Why does edwin arlington robinson choose to narrate the poem “richard cory” from the perspective of a townsperson?

PLATO

The people of the town in which Richard Cory lives belong to a low socioeconomic background, while Richard Cory is a rich, well-mannered gentleman, envied by everyone in town, as seen in these lines:  

And he was rich—yes, richer than a king—  

And admirably schooled in every grace:  

In fine, we thought that he was everything  

To make us wish that we were in his place.

By choosing one of the townsfolk as narrator, Robinson relates everything Richard Cory does and has through envy. This perspective also helps highlight the shock of Cory’s suicide at the end of the poem. Cory’s suicide depicts irony, as Cory was a man who seemed to have everything but chose to give it all up by taking his own life.

now, of course, the quality and the seasonability of these winter dreams varied, but the stuff of them remained.   they persuaded dexter several years later to pass up a business course at the state university—his father, prospering now, would have paid his way—for the precarious advantage of attending an older and more famous university in the east, where he was bothered by his scanty funds. but do not get the impression, because his winter dreams happened to be concerned at first with musings on the rich, that there was anything merely snobbish in the boy. he wanted not association with glittering things and glittering people—he wanted the glittering things themselves. often he reached out for the best without knowing why he wanted it—and sometimes he ran up against the mysterious denials and prohibitions in which life indulges.

there you go thats what we are missing