Analysis of The Choice
William Butler Yeats 1865 (Sandymount) – 1939 (Menton)
The intellect of man is forced to choose
perfection of the life, or of the work,
And if it take the second must refuse
A heavenly mansion, raging in the dark.
When all that story's finished, what's the news?
In luck or out the toil has left its mark:
That old perplexity an empty purse,
Or the day's vanity, the night's remorse.
| Scheme | ABACACDE |
|---|---|
| Poetic Form | |
| Metre | 010111111 0101011101 0111010101 01001010001 1111010101 0111011111 1101001101 1011000101 |
| Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
| Characters | 329 |
| Words | 64 |
| Sentences | 4 |
| Stanzas | 1 |
| Stanza Lengths | 8 |
| Lines Amount | 8 |
| Letters per line (avg) | 32 |
| Words per line (avg) | 8 |
| Letters per stanza (avg) | 253 |
| Words per stanza (avg) | 62 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on May 01, 2023
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"The Choice" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/39453/the-choice>.
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