Mutation as Metaphor in the Education of Henry Adams

Abstract

Any reading of The Education of Henry Adams has got to take into account its rather peculiar three sentence conclusion. In this conclusion Adams, on the basis of what seems to be, in his own terms at least, an incredibly naive optimism, proceeds to destroy the whole tragic effect which he has apparently been attempting to achieve. After describing the deaths of his two friends, Clarence King and John Hay, Adams concludes The Education with a solemn elegy for them and for himself, immediately followed by a final sentence giving the whole book an incongruous happy ending. The passage in question runs as follows: