World's History
O thou world's history! O thou book of wonders!Each reads thy pages with a different breath;Musical blessings here, there cursing thunders:Now smiles of life, and then the frowns of death.Thou bearest in one hand a flashing sword,"Go forth and conquer" is thy sovereign word,"For help is wanted—to the rescue—Go!"And to another—"Sheathe the sword, and knowThou draw'st it forth in vain, in vain thou strivest,Against inexorable fate thou drivest;The world was doomed to slavery—and shall be—Thou canst not change nor check its destiny."
Words in this poem
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
World's History is in the public domain. This text is taken from Translations from Alexander Petofi, the Magyar Poet, by Sir John Bowring (London: Trübner & Co., 1866), Internet Archive, the John Bowring translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Sándor Petőfi, World's History, in Translations from Alexander Petofi, the Magyar Poet (1866), text of Internet Archive, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/petofi-poems-bowring/world-s-history.html, id L29861.
Form and metre
World's History is 12 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 88%).
See other poems in iambic pentameter.
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 ABAB--CCDD-- wondersA · breathB · thundersA · deathB · sword · word · goC · knowC · strivestD · drivestD · be · destiny
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 pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| O thou world's history! O thou book of wonders! | 11 | ···/˘····/˘ |
| Each reads thy pages with a different breath; | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| Musical blessings here, there cursing thunders: | 11 | /˘˘/˘··/˘/˘ |
| Now smiles of life, and then the frowns of death. | 10 | ·········· |
| Thou bearest in one hand a flashing sword, | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| "Go forth and conquer" is thy sovereign word, | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| "For help is wanted—to the rescue—Go!" | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| And to another—"Sheathe the sword, and know | 10 | ··˘/˘····· |
| Thou draw'st it forth in vain, in vain thou strivest, | 11 | ·········/˘ |
| Against inexorable fate thou drivest; | 11 | ···/˘˘˘··/˘ |
| The world was doomed to slavery—and shall be— | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Thou canst not change nor check its destiny." | 10 | ·······/˘˘ |
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.