Analysis of My Dearest Frank, I Wish You Joy

Jane Austen 1775 (Steventon Rectory, Hampshire) – 1817 (Winchester, Hampshire)



My dearest Frank, I wish you joy
Of Mary's safety with a Boy,
Whose birth has given little pain
Compared with that of Mary Jane.--
May he a growing Blessing prove,
And well deserve his Parents' Love!--
Endow'd with Art's and Nature's Good,
Thy Name possessing with thy Blood,
In him, in all his ways, may we
Another Francis WIlliam see!--
Thy infant days may he inherit,
THey warmth, nay insolence of spirit;--
We would not with one foult dispense
To weaken the resemblance.
May he revive thy Nursery sin,
Peeping as daringly within,
His curley Locks but just descried,
With 'Bet, my be not come to bide.'--
Fearless of danger, braving pain,
And threaten'd very oft in vain,
Still may one Terror daunt his Soul,
One needful engine of Controul
Be found in this sublime array,
A neigbouring Donkey's aweful Bray.
So may his equal faults as Child,
Produce Maturity as mild!
His saucy words and fiery ways
In early Childhood's pettish days,
In Manhood, shew his Father's mind
Like him, considerate and Kind;
All Gentleness to those around,
And anger only not to wound.
Then like his Father too, he must,
To his own former struggles just,
Feel his Deserts with honest Glow,
And all his self-improvement know.
A native fault may thus give birth
To the best blessing, conscious Worth.
As for ourselves we're very well;
As unaffected prose will tell.--
Cassandra's pen will paint our state,
The many comforts that await
Our Chawton home, how much we find
Already in it, to our mind;
And how convinced, that when complete
It will all other Houses beat
The ever have been made or mended,
With rooms concise, or rooms distended.
You'll find us very snug next year,
Perhaps with Charles and Fanny near,
For now it often does delight us
To fancy them just over-right us.--


Scheme AABBCDEFGGHHIJKKELBBMMNNOOPPQQRRSSTTUUVVWWQQXXYYZZ1 1
Poetic Form
Metre 11011111 11010101 11110101 01111101 11010101 01011101 01110101 11010111 01011111 01010101 110111010 111100110 11111101 1100010 110111001 101101 1101111 11111111 10110101 01010101 11110111 1101011 11010101 01111 11110111 01010011 110101001 010111 0111101 11010001 11001101 01010111 11110111 11110101 11101101 01110101 01011111 10110101 110011101 1010111 1111101 01010101 10111111 010011101 01011101 11110101 010111110 110111010 11110111 01110101 111101011 110111011
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 1,717
Words 318
Sentences 14
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 52
Lines Amount 52
Letters per line (avg) 26
Words per line (avg) 6
Letters per stanza (avg) 1,368
Words per stanza (avg) 309
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 13, 2023

1:38 min read
79

Jane Austen

Jane Austen was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature. more…

All Jane Austen poems | Jane Austen Books

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