Vox Populi
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Edwin Arlington Robinson: Richard Cory
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.
~~~~
Public Domain
Edwin Arlington Robinson (1869 – 1935) was an American poet and playwright. Robinson won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry on three occasions and was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature four times.
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I was made to memorize Richard Cory in high school, along with another Robinson poem: Miniver Cheevy. Today I only remembered the endings: a bullet for Cory, another drink for Cheevy. But both poems get you to their conclusion through fine language., and the regularity and orderly sense of the ABAB rhyme scheme used right up through the end. Good stuff. Betcha they were shocking for those times. Cathartic, maybe?
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These sketches of ordinary citizens rendered in fixed poetic form were revolutionary in their time.
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Robinson’s “Eros Turannos” makes my hair stand up. Though I’m fond of Paul Simon, his version of “Richard Cory” does not.
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Thanks for the tip, Arlene. I’ve posted Eros Turannos to appear later.
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I wrote my Master’s thesis on Robinson. And. loved this poem. It’s so good to see it again.
Thank you-
Alice Friman
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Thanks, Alice. He’s always been one of my favorites although he’s out of fashion nowadays.
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