Critique Paper.docx

PAUL ROMANO B. ROYO MAED-ENGLISH EDUC. 224

The Last Leaf by O. Henry A Reader-Response Criticism

The Last Leaf talks about three artists: Sue, Johnsy and Mr. Behrman. In their town struck the sickness of pneumonia, where a lot of people died and suffered. In the apartment of these three painters, Johnsy was the one who became the victim of the sickness. According to the doctor, he can help the patient as long as the patient first helps herself and held on a positive attitude of soon getting well. If we will read the story in its efferent mode we will only see that Johnsy is suffering from pneumonia but she seems ready to die with it. But as we read on the story, it focuses on the change of Johnsy’s attitude towards getting well and surpassing the sickness of pneumonia. She depends her getting well to the falling leaves outside her window and suddenly draws the inspiration from living from the leaves itself. Often times like Johnsy, we tend to give meaning to the things around us. Thinking it was a sign or it is fate. Thinking that our lives are the same as the symbolism around us. We fail to realize that it is us or it is our attitude in facing obstacles that matter. If we were intimidated easily by the powerful forces of these hardships then we will immediately lose the battle. Johnsy fails to realize this, she just wanted to die maybe because she doesn’t want to be a burden to Sue anymore. Or maybe she feels that she suffers so much that there is no more hope to survive. Sue, on the other hand, keeps on having faith that Johnsy will still survive. While Mr. Behrman who was introduced in the text as a sort of eccentric and failure painter became the reason of Johnsy’s survival of pneumonia. He made Johnsy realize that the leaf will not determine whether she will survive or not. Maybe Mr. Behrman realized that she is too young to die and there is still hope. The sad part of the story is that someone has to sacrifice himself in order for Johnsy to learn. Often times we tend to do that. We make decisions without realizing or thinking hard that we hurt the feelings of others. Most of the time we just think of ourselves and how we suffered, we became selfish of the situation and the word “I” becomes present all the time. And at the end of the day after we realized our mistakes, were too late of saving our friends, family or loved ones from getting hurt. Sometimes even worst because we inflicted irreparable damage to their feelings. Maybe another lesson that we can learn from the text is that we should always think of the consequences of our actions. Everything that we do or every decision that we make we should ask ourselves whether it will be good for other people or the other way around. And lastly, facing every obstacle in life with the right attitude gives us the opportunity of winning the battle. We should not be close-minded about things. Attitude can make or break us. When our attitude is right there is no barrier too high or walls too strong that we cannot overcome.