Lim John Peter Cyrus B.

BSBA 2-6

Activity 2 on Elements of Fiction

1. Who is O.Henry? O. Henry was a well-known American writer in the world literature history. His
writing is vivid and he is good at using irony, paronomasia, metaphor, metonymy and exaggeration to
make the story full of fun.

2. Identify the following:

1.1. Characters (Who are the characters in the story? Give a short description of each)

 Joanna (“Johnsy”)- A young artist from California. She lives with Sue in a studio apartment in
Greenwich Village and has long dreamed of visiting Italy to paint the Bay of Naples. She falls
seriously ill with pneumonia and becomes convinced that she will die when the last leaf falls
from the vine outside her window. The doctor presents Johnsy’s hopelessness and her
acceptance of death as the primary obstacle to her recovery, but Johnsy nonetheless cannot
shake her fatalistic insistence that she will die when the last leaf falls. Sue’s attempts to cheer
her up are unsuccessful, but when Mr. Behrman paints a realistic-looking leaf onto the wall
outside Johnsy’s window—tricking Johnsy into believing that one leaf has improbably survived a
storm—Johnsy realizes that her attitude has been unacceptable, and she regains her health.
 Sue- A young artist from Maine. She is very close to Johnsy, cooking for her, caring for her, and
financially supporting her in her illness. When the doctor visits, Sue tells him firmly that Johnsy is
not depressed because of a man and that Johnsy had always wanted to paint the Bay of Naples,
suggesting her detailed knowledge of her friend’s life and artistic ambitions. She tries
unsuccessfully to bring Johnsy out of her depression. Throughout the story, Sue is working on a
picture for a magazine story, using Behrman as a model, and plans to use the money she will
earn to buy food and wine for Johnsy. After Johnsy recovers, Sue is the one to inform her that
Behrman has died of pneumonia.
 Behrman- An old and somewhat cantankerous artist who lives downstairs from Sue and Johnsy.
He has been painting for four decades without any commercial success, but still hopes to paint
what he calls his “masterpiece.” He is an alcoholic and earns money by posing as a model for
artists in the neighborhood. Despite his gruff exterior, he has a soft spot for Sue and Johnsy. He
is initially dismissive of the idea that leaves on a vine could have anything to do with Johnsy’s
health, but ultimately goes outside on a cold and rainy night to paint a realistic-looking leaf onto
the wall outside her window so that she will think one last leaf has miraculously survived the
storm. As a result of this sacrifice, he catches pneumonia and dies—but Sue remarks that he had
finally painted his masterpiece.
 Doctor- A busy, older man with “shaggy grey eyebrows” who attends to Johnsy and Behrman.
He diagnoses Johnsy with mental as well as physical illness, telling Sue that he cannot help a
patient with medicine when she doesn’t want to get better. He is skeptical of the idea that
unfulfilled artistic ambitions might be the cause of Johnsy’s depression, asking Sue whether she
 is depressed over a man. He visits Johnsy again after she has recovered and gives her a good
prognosis, but tells Sue that Behrman is dying of pneumonia.
 MR. PNEUMONIA- The story has another character which is in fact abstract. The narrator has
stated pneumonia as a gentleman who enters the city, touches people with his ‘icy fingers’ and
makes them ill. Mr. Pneumonia is not a good person. He victimizes every weak person. Many of
his victims die soon after the illness.
1.2 Setting of the story
 The short story ‘The Last Leaf’ is set in the colony of artists in Greenwich Village, New York. The
setting is significant in drawing the plot of the story because the main characters in the story are
artists living in a colony of artists. The narrator says describing the place “In a little district west
of Washington Square the streets have run crazy and broken themselves into small strips called
“places”. These “places” make strange angles and curves.” Such a description of the setting is
done by the author in order to create an image of the place in the mind of the reader because
the setting is significant in plot construction of the story. “To quaint old Greenwich Village, the
art people soon came prowling, hunting for north windows and eighteenth-century gables and
Dutch attics and low rents.” In the above sentence, the author has chosen Greenwich Village as
the setting of his story because his plot needed a setting where there would be a large number
of artists and Greenwich Village used to be and it still is a colony of artists. Since it is a little
village and the expenses of living there are low so a great number of struggling artists live there.
1.3 Plot
 The Last Leaf” concerns Johnsy, a poor young woman who is seriously ill with pneumonia. She
believes that when the ivy vine on the wall outside her window loses all its leaves, she will also
die. Her neighbor Behrman, an artist, tricks her by painting a leaf on the wall. Johnsy recovers,
but (in a twist typical of O.
1.4 Conflict
 A conflict is an opposition faced by the protagonist of the story. The conflict in the story is
internal as well as external.
 INTERNAL CONFLICT- This is an internal force fighting the protagonist. Internal conflict in the
story is Johnsy’s lost hope. She gives up and thinks only about her death. Her own negative
feelings do not let her get well. She is a pessimistic person and her own negative feelings do not
allow her to get well. She keeps thinking about her death.
 EXTERNAL CONFLICT- External conflict is an outside force or opposition fighting the protagonist.
The example of external conflict in the story is pneumonia. It is a force of nature that fights the
main character, Johnsy but at last, she defeats the illness and gets well.
1.5 Theme
 The theme of "The Last Leaf" is life is precious and should have faith in life always. When
the last leaf in the tree becomes the scope of survival, then it is understood that life is
precious.
 The other themes also include, optimism, courage and hope. Johnsy had faith and fought
until the last leaf in the Ivy tree withered. Thus, she was optimistic, courageous to fight
though ailment.
 The protagonist survived while the last leaf falls and thus the theme of faith in life is also
crucial in the story.