Kane’s unnatural focus on his public life directly leads to his lonely retirement. Kane’s focus is always on his public life and what the public saw of him. This is shown through when he hurts Susan Alexander by continuing to publish Leland’s review, due to stubbornness, and fear of being judged by Leland. Another example of Kane keeping his concentration on his public life, is when he refuses to stand down when he is caught out with Susan Alexander, this shows he does not want to withdraw his previous decisions and back down in front of the public. Kane is always trying to prove himself, to everyone he knows, and those he does not, he likes to control peoples thoughts and what they think on him and certain issues. This is shown when it is said by ______ “You talk about the people like you own them” Speaking about Kane.
The focus on Kane’s public life directly results in the destruction of his private life. One major aspect that led to the destruction of Kane’s personal life is yellow journalism. Many of the decisions Kane made were made to please the public, or assist in the running of business. These decisions end up corrupting Kane’s morals, and destroying his personal life and relationships. For example Kane’s first marriage was for convenience and public image, although it did help his public life, his marriage was unhappy and miserable, which deeply affected both Kane and his wife Emily Rose Norton. Kane put the public, before those closest to him, as he cares more of what they think. Although Kane does not let the public nor those closest to him make his decisions, he bases his decisions on what he thinks people will think of his rather than the result of the decision. This can be shown when Kane says, “there’s only one person who decides what I do, and that’s me. “
Kane’s obsession with his public image directly results in his lonely death. All the factors said in the above paragraph are reasons that contributed to Kane dying a lonely death. Due to his irrational decisions based on his public life, Susan and Emily leaving him, all his friends leaving him all unaccompanied in xanadu to die alone. Even his best friend Leland stops talking to Kane. The quote from Laland saying ““He sent me a letter from Xanadu. He must have been lonely there by himself“ shows us that Kane has realized that the people closest to him are gone, and the public do not care for him anymore, he is lonely and only wants a friend again. But it is too late.
Despite Kane’s best efforts to have the public love him, his focus on this media image leads directly to the destruction of his private life, and, ultimately a lonely death. The fact that his public life is more important than his private one is shown through his media campaigns and his stubbornness to create a certain image of himself. The downfall of his private life shown through the breakdown of his ethics and his ultimate loneliness demonstrated when Susan leaves him alone to die in Xanadu. Kane’s downfall, resulting from his unnatural focus on his public image, shows us that Citizen Kane is responsible for his own downfall.