The Last Leaf

THE LAST LEAF
"The Last Leaf" is a short story by O. Henry published in 1907 in his collection The Trimmed Lamp and
Other Stories. Set in Greenwich Village, it depicts characters and themes typical of O. Henry's works.
Johnsy has fallen ill and is dying of pneumonia. She watches the leaves fall from a vine outside the
window of her room, and decides that when the last leaf drops, she too will die, while Sue tries to tell
her to stop thinking like that.
An old, frustrated artist named Behrman lives below Johnsy and Sue. He has been claiming that he will
paint a masterpiece, even though he has never even attempted to start. Sue goes to him and tells him
that her friend is dying of pneumonia, and that Johnsy claims she will die when the last leaf falls off of
a vine outside her window. Behrman scoffs at this as foolishness, but—as he is protective of the two
young artists—he decides to see Johnsy and the vine.
In the night, a very bad storm comes and wind is howling and rain is splattering against the window.
Sue closes the curtains and tells Johnsy to go to sleep, even though there is still one leaf left on the vine.
Johnsy protests but Sue insists on doing so because she doesn't want Johnsy to see the last leaf fall. In
the morning, Johnsy wants to see the vine, to be sure that all the leaves are gone, but to their surprise,
there is still one leaf left.
While Johnsy is surprised that it is still there, she insists it will fall that day. But it doesn't, nor does it fall
through the night nor the next day. Johnsy believes that the leaf stayed there to show how wicked she
was, and that she sinned in wanting to die. She regains her will to live, and makes a full recovery
throughout the day.
In the afternoon, a doctor talks to Sue. The doctor says that Mr. Behrman has come down with
pneumonia and, as there is nothing to be done for him, he is being taken to the hospital to be made
comfortable in his final hours. A janitor had found him helpless with pain, and his shoes and clothing
were wet and icy cold. The janitor couldn't figure out where he had been on that stormy night, though
she had found a lantern that was still lit, a ladder that had been moved, some scattered brushes, and
a palette with green and yellow colors mixed on it. "Look out the window, dear, at the last ivy leaf on
the wall. Didn't you wonder why it never fluttered or moved when the wind blew? Ah, darling, it's
Behrman's masterpiece - he painted it there the night that the last leaf fell."
Summary
Living in early 20th century Greenwich Village are two young women artists, Sue and Johnsy (familiar
for Joanna). They met in May, six months previously, and decided to share a studio apartment. Stalking
their artist colony in November is "Mr. Pneumonia." The story begins as Johnsy, near death from
pneumonia, lies in bed waiting for the last leaf of an ivy vine on the brick wall she spies through her
window to fall.
"I’m tired of thinking," says Johnsy. "I want to turn loose my hold on everything, and go sailing down,
down, just like one of those poor, tired leaves"(16). However, an unexpected hero arrives to save
Johnsy. It’s not the brusque doctor who gives her only one in ten chances to survive, raising them to
one in five if Sue can get her to hope for something important like a man, not her true desire to "paint
the Bay of Naples some day" (14).
Mr. Behrman, an old man who lives in the apartment below Sue and Johnsy, who enjoys drinking, works
sometimes as an artist’s model, and as yet has made no progress over the past 40 years on painting
his own masterpiece, becomes in typical O. Henry fashion the hero. The evidence of his heroics are
found the day before he dies from pneumonia: outside Johnsy’s window are a ladder, a lantern still
lighted "some scattered brushes, and a palette with green and yellow colors mixed on it . . . it’s
Behrman’s masterpiece--he painted it [a leaf] there the night that the last leaf fell"(19), Sue informs
Johnsy.

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THE LAST LEAF

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