The Replacements’ 1987 song, "The Ledge" describes a boy's thoughts as he attempts to commit suicide. Jack Finney's "Contents of the Dead Man's Pocket" tells a short story of a man, named Tom Benecke, who has to reevaluate what he believes to be most important in his life. Together, "The Ledge" and "Contents of the Dead Man's Pocket" have an array of similarities and differences.
Both “The Ledge” and “Contents of the Dead Man’s Pocket” show how people deal with their own self-worth and self-esteem as they determine what is important to them. For insistence, both Tom and the boy have a need for acceptance. When the boy says “...I’m the boy they can’t ignore” (line 5), it suggest a time where he was not included. His suicide shows how he…show more content… After Tom’s important yellow slip of paper flew out through the window, he is convinced that by retrieving it, people at his work would recall and be intrigued by such an idea. Tom thought, “The mental picture of himself sliding across the ledge… would add special interest and importance to his memorandum, which would do it no harm,” (64). Tom only sees the idea through his idealist standpoint. Despite the similarities found in “The Ledge” and “Contents of the Dead Man’s Pocket”, Tom and the boy lead decidedly different lives. For example, each had a different intention for going out on the ledge. The boy’s intention was to end his life. At the end of the song, the boy even said, “I’m the boy for the last time in my life, All the love that they pledge, For the last time will not reach the ledge..,” (lines 26-28). In this situation, the ledge could symbolize the boy since both are not accepting the pledges of love. On the other hand, Tom only wanted the paper retrieved. Once he was on the ledge he imagined, " He saw himself falling with a terrible speed as his body revolved in the air, knees clutched tight to his chest, eyes squeezed shut, moaning softly...knowing that any