Analysis of Retort

Paul Laurence Dunbar 1872 (Dayton) – 1906



'THOU art a fool,' said my head to my heart,
'Indeed, the greatest of fools thou art,
To be led astray by the trick of a tress,
By a smiling face or a ribbon smart;'
And my heart was in sore distress.
Then Phyllis came by, and her face was fair,
The light gleamed soft on her raven hair;
And her lips were blooming a rosy red.
Then my heart spoke out with a right bold air:
'Thou art worse than a fool, O head!'


Scheme AABABCCDCD
Poetic Form Tetractys  (20%)
Etheree  (20%)
Metre 1101111111 010101111 11101101101 1010110101 01110101 1101100111 011110101 0010100101 1111110111 11110111
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 410
Words 90
Sentences 4
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 10
Lines Amount 10
Letters per line (avg) 31
Words per line (avg) 9
Letters per stanza (avg) 307
Words per stanza (avg) 85
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on May 02, 2023

26 sec read
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Paul Laurence Dunbar

Paul Laurence Dunbar was a seminal American poet of the late 19th and early 20th centuries Dunbar gained national recognition for his 1896 Lyrics of a Lowly Life one poem in the collection being Ode to Ethiopia more…

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