Breakfast at Tiffany's Holly Golightly

Holly Golightly:

Well I find it absolutely ridiculous when people think that I am a phony.  I am very real. I simply worship those who are adoring me. That does not mean I am phony. Darling, I am just a filles living in this wonderful world. Why should I not embrace it? Now there are some guys that are just beasts, but I just get tiresome of it so I leave them be. That doesn’t mean I am a phony, I just have to throw them out, especially if they wash enough wine down to bathe an elephant. On the topic of boys, I would like to say that I have trained myself to like them, well the older ones that is. The older ones give me enough money for the powder room, so I find them delicate to put up with. “I suppose you think I’m very brazen. Or trés fou. Or something.” Well it’s useful to me if you call me that because everybody else does, I am just used to these horrors of the way people talk to me. I know what my snob O.J. said about me to poor Fred. He said that, “She’s a phony. But on the other hand you’re right. She isn’t a phony because she’s a real phony” (Capote 30).  But darling, I didn’t care, I just told him to light me a cigarette.

            Oh my cat. The poor slob doesn’t have a name, but we don’t belong to each other so I don’t have the right to give him a name. Why should I give him a name when I don’t even know where I belong. This is very real of me because I am trying to give the darling a place to stay for the time, but he can’t stay with me. I am honest to the cat. I wish the darling had a name because it’s inconvenient, but “he’ll have to wait until he belongs to somebody” (Capote 39). I stated in the novella that, “he’s an independent, and so am I. I don’t want to own anything until I know I’ve found the place where me and things belong together” (Capote 39).  How much realer can I get? The day I left that poor little slob, I ran to get him back. But it was his time to go find his place.

            Some people may look at my lifestyle as gaudy, fake, or flashy, but I’m just natural. I was given my character early in life, so I know I am a real one. I lie, yes, and I am good at making an agonized confession, but God everyone does that.  What girl would go to the powder room with no change? I might let a little lie about how much I need, but it’s tacky to only have 25 cents, everyone knows that. You just have to present a little proof that you need the money. There has been some silly controversy about when I stated, “I haven’t anything against whores. Except this: some of them may have an honest tongue but they all have dishonest hearts. I mean you can’t bang the guy and cash his checks and at least not try to believe you love him. I never have” (Capote 82). It might seem fake of me darling to admit in a nonchalant way that I never fell in love with guys that gave me some money, but I honestly didn’t. I am not a slut or dyke either, although I would like to live with a dyke. They are just very clean. Et pourquois pas? Because I’m rather honest about life. More of an unto-myself type honest, no person is law-type honest and that is a fact. To end this little interview of ours darling, I will stick to the statement I made later in the novella, “Be anything but a coward, a pretender, an emotional crook, a whore: I’d rather have cancer than a dishonest heart” (Capote 83). 

Look at this great picture of me: