Analysis of Song of Snobs
Clarence Michael James Stanislaus Dennis 1876 (Auburn) – 1938 (Melbourne)
When Leonardo was a lad there was a certain set
Who snubbed him most outrageously - in fact, they snub him yet
He wasn't in the fashion, so he wasn't in the fold;
Before his death he was too new, and now he grows too old.
Because his art was new to them the snobs of Florence laughed;
And now, because he isn't new, the moderns scorn his craft.
'Da Vinci? Don't be crude, my dear! Call him an artist? Pshaw!
Why that old anachronism, so they say, knew how to draw!'
They have wandered thro' the ages, mouthing cliches as they go.
At first nights, and private views, 'mid the people 'one should know.'
But the artist goes on laughing as thro' every age he's laughed
At snobs who patronise the 'Arts,' but boggle at the craft.
When Shakespeare sought draw the crowds and please the taste of town
And watched box office takings with a worn and worried frown,
Kit Marlowe knew, Ben Jonson knew what stuff was in the lad;
But the dilettanti voted him quite definitely bad.
The fellow simply stole his plots, they said with lofty sneers,
And served them up most vulgarly to tickle groundling's ears.
'Will Shakespeare? That cheap showman!
Why the man's quite gauche, my dear!
I prefer them cultivated like dear Bacon and de Vere. '
So reputations surge and sink as lifts and ebbs the tide,
Now wallowing within the trough, now on the crest they ride.
But the snobs are ever with us, snobs of art, of place, of pelf.
And reading this, I rather think I might be one myself.
Scheme | AABBCCXX DDCC EEFFGGXHH IIJJ |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1010101110101 1111100011111 11000101110001 01111111011111 01111111011101 01011101010111 11011111111101 11101001111111 111010101001111 11101011010111 1010111011100111 111101110101 111101010111 01110101010101 1111101111001 101101110001 01010111111101 01111111011 111110 1011111 10111001110011 1010101110101 11000101110111 101110111111111 0101110111111 |
Closest metre | Iambic heptameter |
Characters | 1,468 |
Words | 277 |
Sentences | 20 |
Stanzas | 4 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 4, 9, 4 |
Lines Amount | 25 |
Letters per line (avg) | 45 |
Words per line (avg) | 11 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 283 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 68 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:24 min read
- 83 Views
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"Song of Snobs" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 8 Jun 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/6540/song-of-snobs>.
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