Fans of Truman Capote’s enduring literary legacy will soon have an unprecedented opportunity to acquire personal effects directly from the iconic author’s life. Capote, whose brilliant career and complex personal history have been immortalized through cinematic adaptations such as the 2005 biopic Capote and the 2024 television miniseries Feud: Capote vs. the Swans, passed away in 1984 at the age of 59. Following his death, a significant portion of his personal belongings was entrusted to journalist and close friend Gerald Clarke, who published a definitive biography of the writer in 1988. Now 89 years old and in the process of downsizing, Clarke is putting nearly 400 lots of Capote’s personal possessions up for public auction.
The upcoming sale is being managed by the Cornell Auction house based in Bellport, New York. The official auction is scheduled to take place on November 21, preceded by an online preview and the opening of bidding on October 26. While the auction house has not yet released the full catalogue to the public, representatives revealed in an Instagram preview video that the vast majority of the items included in the Truman Capote auction were documented precisely half a century ago. These objects were famously photographed in 1976 for an Architectural Digest feature detailing Capote’s rustic, custom-built beach house located in Sagaponack on the South Fork of Long Island.
Confirmation from The New York Times has verified that among the treasures headed to the auction block is Capote’s extensive collection of paperweights, which were prominently featured in the original AD magazine spread. Clarke recalled in an interview with the Times that the famous scribe "became addicted to paperweights and collected so many of them." Several of these decorative pieces were actually crafted by Capote himself, utilizing flowers carefully preserved within resin. Notably, one of the paperweights included in the auction was constructed using authentic rocks gathered from the Kansas farm that became a central focal point of his groundbreaking true-crime masterpiece, In Cold Blood.
Additional lots featured in the auction include a rare, signed copy of Harper Lee’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel To Kill a Mockingbird, a poignant nod to Lee’s lifelong friendship with Capote. Collectors will also have the chance to bid on a bronze frog inkwell and, perhaps most intimately, Capote’s personal house keys.
To fully understand the provenance of these items, it is necessary to revisit the secluded Long Island sanctuary where Capote spent decades writing, reading, and retreating from the pressures of high society. Finding his Hamptons home has always been a challenge, hidden as it is behind dense scrub pine, thick privet hedges, and rows of vibrant hydrangea bushes. The two-story, weathered-gray beach house sits quietly near Sagaponack, nestled within a landscape of rolling potato fields and lush farmlands that meet the nearby Atlantic Ocean. Capote famously described the region as "Kansas with a sea breeze."
During Capote’s time there, the area evolved into a rural Montparnasse, attracting celebrated creative figures such as James Jones, Willem de Kooning, Marya Mannes, Jean Stafford, and Joseph Heller. Despite the presence of elite artistic talent, Sagaponack retained the feel of a sleepy, sentimental town. The local establishment where Capote frequently lunched or shared drinks with fellow writers like John Knowles and Willie Morris even ran a congratulatory advertisement in the biweekly local newspaper on his birthday, allowing the famous author to come and go entirely as he pleased.
The most reliable way to locate Capote’s hidden residence was to ride alongside him as he gripped the steering wheel of his deep-green Buick. A short, bumpy ride down a narrow dirt lane established back in 1670 led to a quick turn into a gravel driveway. The path wound past a natural bird sanctuary and a friend’s guest cottage built directly on his property before pulling up in front of the box-shaped, flat-roofed wooden house. Wildflowers bloomed across the grounds, carrying the pungent scent of unharvested potatoes on the salty Atlantic air.
"I own these fields," Capote remarked proudly in 1976, gesturing with a sweeping motion of his left hand across the six acres he had acquired in 1962. He had commissioned a local carpenter, now deceased, to construct the house precisely to his specifications. "He did it to my directions. It’s exactly the way I wanted it. I work at this untended look. It’s intentional. You can see how quiet it is here because you can barely see the top of another house. This is a place to be alone."
Only a select circle of friends ever made the journey up the overgrown path to the house nestled deep in the dune grass, and every visitor arrived by explicit invitation. Capote emphasized that his primary purpose for retreating to the Hamptons was professional isolation. "I’m here to work. I come here a lot in the autumn and winter, and I see almost no one. I don’t care for the Hamptons in the summer—it’s gotten too crowded. I don’t understand the way some people come out here and run themselves ragged every night. I just don’t think some of these writers are working."
This perspective seemed somewhat paradoxical for a man who famously bridged two entirely different worlds, maintaining deep friendships with prisoners and princesses, socialites and sailors alike. Capote held a dual reputation as one of America’s preeminent literary stylists and as an ubiquitous social butterfly in Manhattan high society.
"I spend most of my time out here reading, writing, going for walks with my dog and talking on the telephone. I see people in New York; I don’t see New York people out here. I hardly see anyone when I’m here. In the past 14 years, since I’ve had this house, I’ve gone out six times for dinner. Now that’s quite a record for someone known for being so social, isn’t it? Besides, whom would I entertain? I only know about four people I’d really have over!"
Entering the residence through the back kitchen door, Capote would remove his loafers in the traditional Japanese style before stepping into the living room. Barefoot, he would pick up a rag mop with the delicate grace of Fred Astaire handling a dancing cane to dust the marine-blue floor, which often remained slightly tacky from fresh coats of boat deck paint. "I’ve just had it repainted, and this humidity doesn’t help it dry. You should see this room at night. The floor floats like a big blue-green lake."
