CLASSIFICATION. This seven or eight hundred word short-story
illustrates the extreme type. The setting is the end of a pier; the
time, only a few minutes; the action represents a crisis in the life of
one character, the village drunkard; the struggle--which culminates in
the suicide of the drunkard--is between him and society. The unities
are, therefore, well conserved; the singleness of effect is pronounced.
It is a _tour de force_ in its manipulation of story elements.
Is the motivation for John’s suicide sufficient?
What social relation does the policeman bear to the drunkard? What
contrast does the author employ?
THEMATIC VALUE. Society is not arraigned: a case is posed. Has it
propaganda value?