Who is Caesar Matthews from Lost in the City: Stories and what is their importance? Lost_in_the_City English & Literature Caesar Matthews | Lost in the City: Stories

Caesar Matthews is a twenty-four-year-old black man living with a woman of recent acquaintance. Caesar has spent the past six years living a life of escalating criminal involvement. He specializes in confidence cons or outright burglary. During a recent store robbery, Caesar murdered the store clerk for no apparent reason. Caesar occasionally does odd jobs for Manny Soto, a local fence. In the past, Caesar worked closely with an older confidence man named Sherman Wheeler. Sherman took Caesar in when he was a youngish teenager and taught him the methods of successful crime. Under Sherman's tutelage, Caesar first burglarized his own father's home and then moved on to opulent homes in the metropolitan area. Sherman seemed to prefer to specialize in scams taking prolonged setup and some measure of skill. Sherman eventually overdosed and thereafter disappeared from the criminal life, taking a job as a security guard in a museum. Caesar views Sherman's defection as a minor affront but is determined to continue being a criminal on his own merits.