Analysis of Somewhere there is a simple life

Anna Akhmatova 1889 (Odessa) – 1966 (Moscow)



Somewhere there is a simple life and a world,
Transparent, warm and joyful. . .
There at evening a neighbor talks with a girl
Across the fence, and only the bees can hear
This most tender murmuring of all.

But we live ceremoniously and with difficulty
And we observe the rites of our bitter meetings,
When suddenly the reckless wind
Breaks off a sentence just begun -

But not for anything would we exchange this splendid
Granite city of fame and calamity,
The wide rivers of glistening ice,
The sunless, gloomy gardens,
And, barely audible, the Muse's voice.


Scheme XXXXX AXXX XAXXX
Poetic Form
Metre 1110101001 0101010 11100101101 01010100111 111010011 1111011000 0101011101010 11000101 11010101 111101101110 10101100100 011011001 011010 010100011
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 553
Words 98
Sentences 6
Stanzas 3
Stanza Lengths 5, 4, 5
Lines Amount 14
Letters per line (avg) 32
Words per line (avg) 7
Letters per stanza (avg) 148
Words per stanza (avg) 33
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on April 06, 2023

29 sec read
123

Anna Akhmatova

Anna Akhmatova was born in 1889 in Odessa on the Black Sea coast. In 1910 she married Nikolai Gumilev, who was also a poet. He was shot as an alleged counter-revolutionary in 1921. Very little of Akhmatova's poetry was published between 1923 and 1941. After Stalin's death her poetry began to be published again. She died in 1966, in a suburb of Moscow. more…

All Anna Akhmatova poems | Anna Akhmatova Books

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