Journal # 14

“Richard Cory“ (497)

In the poem Richard Cory is a well off, the “ideal” person. This causes last line of the poem to be ironic and shocking. He has everything and is basically perfect, but in the end he killed himself. Everyone aspires to be him because he is rich and gentleman like. The real of the poem comes in in the last line. It shows that you cannot judge by looking on the outside you must look to see what is on the inside. The “ideal” perfect person suffers just like everyone else in the world and is subject to the same fate that every single human being will eventually come to in the end. The theme is appearance verses reality.

“Miniver Cheevy” (497)

Miniver Cheevy was an idealist. He wished that he had been born during the Medieval time period. He wanted to live the life that is depicted in the Romance stories.He idealized the life of a knight saving his princess from some evil, to live happily ever after. He wanted this ideal life but he got reality. What he failed to see was that he could find similar situations in his daily life. Maybe not to the extent of what he thought knights would do, but he still could have live a life with adventure. The unfortuneate part in his story was that he had to turn to drinking to cope and he would escaped into his mind to follow his fantasies.

“Mr. Flood’s Party” (498)

Mr. Flood is a poor man who has lossed his grasp on reality. He is an old man that has lost all of his friends because of his drinking problem. He suffers froma very serious medical situation known as Alcoholism. His problem has driven all of his friends, aquaintances, and family away. It is sad to see that he has to create friends as he drinks so that he is not alone.