NAME: Corpuz, Elisamae T. DATE: Oct.

25,2022

GRADE/SECTION: 12- Diamond SUBJECT: EAPP

The Last Leaf

O. Henry

Two female artists are the focus of the story.Sue and Joanna, also known as "Johnsy," are
the names of the women.They are part of a "colony" of artists who live in Greenwich Village,
New York.Johnsy contracts pneumonia during a particularly cold winter, and it appears likely
that she will die from the illness.The doctor moves Sue to one side and tells her that Johnsy
only has a ten percent chance of surviving; however, what she really needs is something that
she can live for, which will give her the energy she needs to get back on her feet and recover.He
asks Sue if Johnsy has a love interest, but Sue replies that she hasn't.When the last leaf of the
year falls from the ivy vine outside her window, Johnsy believes she will die.Sue, who is
attempting to assist her friend, is frustrated because she has accepted the fact that she will
die.The top apartment of the house is where Sue and Johnsy live.Behrman, a male artist in his
sixties, lives on the ground floor.He has a beard like Moses in the famous sculpture by
Michelangelo.He constantly claims to be close to completing his "masterpiece," but he has
never done so.In a nutshell, he is a failed artist.He laughs at Johnsy's superstition that she will
die when the last leaf falls from the vine when Sue tells Behrman about it.However, he agrees
to come and pose for Sue, as he frequently does so for other artists. Johnsy asks Sue to roll up
the blind the following day so she can check to see if the last leaf has fallen from the ivy
vine.However, when the blind is put up, the final leaf is still attached to the branch.The final leaf
still clings to the vine as night falls.Realizing how selfish it was to want to die that way, Johnsy
apologizes to Sue.She sees the persistence of the ivy leaf as a sign that she should not have
been so ready to accept death.The specialist visits and declares that Johnsy's condition has
significantly better.However, he has also come downstairs to see Behrman, who has pneumonia
and is seriously ill.He does, and he passes away quickly.Sue tells Johnsy in the story's final
paragraph that the night the real last leaf fell, Berhman painted an imitation ivy leaf and
attached it to the vine on the wall.His masterpiece, which he has finally produced, is that leaf
that was good enough to pass for a real leaf.But when he went outside to paint the leaf in the
cold, he got pneumonia and died.