Analysis of Hail! Childish Slave Of Social Rules
Robert Louis Stevenson 1850 (Edinburgh) – 1894 (Vailima, Samoa)
HAIL! Childish slaves of social rules
You had yourselves a hand in making!
How I could shake your faith, ye fools,
If but I thought it worth the shaking.
I see, and pity you; and then
Go, casting off the idle pity,
In search of better, braver men,
My own way freely through the city.
My own way freely, and not yours;
And, careless of a town's abusing,
Seek real friendship that endures
Among the friends of my own choosing.
I'll choose my friends myself, do you hear?
And won't let Mrs. Grundy do it,
Tho' all I honour and hold dear
And all I hope should move me to it.
I take my old coat from the shelf -
I am a man of little breeding.
And only dress to please myself -
I own, a very strange proceeding.
I smoke a pipe abroad, because
To all cigars I much prefer it,
And as I scorn your social laws
My choice has nothing to deter it.
Gladly I trudge the footpath way,
While you and yours roll by in coaches
In all the pride of fine array,
Through all the city's thronged approaches.
O fine religious, decent folk,
In Virtue's flaunting gold and scarlet,
I sneer between two puffs of smoke, -
Give me the publican and harlot.
Ye dainty-spoken, stiff, severe
Seed of the migrated Philistian,
One whispered question in your ear -
Pray, what was Christ, if you be Christian?
If Christ were only here just now,
Among the city's wynds and gables
Teaching the life he taught us, how
Would he be welcome to your tables?
I go and leave your logic-straws,
Your former-friends with face averted,
Your petty ways and narrow laws,
Your Grundy and your God, deserted.
From your frail ark of lies, I flee
I know not where, like Noah's raven.
Full to the broad, unsounded sea
I swim from your dishonest haven.
Alone on that unsounded deep,
Poor waif, it may be I shall perish,
Far from the course I thought to keep,
Far from the friends I hoped to cherish.
It may be that I shall sink, and yet
Hear, thro' all taunt and scornful laughter,
Through all defeat and all regret,
The stronger swimmers coming after.
Scheme | ABABCDCD EBEBFGHG IBIBJGJG KXKXLMLM HCFNOPOP JXJXDNDN QRQRSTST |
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Poetic Form | |
Metre | 11011101 110101010 11111111 111111010 11010101 110101010 01110101 111101010 11110011 010101010 1110101 010111110 11111111 011101011 1111011 011111111 11111101 110111010 0101111 110101010 11010101 110111011 01111101 111101011 1011011 110111010 01011101 110101010 11010101 01101010 11011111 1101010 11010101 110101 11010011 111111110 11010111 010101010 10011111 111101110 11011101 110111010 11010101 110011010 11111111 111111010 110111 111101010 011111 111111110 11011111 110111110 111111101 111101010 11010101 010101010 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,949 |
Words | 378 |
Sentences | 21 |
Stanzas | 7 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8 |
Lines Amount | 56 |
Letters per line (avg) | 27 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 220 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 54 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on May 03, 2023
- 1:55 min read
- 142 Views
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"Hail! Childish Slave Of Social Rules" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 27 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/31594/hail%21-childish-slave-of-social-rules>.
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