Poem fractal

The Beggar

by James Russell Lowell

22 February 1819 to 12 August 1891 (~72)

Browse poets 678
In their words

“Democracy is the form of government that gives every man the right to be his own oppressor.”

A wry observation on the responsibilities and contradictions of popular government · Political commentary, commonly attributed

More remarks (4)

Drawing the boundary…

Read the poem Another poem

A fractal is a shape that keeps its pattern when you look closer. Coastlines, trees, shells, and weather do this. A poem can be drawn the same way.

The poem’s constant is read from the build of its lines: their length, the size of the stanzas, and the share of vowels. Poems whose constants lie closer together are built more alike. The same poem always draws the same picture. Change the length of a line, the stanza, or the vowel share, and both the number and the picture move.

Primunia is the name for the source of that order: the pattern under the pattern, already there in a tree, a shell, and a verse.

Poems nearby in the constant

A smaller distance means the lines are built more alike.

  1. Ben Jonson · −0.2527 − 0.4345i · 0.004 away · Compare side by side
  2. Lord Byron · −0.2620 − 0.4395i · 0.007 away · Compare side by side
  3. John Greenleaf Whittier · −0.2637 − 0.4334i · 0.009 away · Compare side by side
  4. Alice Meynell · −0.2544 − 0.4246i · 0.013 away · Compare side by side
  5. Felicia Dorothea Hemans · −0.2645 − 0.4270i · 0.014 away · Compare side by side
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