Analysis of The Garret

Paul Laurence Dunbar 1872 (Dayton) – 1906



Within a London garret high,
Above the roofs and near the sky,
My ill-rewarding pen I ply
To win me bread.
This little chamber, six by four,
Is castle, study, den, and more,--
Altho' no carpet decks the floor,
Nor down, the bed.

My room is rather bleak and bare;
I only have one broken chair,
But then, there's plenty of fresh air,--
Some light, beside.
What tho' I cannot ask my friends
To share with me my odds and ends,
A liberty my aerie lends,
To most denied.

The bore who falters at the stair
No more shall be my curse and care,
And duns shall fail to find my lair
With beastly bills.
When debts have grown and funds are short,
I find it rather pleasant sport
To live 'above the common sort'
With all their ills.

I write my rhymes and sing away,
And dawn may come or dusk or day:
Tho' fare be poor, my heart is gay.
And full of glee.
Though chimney-pots be all my views;
'T is nearer for the winging Muse,
So I am sure she 'll not refuse
To visit me.


Scheme AAABCCCB DDDEFFFE DDDGHHHG IIIJKKKJ
Poetic Form
Metre 01010101 01010101 11010111 1111 11010111 11010101 1110101 1101 11110101 11011101 11110111 1101 11110111 11111101 01001101 1101 01110101 11111101 01111111 111 11110111 11110101 11010101 1111 11110101 01111111 11111111 0111 11011111 111010101 111111101 1101
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 933
Words 194
Sentences 10
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 8, 8, 8, 8
Lines Amount 32
Letters per line (avg) 23
Words per line (avg) 6
Letters per stanza (avg) 180
Words per stanza (avg) 48
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

58 sec read
110

Paul Laurence Dunbar

Paul Laurence Dunbar was a seminal American poet of the late 19th and early 20th centuries Dunbar gained national recognition for his 1896 Lyrics of a Lowly Life one poem in the collection being Ode to Ethiopia more…

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