So on we worked, and waited for the light, And went without the meat, and cursed the bread; And Richard Cory, one calm summer night, Went home and put a bullet through his head.
[3] The American composer Charles Naginski wrote the music to "Richard Cory", published 1940, included in Thomas Hampson's Album "I hear America singing" from 2001.
American humorist Garrison Keillor wrote a variation of the poem for the Introduction to his The Book of Guys (1993), which suggested that Cory's wife was the reason he killed himself.
[7] The character Ben Nicholson, played by Paul Lambert misquotes the poem in the episode "The Case of the Envious Editor" of the CBS television series Perry Mason (1957–66) starring Raymond Burr.
Author George Flynn also directly references the original poem (and Simon and Garfunkel version) prominently in his novel Richard Cory Revisited as a thematic device.