"The Rolling English Road" is one of the best-known poems by
G. K. Chesterton
Gilbert Keith Chesterton (29 May 1874 – 14 June 1936) was an English author, philosopher, Christian apologist, journalist and magazine editor, and literary and art critic.
Chesterton created the fictional priest-detective Father Brow ...
. It was first published under the title "A Song of Temperance Reform" in the ''New Witness'' in 1913. It was also included in the novel by Chesterton, ''
The Flying Inn'', in 1914.
The poem is written in
heptameter
Heptameter is a type of meter where each line of verse contains seven metrical feet.Harmon, William, and Hugh Holman. ''A Handbook to Literature.'' Eleventh ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson-Prentice Hall, 2009. 264. It was used frequently in Cl ...
s.
Alliteration
Alliteration is the repetition of syllable-initial consonant sounds between nearby words, or of syllable-initial vowels if the syllables in question do not start with a consonant. It is often used as a literary device. A common example is " Pe ...
is plentiful and "a particularly useful device in the last line of each
stanza
In poetry, a stanza (; from Italian ''stanza'', ; ) is a group of lines within a poem, usually set off from others by a blank line or indentation. Stanzas can have regular rhyme and metrical schemes, but they are not required to have either. ...
, playfully yoking the far-flung places together (Birmingham/Beachy Head, etc) and reminding us that, like a pub comic, our narrator is, supposedly, improvising his tall story. When he drops the alliterative yoke in the last stanza ("Paradise ... Kensal Green") you know he's being serious."
In the final line of the poem, Kensal Green refers to
Kensal Green Cemetery
Kensal Green Cemetery is a cemetery in the Kensal Green area of North Kensington in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham in London, England. Inspired by Père Lachaise Cemetery in P ...
in London.
A restaurant in the local area, on Chamberlayne road, uses most of the last line, "''Paradise by way of Kensal Green''" as its name.
See also
*
Byway (road)
References
External links
G. K. Chesterton's Works on the Web*
1914 poems
Poems by G. K. Chesterton
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