Analysis of He Never Expected Much
Thomas Hardy 1840 (Stinsford) – 1928 (Dorchester, Dorset)
Well, World, you have kept faith with me,
Kept faith with me;
Upon the whole you have proved to be
Much as you said you were.
Since as a child I used to lie
Upon the leaze and watch the sky,
Never, I own, expected I
That life would all be fair.
'Twas then you said, and since have said,
Times since have said,
In that mysterious voice you shed
From clouds and hills around:
"Many have loved me desperately,
Many with smooth serenity,
While some have shown contempt of me
Till they dropped underground.
"I do not promise overmuch,
Child; overmuch;
Just neutral-tinted haps and such,"
You said to minds like mine.
Wise warning for your credit's sake!
Which I for one failed not to take,
And hence could stem such strain and ache
As each year might assign.
Scheme | AAAXBBBX CCCDAAAD EEEFGGEF |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 11111111 1111 010111111 111110 11011111 01010101 10110101 111111 11110111 1111 010100111 110101 101111000 10110100 11110111 11110 111101 11 11010101 111111 11011101 11111111 01111101 111101 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 761 |
Words | 143 |
Sentences | 7 |
Stanzas | 3 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 8, 8 |
Lines Amount | 24 |
Letters per line (avg) | 24 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 195 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 47 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on May 04, 2023
- 42 sec read
- 924 Views
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