Analysis of Ernie Pyle



I wish I had a simple style
          In writing verse,
As in his prose had Ernie Pyle,
          So true and terse;
Springing so forthright from the heart
          With guileless art.

I wish I could put back a dram
          As Ernie could;
I wish that I could cuss and damn
          As soldier should;
And fain with every verse would I
          Ernie outvie.

Alas! I cannot claim his high
          Humanity;
Nor emulate his pungent, dry
          Profanity;
Nor share his love of common folk
          Who bear life's yolk.

Oh Ernie, who on earth I knew
          In war and wine,
Though frail of fame, in soul how you
          Were pure and fine!
I'm proud that once when we were plastered
          You called me 'bastard.'


Scheme ABABCC DEDEFX FGFGHH IJIJKK
Poetic Form
Metre 11110101 0101 10111101 1101 10111101 1101 11111101 1101 11111101 1101 011100111 101 01110111 0100 1101101 0100 11111101 1111 11011111 0101 11110111 0101 111111010 11110
Closest metre Iambic trimeter
Characters 717
Words 123
Sentences 7
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 6, 6, 6, 6
Lines Amount 24
Letters per line (avg) 20
Words per line (avg) 5
Letters per stanza (avg) 118
Words per stanza (avg) 30
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

37 sec read
77

Robert William Service

Robert William Service was a poet and writer sometimes referred to as the Bard of the Yukon He is best-known for his writings on the Canadian North including the poems The Shooting of Dan McGrew The Law of the Yukon and The Cremation of Sam McGee His writing was so expressive that his readers took him for a hard-bitten old Klondike prospector not the later-arriving bank clerk he actually was Robert William Service was born 16 January 1874 in Preston England but also lived in Scotland before emigrating to Canada in 1894 Service went to the Yukon Territory in 1904 as a bank clerk and became famous for his poems about this region which are mostly in his first two books of poetry He wrote quite a bit of prose as well and worked as a reporter for some time but those writings are not nearly as well known as his poems He travelled around the world quite a bit and narrowly escaped from France at the beginning of the Second World War during which time he lived in Hollywood California He died 11 September 1958 in France Incidentally he played himself in a movie called The Spoilers starring John Wayne and Marlene Dietrich more…

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