Analysis of No Buyers

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



A Load of brushes and baskets and cradles and chairs
Labours along the street in the rain:
With it a man, a woman, a pony with whiteybrown hairs. --
The man foots in front of the horse with a shambling sway
At a slower tread than a funeral train,
While to a dirge-like tune he chants his wares,
Swinging a Turk's-head brush (in a drum-major's way
When the bandsmen march and play).

A yard from the back of the man is the whiteybrown pony's nose:
He mirrors his master in every item of pace and pose:
He stops when the man stops, without being told,
And seems to be eased by a pause; too plainly he's old,
Indeed, not strength enough shows
To steer the disjointed waggon straight,
Which wriggles left and right in a rambling line,
Deflected thus by its own warp and weight,
And pushing the pony with it in each incline.

The woman walks on the pavement verge,
Parallel to the man:
She wears an apron white and wide in span,
And carries a like Turk's-head, but more in nursing-wise:
Now and then she joins in his dirge,
But as if her thoughts were on distant things,
The rain clams her apron till it clings. --
So, step by step, they move with their merchandize,
And nobody buys.


Scheme ABACBACC DDEEDFGFG HIIJHKKAJ
Poetic Form
Metre 0111001001001 10101001 110101001111 011011011011 10101101001 1101111111 100111001101 101101 0110110110111 1101100100101101 11101101101 0111110111011 0111011 11001011 1110100101 0101111101 01001110101 010110101 10101 1111010101 0100111110101 10111011 1110101101 011010111 111111111 011
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 1,159
Words 223
Sentences 6
Stanzas 3
Stanza Lengths 8, 9, 9
Lines Amount 26
Letters per line (avg) 35
Words per line (avg) 9
Letters per stanza (avg) 303
Words per stanza (avg) 74
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on April 15, 2023

1:08 min read
92

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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