Contents Of A Dead Man's Pocket Analysis

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Do you have your priorities straight? In “Contents of a Dead Man’s Pocket” by Jack Finney, the main character, Tom didn’t. He worked all the time and never spent time with his wife. His wife Claire wanted to her husband to go to the movies with her. Instead of going to the movies, he stayed behind and worked on the yellow paper, which could get him a promotion. The paper blows out the window of his tall apartment and he goes and retrieves it on the ledge of the building. He gets the paper and goes to get back inside but he panics and the window closes, meaning he is locked outside. He tries to scream for help, but is no use, he then realizes his job isn’t worth his life, so he punches the window and causes it to break and he changes from a workaholic, to being a family man. Both setting and conflict are the main to “The Contents in a Dead Man’s Pocket.” Settings is the place, which is the tall apartment building. “Above the muffled sound of the …show more content…

“and another sheet, yellow, moving towards the window, caught in the drying current flowing through the narrow opening" (Finney 112).This introduces the reader to the reason on why the main character is going on the ledge of the building. "A fraction of his mind knew he was going to fall, and he knew he began taking rapid blind steps with no feeling of what you was doing” (Finney 119).This shows the reader that he would do anything in the moment for this piece of paper. Without the conflict the main character would've never realized that he was wasting his life over a silly piece of paper. Both setting and conflict are the main to “The Contents in a Dead Man’s Pocket.” There is multiple conflicts throughout this story that needed to happen, like the paper blowing away and then Tom going to retrieve it. If the setting wasn’t in a tall building then he could of went outside with no problem and he would of never of became a family

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