On Fanny Godwin
Her voice did quiver as we parted,Yet knew I not that heart was brokenFrom which it came, and I departedHeeding not the words then spoken.Misery--O Misery,This world is all too wide for thee.
About this text
On Fanny Godwin is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley — Volume 2, Project Gutenberg ebook #4798; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Percy Bysshe Shelley, On Fanny Godwin, in The Complete Poetical Works, Volume II (1816–1819), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #4798, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/shelley-later-poems/on-fanny-godwin.html, id L16318.
Form and metre
On Fanny Godwin is 6 lines in a single stanza. The metre is trochaic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 86%). 94% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.3 syllables. 5 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending.
See other poems in trochaic 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-- partedA · brokenB · departedA · spokenB · misery · thee
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 trochaic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Her voice did quiver as we parted, | 9 | ···/˘··/˘ |
| Yet knew I not that heart was broken | 9 | ·······/˘ |
| From which it came, and I departed | 9 | ······˘/˘ |
| Heeding not the words then spoken. | 8 | /˘····/˘ |
| Misery--O Misery, | 7 | /˘˘·/˘˘ |
| This world is all too wide for thee. | 8 | ········ |
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.