Capote frequently referred to his home as a "raincoat," a metaphor for its architectural design. With exterior walls constructed to reveal vertical studs and horizontal bracings, the building’s outer skin functioned purely to shield the interior space from the elements. "I wanted a rustic house. I really think of it as one big room. Completely winterized, it’s been designed to look unfinished. I call it ‘run-down comfort.’ I like the effect of texture in rooms—the rawness of the wood plus the mirrors that line one end."
Floor-to-ceiling windows featuring divided panes welcomed the morning sun while offering unobstructed views of the sea and sand situated roughly 200 yards away. A spiraling steel staircase led upward to a balconied second-floor study furnished with red sofas, wicker chairs, hassocks, and a celebrated charcoal and pencil sketch of Capote created by René Bouché.
The interior lacked any formal pretense; there were no invisible boundaries or implied "Don’t Touch" signs. The furnishings were comfortable, attractive, and clearly meant for daily use. A priceless Tiffany lamp stood beside a worn yellow velvet easy chair. While the upholstery displayed a few sun-faded patches, the author’s beloved collections of paperweights sparkled under the light. The wicker furniture originated from affordable import shops or existed alongside rare antiques, such as the round, claw-footed table downstairs where Capote did his writing. Needlepoint pillows crafted by friends were scattered throughout the rooms alongside silver-framed photographs capturing figures like Lee Radziwill and companions from his inner circle.
Maggie, Capote’s celebrated English bulldog, was frequently a central character in tales of the household, even when she was off visiting neighbors. Capote delighted in describing his pet as "sweet, quirky, and huggy," recounting how she had famously consumed Joanne Carson’s pink satin slippers, devoured Charlotte Curtis’s poinsettias, and periodically raided picnic baskets along nearby Gibson Beach. Pushing his Windex-blue-tinted prescription glasses up the bridge of his nose, Capote would let out his signature high-pitched giggle and shrug. "Oh, she’s very munchy all right."
Beyond the expansive living room lay a small screened-in porch reminiscent of traditional southern architecture, utilized as a summer sitting room when gentle breezes blew off the water. In contrast, Capote’s bedroom near the kitchen was exceptionally stark, resembling a simple camper’s tent. Outfitted with a cot-sized iron bedstead, a stack of detective magazines on a card table, a reducing machine, and a reading lamp, it prioritized function over luxury.
Capote maintained strict routines regardless of his location, whether at his permanent residence in a sleek United Nations Plaza apartment in Manhattan or during travels to Switzerland and California. "I like to have my own things around me. Even when I travel to my other houses in Switzerland and in California, I take things of my own with me," he explained. "I’m a great houseguest. I only appear at mealtimes. However, I really don’t like people staying with me. It’s interrupting."
His daily schedule in Sagaponack followed a rigorous rhythm. "I get up around 7:00 a.m. and work until 11:00, stopping to read the papers. I work again until 1:00 p.m., when I have my lunch. Then I drive to the post office, do my errands, go for a walk. I fool around in the evenings, reading, walking Maggie. I have my dinner by 7:00 p.m., and I’m usually in bed around 9:30 with a book."
During the period of the Architectural Digest feature, Capote was intensely focused on writing his long-anticipated, controversial novel, Answered Prayers, while simultaneously branching out into film acting with a lead role in Neil Simon’s comedic mystery Murder by Death. Playing the eccentric millionaire Lionel Twain—a character living in a gloomy New England mansion who serves as a premier authority on detective fiction—Capote considered the casting a natural fit given his lifelong obsession with real-life crime and the literary triumph of In Cold Blood. The film featured an ensemble cast including Peter Sellers, Orson Welles, Myrna Loy, Eileen Brennan, Peter Falk, David Niven, Madeline Kahn, James Coco, and Nancy Walker.
Reflecting on his lifelong tendency to acquire items, Capote acknowledged his collector’s instinct, pointing to a portrait captured by society photographer Slim Aarons that showed a youthful Capote surrounded by Victorian furniture and cherished objects. "I like to collect things, Victorian things, and mix everything together. I enjoy looking for and at all of them. I’m not sure I need them. I’ve got too much, and I haven’t edited myself lately!"
Rejecting the assistance of professional interior designers, Capote firmly believed in curating his own spaces. "For me, it’s a bore to use a decorator. I know exactly what I want. I just don’t care to have someone come in and tell me what I need to live with. I know." His guiding philosophy for interior design remained simple: "Something that’s not immediately offensive when you walk into a room. Of course it may be, eventually."
Born in New Orleans and raised across the American South, Capote opened his classic novella Breakfast at Tiffany’s with the famous observation: "I am always drawn back to places where I have lived, the houses and the neighborhoods." For Capote, Sagaponack ultimately served as an emotional anchor, echoing his childhood memories. "I moved around so much as a child, I never had a sense of home. Maybe I did when I was 11 and I lived in a rural town in Alabama."
Glancing at a hat rack positioned above his brick fireplace adorned with an assortment of rumpled panama hats, the author offered a final, characteristic laugh. "Home is where I hang my hats. However, I keep leaving them when I go visit people. I don’t have as many as I used to because I don’t recover them all. People always promise to send them back, but they don’t."