Analysis of Near Lanivet 1872
Thomas Hardy 1840 (Stinsford) – 1928 (Dorchester, Dorset)
There was a stunted handpost just on the crest,
Only a few feet high:
She was tired, and we stopped in the twilight-time for her rest,
At the crossways close thereby.
She leant back, being so weary, against its stem,
And laid her arms on its own,
Each open palm stretched out to each end of them,
Her sad face sideways thrown.
Her white-clothed form at this dim-lit cease of day
Made her look as one crucified
In my gaze at her from the midst of the dusty way,
And hurriedly 'Don't,' I cried.
I do not think she heard. Loosing thence she said,
As she stepped forth ready to go,
'I am rested now.-Something strange came into my head;
I wish I had not leant so!'
And wordless we moved onward down from the hill
In the west cloud's murked obscure,
And looking back we could see the handpost still
In the solitude of the moor.
'It struck her too,' I thought, for as if afraid
She heavily breathed as we trailed;
Till she said, 'I did not think how 'twould look in the shade,
When I leant there like one nailed.'
I, lightly: 'There's nothing in it. For YOU, anyhow!'
-'O I know there is not,' said she . . .
'Yet I wonder . . . If no one is bodily crucified now,
In spirit one may be!'
And we dragged on and on, while we seemed to see
In the running of Time's far glass
Her crucified, as she had wondered if she might be
Some day.-Alas, alas!
Scheme | ABAB CDCD EFEF GHGH IJIJ KLKL MNMN NONO |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Quatrain |
Metre | 1101011101 100111 11100110011101 101111 1101101100111 0101111 11011111111 01111 01111111111 1011110 0111010110101 0100111 11111110111 11111011 1110110110111 11111101 01011101101 0011101 0101111011 0010101 11011111101 11001111 1111111111001 11101111 110110011110 11111111 11101111100101 010111 01110111111 00101111 010111101111 110101 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 1,314 |
Words | 267 |
Sentences | 20 |
Stanzas | 8 |
Stanza Lengths | 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4 |
Lines Amount | 32 |
Letters per line (avg) | 31 |
Words per line (avg) | 8 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 126 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 33 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:19 min read
- 128 Views
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