Shakspeare: Written at the Age of Eleven
I love to rove o’er history’s page,Recall the hero and the sage;Revive the actions of the dead,And memory of ages fled:Yet it yields me greater pleasure,To read the poet’s pleasing measure.Led by Shakspeare, bard inspired,The bosom’s energies are fired;We learn to shed the generous tear,O’er poor Ophelia’s sacred bier;To love the merry moonlit scene,With fairy elves in valleys green;Or, borne on fancy’s heavenly wings,To listen while sweet Ariel sings.How sweet the “native woodnotes wild”Of him, the Muse’s favourite child!Of him whose magic lays impartEach various feeling to the heart!
Words in this poem
- generous a.
- Of honorable birth or origin; highborn. [F. généreux, fr. L. generous of noble birth, noble, excellent, magnanimous, fr. genus birth, race: cf. It. generoso. See 2d Gender.]
- bier n.
- A handbarrow or portable frame on which a corpse is placed or borne to the grave. [OE. bæe, beere, AS. b, b; akin to D. baar, OHG. bara, G. bahre, Icel barar, Dbaare, L. feretrum, Gr. , from the same bear to produce. See 1st Bear, and cf. Barr]
- moonlit a.
- Illumined by the moon.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Shakspeare: Written at the Age of Eleven is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poems of Felicia Hemans, Project Gutenberg ebook #66785; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Felicia Hemans, Shakspeare: Written at the Age of Eleven, in Poems (1808–1835), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #66785, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/hemans-poems/shakspeare-written-at-the-age-of-eleven.html, id L13412.
Form and metre
Shakspeare: Written at the Age of Eleven is 18 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets: octosyllabic couplets. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 86%). 87% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.6 syllables. 4 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 6% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in octosyllabic couplets, other poems in iambic tetrameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 AABBCCDDEEFFGGHHII pageA · sageA · deadB · fledB · pleasureC · measureC · inspiredD · firedD · tearE · bierE · sceneF · greenF · wingsG · singsG · wildH · childH · impartI · heartI
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| I love to rove o’er history’s page, | 9 | ·····/˘˘· |
| Recall the hero and the sage; | 8 | ˘/·/˘··· |
| Revive the actions of the dead, | 8 | ˘/·/˘··· |
| And memory of ages fled: | 8 | ·/˘˘·/˘· |
| Yet it yields me greater pleasure, | 8 | ····/˘/˘ |
| To read the poet’s pleasing measure. | 9 | ···/˘/˘/˘ |
| Led by Shakspeare, bard inspired, | 9 | ·····˘/˘˘ |
| The bosom’s energies are fired; | 10 | ·/˘/˘˘·/˘˘ |
| We learn to shed the generous tear, | 9 | ·····/˘˘· |
| O’er poor Ophelia’s sacred bier; | 9 | ··˘/˘/˘˘· |
| To love the merry moonlit scene, | 8 | ···/˘/·· |
| With fairy elves in valleys green; | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Or, borne on fancy’s heavenly wings, | 9 | ···/˘/˘˘· |
| To listen while sweet Ariel sings. | 9 | ·/˘··/˘˘· |
| How sweet the “native woodnotes wild” | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Of him, the Muse’s favourite child! | 9 | ···/˘···· |
| Of him whose magic lays impart | 8 | ···/˘·˘/ |
| Each various feeling to the heart! | 9 | ·/˘˘/˘··· |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.