My Shadow
by Robert Louis Stevenson
CountryGreat Britain
LanguageEnglish
Subject(s)Shadows
Publication date1885 (1885)

My Shadow is an 1885 poem by Robert Louis Stevenson. Among his most famous poems for children,[1][2] it appeared in A Child's Garden of Verses in 1885.[3][4]

Because it is written in iambs that contain seven syllables per line, it is written in iambic heptameter, and can be considered a fourteener.

In 1885, the poem was disfavored by the British Quarterly Review, preferring Stevenson's other poems including The Hayloft, Farewell to the Farm, and The North-West Passage.[5]

It was included in multiple syllabus textbooks for elementary school teachers, including 1918,[6] 1916,[7] and 1921.[8]

In 1948, former U.S. President Harry S. Truman recalled the lines, "I have a little shadow / That goes in and out with me; / And what can be the use of him / Is more than I can see" to refer to the Republican candidate "running along behind him."[9][10]

In July 1953, Frances Horwich read the poem on an episode of her NBC children's series Ding Dong School.[11]

References

  1. ↑ Primary Education - Volume 29 - Page 311 1921 DEAR to the hearts of all children are the poems of Robert Louis Stevenson. Perhaps no one of his poems is more popular than "My Shadow." Its song-like rhythm is a delight to the ear and the " story " makes a strong .
  2. ↑ Grasping Shadows: The Dark Side of Literature, Painting, ... - Page 68 0190675276 William Chapman Sharpe - 2017 And in all of these characteristics, the child's shadow anticipates the much more traumatic split of “me” and “not-me” in Stevenson's most famous work, Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886). The enduring popularity of “My Shadow” as .
  3. ↑ Livesey, Margot (1994-11-01). "The Double Life of Robert Louis Stevenson". The Atlantic. Retrieved 2021-06-06.
  4. ↑ "Anyone for Tennyson?: A Christmas Goose...We mean Mother Goose!". The Berkshire Edge. 2020-12-20. Retrieved 2021-06-06.
  5. ↑ The British Quarterly Review - Volume 82. Princeton University: Hodder and Stoughton. 1885. p. 214.
  6. ↑ of Public Instruction, Michigan Dept (1918). Course of Study Syllabus, Elementary Schools ... University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. p. 32.
  7. ↑ New York Teachers' Monographs, Volume 21. New York Teachers' Monographs Company. 1916. p. 9.
  8. ↑ Curry, Charles Madison; Clippinger, Erle Elsworth (1921). Children's Literature: A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-training Classes. Harvard University: Rand McNally. p. 383. ISBN 978-1-344-64678-9.
  9. ↑ Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: 1623761255 Truman, Harry S. - 1963 "That made me think of something I used to hear a long time ago, that went: I have a little shadow That goes in and out with me; And what can be the use of him Is more than I can see. That has several connotations, if you want to think about it ..."
  10. ↑ S, Truman, Harry (1963-01-01). Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Harry S. Truman, 1948, Volume 4. Best Books on. ISBN 978-1-62376-125-7.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  11. ↑ Ding Dong School, 1953, retrieved 2021-06-06

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