Analysis of The Shadow on the Stone Kiran Bhimani 12th Grade

Thomas Hardy wrote “The Shadow on the Stone” after his wife’s death, and the ghost he mentions is his wife’s. The poem focuses on the realities of time and death. The poet’s feelings are complex, which is reflected in the complex rhyme scheme of the poem. The title shows us how Emma has always been like a shadow for Hardy. When she was alive, she followed him and now that she’s dead, according to Greek mythology, her soul has become a shadow. The stone in the poem is white as opposed to the black color of a shadow. Black may symbolize the evil way Emma was treated during the last years of her life.

For convenience, I will analyze this poem stanza by stanza.

I went by the Druid stone

That broods in the garden white and lone,

And I stopped and looked at the shifting shadows

That at some moments fall thereon

From the tree hard by with a rhythmic swing,

And they shaped in my imagining

To the shade that a well-known head and shoulders

Threw there when she was gardening.

A druid stone is a mystical stone of intuition and physic wisdom. Another definition of Druid Stone is a stone made by the ancient Druids. Both these definitions apply to the poem as we will later see. The stone is a representation of Hardy. He broods (or thinks) a...