An Answer to a Friend's Question
The furniture that best doth pleaseSt. Patrick's Dean, good Sir, are these:The knife and fork with which I eat;And next the pot that boils the meat;The next to be preferr'd, I think,Is the glass in which I drink;The shelves on which my books I keepAnd the bed on which I sleep;An antique elbow-chair between,Big enough to hold the Dean;And the stove that gives delightIn the cold bleak wintry night:To these we add a thing below,More for use reserved than show:These are what the Dean do please;All superfluous are but these.
Words in this poem
- wintry a.
- Suitable to winter; resembling winter, or what belongs to winter; brumal; hyemal; cold; stormy; wintery. [AS. wintrig.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
An Answer to a Friend's Question is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume 1, Project Gutenberg ebook #14353; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Jonathan Swift, An Answer to a Friend's Question, in On Poetry: A Rhapsody, and Other Poems (1727), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #14353, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/swift-poems-vol1/an-answer-to-a-friend-s-question.html, id L24605.
Form and metre
An Answer to a Friend's Question is 16 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 88%).
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 AABBCCDDEEFFGGAA pleaseA · theseA · eatB · meatB · thinkC · drinkC · keepD · sleepD · betweenE · deanE · delightF · nightF · belowG · showG · pleaseA · theseA
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 |
|---|---|---|
| The furniture that best doth please | 8 | ·/˘˘···· |
| St. Patrick's Dean, good Sir, are these: | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| The knife and fork with which I eat; | 8 | ········ |
| And next the pot that boils the meat; | 8 | ········ |
| The next to be preferr'd, I think, | 8 | ····˘/·· |
| Is the glass in which I drink; | 7 | ······· |
| The shelves on which my books I keep | 8 | ········ |
| And the bed on which I sleep; | 7 | ······· |
| An antique elbow-chair between, | 8 | ·˘//···· |
| Big enough to hold the Dean; | 7 | ·˘/···· |
| And the stove that gives delight | 7 | ·····˘/ |
| In the cold bleak wintry night: | 7 | ····/˘· |
| To these we add a thing below, | 8 | ········ |
| More for use reserved than show: | 8 | ···˘/˘·· |
| These are what the Dean do please; | 7 | ······· |
| All superfluous are but these. | 7 | ·/˘···· |
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.