How we cite our quotes: (Line)
Quote #1
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. (1-4)
The poem makes a distinction between the "people on the pavement" and good ol' Richard Cory. He doesn't live downtown with them. He's not one of them. He's an outsider. But still, the people of the town think he's a real winner. He's a gentleman from head to toe. Nice clothes, nice build, nice attitude—he seems like an all-around great guy.
Quote #2
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. (5-12)
Thought we were done hearing how fabulous Richard Cory is? Try again. In these two stanzas, the poem really brings home how Richard appears to the townsfolk. He's wealthy and polite. He's got great clothes, and he's the object of more than one crush. Everyone wants to be like R.C.
Quote #3
And Richard Cory, one calm summer night,
Went home and put a bullet through his head. (15-16)
We are having a real OMG moment here. After an entire poem that tells us how perfect Richard Cory is, we end on this: the dude kills himself. As it turns out, his life wasn't so perfect after all. We guess we can't ever know exactly what's going on in someone else's head. From these last lines of the poem, we can only surmise that Richard Cory's reality was quite different than the townspeople expected.