Irony In A Dead Man's Pocket

Money means different things to everyone. Money could mean power, happiness, and success to some people, but it could also mean greed, debt, and problems to others. The only way money can have value is by the value we give it. In the story “Contents of the Dead Man’s Pocket,” Tom Benecke had been working for months on a paper for work, while his wife went to the movies. The paper flew out the window, onto the ledge,and he had to work to get the paper back. In the story “One Thousand Dollars,”Gillian inherited 1,000 dollars from his uncle, and through the story, finds a way to spend it. In their stories, Jack Finney and O. Henry develope a constant theme; money means nothing on its own until we give it value.

These stories use irony to show money means nothing without personal value. For instance, in “Contents of the Dead Man's Pocket,” irony is used to

Towards the end of the story, after Tom gets back into his apartment, he takes the paper out of his pocket and sets it down on the desk. At that moment, “he saw the yellow paper, the pencil flying, scooped off the desk and, unimpeded by the glass in the window, sailed out into the night & out of his life” (Finney 134). Finney uses this irony to demonstrate that even though Tom believed, in the beginning, that the paper was worth more then his life, in the end he realized that it was no more than a piece of paper that he gave value to. The money’s value changed because he decided that his family and time spent with them was worth more than a crumpled up piece of paper with writing on it. On the other hand, in “One Thousand Dollars,” O.Henry demonstrates the theme by using dramatic irony. Towards the end of the story, Gillian gives the money he discreetly inherited to the girl he loves. When he went to