Analysis of The Man Who Was Away
Andrew Barton Paterson 1864 (Orange, New South Wales) – 1941 (Sydney, New South Wales)
The widow sought the lawyer's room with children three in tow,
She told the lawyer man her tale in tones of deepest woe.
She said, "My husband took to drink for pains in his inside,
And never drew a sober breath from then until he died.
"He never drew a sober breath, he died without a will,
And I must sell the bit of land the childer's mouth to fill.
There's some is grown and gone away, but some is childer yet,
And times is very bad indeed -- a livin's hard to get.
"There's Min and Sis and little Chris, they stops at home with me,
And Sal has married Greenhide Bill that breaks for Bidgeree.
And Fred is drovin' Conroy's sheep along the Castlereagh
And Charley's shearin' down the Bland, and Peter is away."
The lawyer wrote the details down in ink of legal blue --
"There's Minnie, Susan, Christopher, they stop at home with you;
There's Sarah, Frederick and Charles, I'll write to them today,
But what about the other son -- the one who is away?
"You'll have to furnish his consent to sell the bit of land."
The widow shuffled in her seat, "Oh, don't you understand?
I thought a lawyer ought to know -- I don't know what to say --
You'll have to do without him, boss, for Peter is away."
But here the little boy spoke up -- said he, "We thought you knew;
He's done six months in Goulburn gaol -- he's got six more to do."
Thus in one comprehensive flash he made it clear as day,
The mystery of Peter's life -- the man who was away.
Scheme | AABB CCDD XXXE FFEE GGEE FFEE |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Quatrain (83%) |
Metre | 01010101110101 11010101011101 11110111110101 01010101110111 11010101110101 0111011101111 1111010111111 0111010101111 11010101111111 01110111111 0111110101 01010101010101 01010011011101 11010100111111 1101001111101 11010101011101 11110101110111 0101000111101 11010111111111 11110111110101 11010111111111 1111011111111 1010101111111 01001101011101 |
Closest metre | Iambic heptameter |
Characters | 1,447 |
Words | 284 |
Sentences | 13 |
Stanzas | 6 |
Stanza Lengths | 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4 |
Lines Amount | 24 |
Letters per line (avg) | 45 |
Words per line (avg) | 12 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 180 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 46 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:29 min read
- 128 Views
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"The Man Who Was Away" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 19 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/2662/the-man-who-was-away>.
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