Edwin Arlington Robinson

Edwin Arlington Robinson “Richard Cory”

Biography of Edwin Arlington Robinson On December 22nd, 1869, Edwin Arlington Robinson was born to Edwin Robinson and Mary Elizabeth Palmer in Head Tide, Maine. Robinson started seriously writing poetry at age 11, and was a talented writer for someone his age.

Edwin Arlington Robinson’s house.

Robinson attended Harvard for two years, but had to leave because his family's money was running short. His first two books were "The Torrent and the Night Before" and "The Children of the Night" (based on the death of his mother).

In 1902 he published Captain Craig and Other Poems. This work received little attention; until President Theodore Roosevelt wrote a magazine article praising it and Robinson. Robinson dedicated his next work, The Town Down the River (1910), to Roosevelt.

During his lifetime, Edwin Arlington Robinson won three Pulitzer Prizes for his poetry. The first time was in 1922; with "Collected Poems.” In 1925, he won his second for "The Man Who Died Twice". And he won his final Pulitzer in 1928 for "Tristram". Robinson died on April 6th, 1935 in New York City.

“Richard Cory” by Edwin ArlingtonRobinson Whenever Richard Cory went down town, We people on the pavement looked at him: He was a gentleman from sole to crown, Clean favored, and imperially slim. And he was always quietly arrayed, And he was always human when he talked; But still he fluttered pulses when he said, "Good-morning”, and he glittered when he walked.

And he was rich - yes, richer than a king And admirably schooled in every grace; In fine we thought that he was everything To make us wish that we were in his place. So on we worked, and waited for the light, And went without the meat, and cursed the bread; And Richard Cory, one calm summer night, Went home and put a bullet through his head.

Figures Speech Anaphora: There is anaphora in lines 5,6 – 9,10 – 14,15. Irony: “Went home and put a bullet through his head” Metonymy: “from sole to crown” Methaphor: “…waited for the light”

Alliteration Whenever Richard Cory went down town, We people on the pavement looked at him: He was a gentleman from sole to crown, Clean favored, and imperially slim. And he was always quietly arrayed, And he was always human when he talked; But still he fluttered pulses when he said, "Good-morning," and he glittered when he walked

And he was rich - yes, richer than a king And admirably schooled in every grace; In fine we thought that he was everything To make us wish that we were in his place. So on we worked, and waited for the light, And went without the meat, and cursed the bread; And Richard Cory, one calm summer night, Went home and put a bullet through his head.

Personal Interpretation

This is a poem written by E:A: Robinson, and it’s about a rich and successful man called Richard Cory who was the envy of everybody in his town. He is the object of everyone’s attention. In the first stanza, the narrator of the poem refers to him as a polite gentleman. In the second stanza he describes Cory’s social status and the effect he cause on people.

He portraits Cory as a polite man and not as a snob nor as a rude man. He indeed, was a popular man, and a social figure; who “fluttered pulses” with a simple “Good-morning.” In the third stanza, Cory is described as “richer than a King”, and “Schooled in every grace.”

To emphasize more the great life of Richard Cory, the narrator says: “we thought that he was everything” “to make us wish that we were in his place.” In the first two lines the narrator says: “so on we worked and waited for the light, and went without meat and coursed the bread…” This mean that the narrator was either a poor man or a poor woman, because for him or her work was a place of darkness where he or she could only “wait for the light,” which can be translated into a miracle or as a change in life.

For the narrator there is no meat to eat at dinner time, and that is the reason why they coursed the bread that he or she had to eat. The narrator has every excuse to be envious or jealous of Cory’s luck in life and perhaps he or she could even hate him for that. However, not a single bad word or a sign of hate, envy or jealousy is said or shown in the poem by the narrator

Without any explanation the narrator simply tells us how Cory “…one calm summer night went home and put a bullet through his head.” The message I get from E.A. Robinson is that richness is not synonymous of happiness. People looked at Cory as a man who apparently had it all in life, and that everyone wished to be like him. But it seems to me that people thought they knew Cory, but at the end we notice that nobody really knew who he was and what he felt inside, nor how really was his life.

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