Analysis of Bottom's Dream.

Robert Crawford 1959 (Bellshill)



Bottom's dream had no bottom; ours may, too,
Have no foundation. We may wake, indeed;
But all seems such a vision, none can say
(If aught's real) where reality begins.
What if we were dead now — if this were death,
And we had been alive long, long ago,
And here and now were in an after-life!
Thought sets us to a tune that we can sing;
But, like the rustic waked in fairyland,
It's all too hard for us to understand.


Scheme ABCDEFGHII
Poetic Form Tetractys  (20%)
Etheree  (20%)
Metre 10111101011 1101011101 1111010111 11111001 1110111101 0111011101 0101001101 1111011111 110101010 111111101
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 418
Words 84
Sentences 5
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 10
Lines Amount 10
Letters per line (avg) 31
Words per line (avg) 8
Letters per stanza (avg) 313
Words per stanza (avg) 82
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 14, 2023

26 sec read
302

Robert Crawford

Robert Crawford FRSE FBA is a Scottish poet, scholar and critic. He is currently Professor of English at the University of St Andrews.  more…

All Robert Crawford poems | Robert Crawford Books

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