Analysis of Ribblesdale

Gerard Manley Hopkins 1844 (Stratford, London) – 1889 (Dublin)



Earth, sweet Earth, sweet landscape, with leavés throng
And louchéd low grass, heaven that dost appeal
To, with no tongue to plead, no heart to feel;
That canst but only be, but dost that long—

Thou canst but be, but that thou well dost; strong
Thy plea with him who dealt, nay does now deal,
Thy lovely dale down thus and thus bids reel
Thy river, and o’er gives all to rack or wrong.

And what is Earth’s eye, tongue, or heart else, where
Else, but in dear and dogged man?—Ah, the heir
To his own selfbent so bound, so tied to his turn,
To thriftless reave both our rich round world bare
And none reck of world after, this bids wear
Earth brows of such care, care and dear concern.


Scheme ABBA ABBA CCDCCD
Poetic Form
Metre 111111111 01111101101 1111111111 1111011111 1111111111 1111111111 1101110111 11001111111 0111111111 1101011101 11111111111 1111101111 0111110111 1111110101
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 696
Words 134
Sentences 4
Stanzas 3
Stanza Lengths 4, 4, 6
Lines Amount 14
Letters per line (avg) 37
Words per line (avg) 9
Letters per stanza (avg) 174
Words per stanza (avg) 44
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on April 17, 2023

40 sec read
143

Gerard Manley Hopkins

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