Richard Cory is a poem written by Edwin Robinson, he uses a variety of poetic elements. Poetic elements are imagery, rhyme scheme, symbolism and hyperbole to name a few. Robinson’s most common elements used in this poem are rhyme scheme and hyperbole. Robinson uses many elements, you can tell though out his poem that he’s trying to make the ‘flow’ of the poem easy for it’s readers. He makes the poem string together, he makes it come together but he gets the story across.
His first use of elements is rhyme scheme. He uses this together in the first and third line. Rhyme scheme is when the last word in the sentence rhymes or sounds very similar that it is simple of it to roll off our tongue.
‘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. ‘
As you can see from the excerpt above, Robinson uses the words town and crown, as well as him and slim as his rhyme scheme in that model. He makes it very straightforward for the reader to find these elements and point them out. Robinson in addition has the use of a hyperbole in the statement ‘Clean favored and imperially slim.’ He uses the word imperially, for exaggeration of the word slim. He is trying to illustrate that the man is of great size.
‘And he was always quietly arrayed,
And he was always human when he talked:
The Essay on Ways to Understand Poems
Billy Collins’ “Introduction to Poetry” is a short poem consisting of seven stanzas but is nonetheless a colorful piece of literary work that is filled with figurative language. Collins explores how poems in general suffer from the hands, in a manner of speaking, from those who attempt to study them, especially students. The narrator tries to guide the students about the proper way of unraveling ...
But he still fluttered pulses when he said,
“Good morning” and he glittered when he walked.’
In this second paragraph the author uses rhyme scheme once more with the words talked and walked. You get the sense that he wants these words to stand out for a reason, that he is purposely making the structure of the poem this way.
‘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’
In this passage Robinson use three different styles of poetic elements. His first element comes from the opening sentence. ‘And he was rich-yes, richer than a king-‘That line alone shows his imagery. You can see clearly that he wants people to picture him richer than any king. Very wealthy and powerful. In that sentence he also uses a hyperbole, the word richer stand out, for the reason that he wants not to be as rich as a king but, richer. You get the feel of self worth from that statement. He again uses the rhyme scheme essentials with the words king and everything, while also the words grace and place fall into this category.
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.
And as a final point Robinson closes the poem Richard Cory with a few last fine points in his selection. Once more, he uses his most common element rhyme scheme among the words light and night, and again with bread and head. I feel that this is most frequently used element, I feel it helps bring the poem together. I highlighted the second line because I felt that in this line, he uses symbolism incredibly well. He says ” went without the meat and cursed the bread.”
Richard Cory is a very superior poem that bring reality and emotion to paper. The poem shows his personality as well as his character.
