The Dilaceration of Classes

 As we can see,the novel of O Henry is quite short.But,it is obviously that the meaning of the novel is not plain.And the unexpected ending is absolutely sorrow,which is seldom seen in O Henry’s works.

 The plot of the story seems to be very easy to understand,but from my point of view,there is something deeper behind the words.A unnamed young man sought his lover but failed,so he chose to commit suicide.It is a thespian coincidence that he selected a same way to die as his lover in a same room.

 The unnamed young man is a totally ordinary man,struggling in the mire of society.He has made great effort,but all he has done is in vain.He is too faint.In the end,he failed,sinking into the abyss.The young man represents the comprehensive class in society,the proletariat.They are weak like feather when they are not combined.

 “Homeless, they have a hundred homes. They flit from furnished room

to furnished room, transients forever--transients in abode,

transients in heart and mind. They sing "Home, Sweet Home" in

ragtime; they carry their ~lares et penates~ in a bandbox; their vine

is entwined about a picture hat; a rubber plant is their fig tree.”

 And another important role,housekeeper,represents the capitalist class.She lies to the young man,just because of the hotel expense.She use “living” as an excuse.

 "As you say, we has our living to be making," remarked Mrs. Purdy

However,the truth is she becomes a parasite.She is selfish,hypocritical,snobbish and cruel.Her mind is full of property,but none of kindness.

 “To the door of this, the twelfth house whose bell he had rung, came

a housekeeper who made him think of an unwholesome, surfeited worm

that had eaten its nut to a hollow shell and now sought to fill the

vacancy with edible lodgers.”

 The background of the story is America in the beginning of the twentieth century.It happened in the increasingly decadent stages of American capitalism, namely the transition from free capitalism to imperialism. At that time, the contradiction between the poor and the rich was increasingly intensified. In this period, some writers from the middle and small capitalist starting from their own class, condemned the evil of the capitalist system, describing the tragic life of the people, reflecting the people's dissatisfaction with the bourgeois rule.

 The spread of Marx thought, also caused a big shake, so that the America writers group became divided. Some writers from lower class and tends to progress, under the influence of the workers' movement, attracted to the socialist ideals, began to create more advanced works. The works are based on real life, reflecting the tragic life of lower class people, exposing the nature monopoly capitalist’s cruelty, accusing of the rulers’ persecution.

 “The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.”

                                                        ——The Communist Manifesto

 And the history of class struggles is also the history of tragedies.

2016-05-08

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