I recently read O. Henry’s A Retrieved Reformation, and, among other wonderful aspects of writing that this short story has to offer, I especially noticed the tongue-in-cheek humor acting as a veil for life lessons. Henry probably wrote A Retrieved Reformation with a goal of making the reader laugh and contemplate. For instance: “There[,] Jimmy was given an important paper. It said that he was free. [‘You’ll] go out tomorrow morning. This is your chance. Make a man of yourself. You’re not a bad fellow at heart. Stop breaking safes open, and live a better life.’ ‘Me?’ said Jimmy in surprise. ‘I never broke open a safe in my life.’ […] The five dollars were supposed to help him become a better man. […] He gave some money to a blind man […], and then he got on the train. […] It had cost him over nine hundred dollars to have these tools made at a place where they make such things for men who work at the job of safe-breaking.” (The Best of O. Henry Full Text – A Retrieved Reformation – Owl Eyes, n.d.) We as humans benefit from laughter as a general rule, and laughter is no less significant to the human experience than breathing. If I make 99% of people laugh and 1% cry, then I have made nobody laugh and have made everybody cry. On the other hand, humor done right brings us together and makes us better people. The reader might be a fly on the wall, but Jimmy Valentine himself becomes a better person by the end of the read: Valentine uses his safe-breaking tools to rescue his fiancée’s niece who was trapped in a safe: “In a minute Jimmy’s pet drill was biting smoothly into the steel door. In ten minutes—breaking his own burglarious record—he threw back the bolts and opened the door. Agatha, almost collapsed, but safe, was gathered into her mother’s arms.” (The Best of O. Henry Full Text – A Retrieved Reformation – Owl Eyes, n.d.) Valentine’s heroic act is similar to how Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables protagonist Jean Valjean—whom Jimmy Valentine just so happens to share initials with—threw off his respectable new identity in order to prevent an innocent man in his likeness from receiving punishment meant for the old Valjean (Les Misérables, n.d.).
Reference List
Les Misérables: “Fantine,” Books Six–Eight | SparkNotes. (n.d.). Retrieved November 18, 2020, from https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/lesmis/section4/
The Best of O. Henry Full Text—A Retrieved Reformation—Owl Eyes. (n.d.). Retrieved November 18, 2020, from https://www.owleyes.org/text/best-o-henry/read/a-retrieved-reformation#root-218685-27
Mosaic Ponderings 