In no poem in The Town Down The River was the problem of the artist more sharply etched than in the popular "Miniver Cheevy." Miniver Cheevy was drawn to the past as he dreamed of Thebes and Camelot. He disliked the present, cursing the commonplace. But the crux of his difficulty was that he "scorned the gold he sought/ But sore annoyed was he without it." This was a succinct rendering of the dynamic which motivated much of Robinson's commentary on mankind's search for happiness.