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.

-Edwin Arlington Robinson

Wikipedia. Web. 9 May 2010. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Cory_(poem).

*Parallels The Great Gatsby as high class overshadows the true individual and it is shown that there is more to someone than their outward appearance.

The poem "Richard Cory" by Edwin Arlington Robinson parallels the novel The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald as high class overshadows the truth of the true soul of individuals. First, the poem "Richard Cory" says: "He was a gentleman from sole to crown,
Clean favored, and imperially slim. And he was always quietly arrayed." Through these previous lines, the poem describes a person who his wealthy and loved by the town. In connection to Fitzgerald's novel, Gatsby is continually throwing parties and trying to rise to a "higher class." Gatsby plans to rise from the low class he started at to get to the high class in anyway possible to impress Daisy. Then, from "Richard Cory" the following lines conclude the poem "And Richard Cory, one calm summer night,Went home and put a bullet through his head." These concluding lines reveal the poem's theme that there is more to a person than his or her outward appearance. The Great Gatsby involves several deceitful affairs including Gatsby and Daisy. Daisy and Gatsby seem like normal high class honest people while thats not their true self. In conclusion, people should not "judge a book by it's cover" because it only leads to tragedy.