Analysis of Words In The Shadow

Victor Marie Hugo 1802 (Besançon) – 1885 (Paris)



She said, 'I am wrong to want something more, it's true.
The hours go by very quietly just so.
You are there. I never takes my eyes off you.
In your eyes I see your thoughts as they come and go.

To watch you is a joy I have not yet got through.
No doubt it is still very charming of its kind!
I watch, for I know everything that annoys you.
So that nothing comes knocking when you're not inclined.

I make myself so small in my corner near you.
You are my great lion, I am your little dove.
I listen to your leaves, the peacful froufrou.
Sometimes I pick up your pen when it falls off.

Without a doubt I have you. Surely I see you.
Thinking is a wine on which the dreamers are drunk.
I know. But sometimes I'd like to be dreamed of too.
When you are like that, in your books, all evening, sunk.

No lifting your head or saying a word to me,
There is a shadow deep down in my loving heart.
For me to see you whole, it is necessary
To look at me a little, sometimes, on your part.'


Scheme ABAB ACAC AXAX ADAD EFEF
Poetic Form Quatrain  (80%)
Tetractys  (20%)
Metre 111111110111 010111010011 11111011111 011111111101 111101111111 111111010111 11111101011 111011011101 11111011011 111110111101 110111011 01111111111 010111110111 101011101011 111011111111 111110111101 110111100111 11011101101 11111111100 111101001111
Closest metre Iambic hexameter
Characters 966
Words 203
Sentences 22
Stanzas 5
Stanza Lengths 4, 4, 4, 4, 4
Lines Amount 20
Letters per line (avg) 37
Words per line (avg) 10
Letters per stanza (avg) 148
Words per stanza (avg) 40
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

1:01 min read
93

Victor Marie Hugo

Victor Marie Hugo was a French poet, novelist, and dramatist of the Romantic movement. He is considered one of the greatest and best known French writers. In France, Hugo's literary fame comes first from his poetry but also rests upon his novels and his dramatic achievements. Among many volumes of poetry, Les Contemplations and La Légende des siècles stand particularly high in critical esteem. Outside France, his best-known works are the novels Les Misérables, 1862, and Notre-Dame de Paris, 1831. Though a committed royalist when he was young, Hugo's views changed as the decades passed; he became a passionate supporter of republicanism, and his work touches upon most of the political and social issues and artistic trends of his time. He was buried in the Panthéon. more…

All Victor Marie Hugo poems | Victor Marie Hugo Books

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