LAST LEAF BY O’ HENRY

(CRITIQUE PAPER)

O’ Henry is an author who wrote the story of the last leaf. He wrote a
great masterpiece that leaves us a great impression towards the story. He
created it for the people who read it realized that living is important and it
does not depend on some leaf who was about to fall because of the weather.
Remarkably saying, the story is bound to elaborate how something so trivial
could be the factor to living significance. The story practically goes with
Johnsy fighting pneumonia in the winter season. And then metaphorically
relates her life to a vine in a tree gradually losing its leaves because of the
weather.

The last leaf concerns Johnsy, a poor young women who is seriously ill
with pneumonia. She believes that when the last leaves in the ivy vine on the
wall outside her window, she would also go or should we say die. Her
neighbor Mr. Behrman, an artist, tricks he by painting a leaf on the wall so
that she can still live.

The most character that feature of O’ Henry’s story “The Last Leaf”
have been run to just a few pages and has a surprise twist ending. Johnsy’s
belief that the last leaf on the vine is a “sign” of her own imminent demise
and, Mr. Behrman belief that, he is imminently about to produce his life’s
‘masterpiece’. There is also a deep irony attached to the doctor’s earlier
conversation with sue, in which he enquired whether Johnsy had a ‘man’ in
her life who might provide her with a reason to go on living. Of course, the
doctor has a sweetheart in mind, but Behrman turns out to be the unlikely
savior come to fulfill that prophecy.

Mr. Behrman sacrifices his own life in order to give some hope to
Johnsy. He is aware that Johnsy thinks when the last leaf falls, she will die.
Johnsy’s realization that she still had hope and all was not lost. She
recognizes that her will to live was stronger than her psychological stress.