SOURCE: “Robinson's ‘Richard Cory,’” in Explicator, Vol. 28, No. 9, May, 1970, item 73.

In the following essay, Turner argues against Charles R. Morris' thesis that Robinson's word choices in “Richard Cory” are intended to associate Cory with British royalty.

In his discussion of Edward Arlington Robinson's “Richard Cory,” Charles R. Morris (explicator, March, 1965, xxiii, 7) seems to go to extreme lengths to justify the poet's use of “anglicisms” in describing Cory. Although the terms noted—“pavement,” “sole to crown,” “clean favored,” “imperially slim,” “schooled,” and “in fine”—may indeed have British overtones, I would suggest that several of the expressions, as well as Cory's name itself, have a more rewarding technical purpose.

Americans might, in fact, normally refer to themselves as people “on the sidewalk” rather than “on the pavement”; nevertheless, “on the pavement” in American slang usually means that one is down and out, figuratively—sometimes literally—scraping the asphalt. Surely...