The Furnished Room
The
Furnished Room reflects O. Henry’s view on city life by showing that there’s
always more to the story than meets the eye. A seemingly nice little old lady
claims she has never seen the girl he is looking for, meanwhile she doesn’t
reveal the fact that she committed suicide and that that room is haunted
because it’ll mess up her business. She’s only looking out for herself, which
is a very common way to live in big cities. Most people mind their own business
and watch out for only themselves in big cities.
A place full of strangers that only look out for themselves,
“’As you say, we has our living to be making,’ said Mrs. Purdy.”
The Boarded Window
I
believe that this story does have some supernatural elements to it. Some elements
could be explained with reason but there is a certain vagueness of the story
that leaves it up to question and interpretation by the reader. The initial
start of the story opens with the cabin being haunted, so right there, in the
setting is a sign of supernatural elements,
“That
closes the final chapter of this true story---excepting, indeed, the
circumstance that many years afterward, in company with an equally intrepid spirit,
I penetrated to the place and ventured near enough to the ruined cabin to throw
a stone against it, and ran away to avoid the ghost which every well-informed
boy thereabout knew haunted the spot.”
But
whether or not his wife was dead and came back to life or whether she was alive
the whole time and just in some kind of comatose state is all completely up for
interpretation. I believe that she was dead and then came back to life to
protect her love. The fact that her wrist were bound and she was being prepared
for burial but her husband couldn’t tell that she still had a pulse seems a
little too far out. He’s a hunter, he deals with killing things himself all the
time, I think he would’ve been able to tell if his wife was dead or not.
