Richard Cory by Edwin Robinson

“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.”

1. Each stanza follows an alternating rhyme pattern (e.g., town/him/crown/slim in Stanza 1).

2. Number of Stanzas:
4 stanzas (each with 4 lines).

3. Number of Quatrains:
4 quatrains (all stanzas are 4 lines long).

4. Number of Sestets:
0 (no 6-line stanzas).

5. Number of Couplets:
0 (no consecutive rhyming pairs; the rhyme scheme is alternating, not paired).

6. Type of Sonnet:
Not a sonnet. Though the poem has 16 lines (close to a sonnet’s 14), it lacks:

A traditional sonnet structure (e.g., Petrarchan or Shakespearean).

A consistent volta (turn) or resolution.

7. Volta (Turn):
Yes, in the final stanza. The poem’s tone shifts abruptly from admiration to shock with the revelation of Richard Cory’s suicide:

Lines 1–12: Describe Cory’s perfection and the townspeople’s envy.

Lines 13–16: The volta occurs at “And Richard Cory, one calm summer night,” leading to the tragic climax.