or the circumstanceswho the person is and
represents, or where the scene took place was
Mention why this piece of memory is important and give personal reactions
You can also add poems, lyrics from songs or memorable phrases that you
feel illustrate the page and its mood.

Recap
Prepare an oral overview of Breakfast at Tiffanys, remembering what
you have learnt in the chapter. Present the documents you have studied,
takinginto account the following elements:
The main character (her name and her way of life, her restlessness)
The relationship between the narrator and the main character
How he tells the story and what he remembers
The roles played by the other characters
Holly and the cat
The mean reds and restless wandering.

120

Breakfast at Tiffanys

From book to film

Truman Capote with

Marilyn Monroe in 1954

he film Breakfast at Tiffanys was released by

Paramount Pictures in 1961. Capote had originally
picked Marilyn Monroe to play the role of Holly
Golightly but Paramount instead chose the waish
Audrey Hepburn to play the part.
Capote and Monroe shared a similar background that
helped make him persistent in casting her. They both
grew up from desolate childhoods and both had trouble
throughout their careers dealing with their fame
through drugs and alcohol. And although Capote lived
longer than Monroe, they both met with a similar end
[].
Capote was most upset with the changes Paramount
made in the screen version of his novel, in particular
with the change of the ending. Instead of a remembrance of Holly, the narrator ends up convincing Holly
to stay in New York with him by making her realize
that, like her and her cat, they belong to each other.
This totally changed the theme of the story. In the book,
Holly is always travellingsearching for a place to belong, a place she never nds.
As a whole, the lm translates some of the material
from the book elegantly and word for word some scenes
are perfect. Like any lm that is made from a book, the
two should be judged by themselves as separate entities.
On its own Breakfast at Tiffanys is a wonderful lm
that has stood the test of time and remains a classic.

Going Further

FILE 7

Gerald Clarke, Capote: A Biography (2005)

Another wanderer

reakfast at Tiffanys evokes J.D. Salingers

TheCatcher in the Rye, which Idont need to
tell you is a completely different book with a voice
that bears no resemblance to Capotes whatsoever.
Icompare them here because Iget the strong
sense that Holly Golightlys America and Holden
Caulelds America are one and the same. They live
in the same 1940s New York, breathing the same
air of a genuine anxiety about phoniness, caught in
an ambiguous rupture between the intense desire
to be self-made and the inescapable web of social
relations that manufactures them from without.
Nicholas Tam, Wednesday Book Club

121