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A Retrieved Reformation Short Story

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O. Henry’s short story, “A Retrieved Reformation,” shows a man’s journey through rehabilitation. In the story, Jimmy Valentine is in jail for robbery. Then is allowed to leave in hope he has finally learned from his past mistakes and will stop robbing people to get what he desires. When Jimmy leaves, he robs many more banks but does not get caught. Jimmy then goes to a small town so the cops won’t be able to find him, and the town has a train station for him to make a quick getaway. When Jimmy first arrives to the town, he sees a lovely woman named Annabel Adams and everything changes. He knows she won’t like him if he keeps acting like his old self so, he decides he will finally change for the better. He changes his name to Ralph Spencer and starts acting totally different. This short story demonstrates change and how you affect people every day whether you realize it or not. At the beginning of the coming of age story, when Jimmy gets let out of jail, we see how Jimmy has not changed and he had went back to his old ways. To show this, the author explains multiple robberies that happened within weeks of each other. Then, Ben Price, the detective trying to find who has been robbing the banks, realized it was Jimmy Valentine who was back to his old ways. To show this, the author wrote, “Ben Price knew Jimmy’s habits. He had learned them while working on the Springfield case. Long jumps, quick get-aways, no confederates, and a taste for good society-- these ways had

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