Analysis of The Snow Man

Wallace Stevens 1879 (Reading) – 1955 (Hartford)



One must have a mind of winter
To regard the frost and the boughs
Of the pine-trees crusted with snow;

And have been cold a long time
To behold the junipers shagged with ice,
The spruces rough in the distant glitter

Of the January sun; and not to think
Of any misery in the sound of the wind,
In the sound of a few leaves,

Which is the sound of the land
Full of the same wind
That is blowing in the same bare place
For the listener, who listens in the snow,
And, nothing himself, beholds
Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.


Scheme ABC XXA XDX XDXCBX
Poetic Form Tetractys  (20%)
Metre 11101110 10101001 10111011 0111011 1010100111 011001010 1010010111 110100001101 0011011 1101101 11011 111000111 10100110001 010011 101111001011
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 533
Words 109
Sentences 2
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 3, 3, 3, 6
Lines Amount 15
Letters per line (avg) 28
Words per line (avg) 7
Letters per stanza (avg) 105
Words per stanza (avg) 27
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 22, 2023

32 sec read
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Wallace Stevens

Wallace Stevens was an American Modernist poet. more…

All Wallace Stevens poems | Wallace Stevens Books

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