Analysis of In Time of 'The Breaking of Nations'

Thomas Hardy 1840 (Stinsford) – 1928 (Dorchester, Dorset)



Only a man harrowing clods
In a slow silent walk
With an old horse that stumbles and nods
Half asleep as they stalk.

Only thin smoke without flame
From the heaps of couch-grass;
Yet this will go onward the same
Though Dynasties pass.

Yonder a maid and her wight
Come whispering by:
War's annals will cloud into night
Ere their story die.


Scheme ABAB CACA DEDE
Poetic Form Quatrain 
Metre 10011001 001101 111111001 101111 1011011 101111 11111001 11001 1001001 11001 11011011 11101
Closest metre Iambic trimeter
Characters 345
Words 64
Sentences 4
Stanzas 3
Stanza Lengths 4, 4, 4
Lines Amount 12
Letters per line (avg) 22
Words per line (avg) 5
Letters per stanza (avg) 90
Words per stanza (avg) 21
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on April 25, 2023

19 sec read
455

Thomas Hardy

Thomas Hardy, was not a Scottish Minister, not a Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland nor a Professor of Eccesiastical History at Edinburgh University. more…

All Thomas Hardy poems | Thomas Hardy Books

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    The repetition of similar sounds at the ends of words or within words is known as _______.
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