Structure and Narration
The narrator's tone is informal and conversational, attempting to conjure the picture of a dialogue between the reader and the speaker (who is evidently Auden himself, speaking directly in the first person as he does in a large proportion of his work). The informality is established syntactically by enjambment—only 13 of the poem's 93 lines are clearly end-stopped. There are few instances of rhyme, and about half the lines end on unaccented syllables. The lines alternate 13 syllables incorporating five or six accents with 11 syllables and four accents. Auden adapted this syllabic construction from Marianne Moore. The pattern is reinforced by the line indentation and confirmed by Auden's own reading. This structure mitigates the tendency of normally accented English speech to fall into the rhythm of iambic pentameter. Swift changes in the sophistication of diction also occur in the poem, as in conversation, and lend it an immediate, informal quality.
The poet's audience seems to change between halves of the poem. He first addresses, in the first-person plural, an audience of like-minded readers or perhaps humans in general. He is discursive and speaks from a historical perspective, using imperatives such as "mark these rounded slopes", "hear the springs", and "examine this region". At line 44, his listener becomes a single beloved person, and the tone becomes more private. Auden now refers to himself, specifically, and addresses an intimate as "dear", with a greater sense of urgency:
They were right, my dear, all those voices were right
And still are; this land is not the sweet home that it looks,
Nor its peace the historical calm of a site
Where something was settled once and for all: A backward
And dilapidated province, connected
To the big busy world by a tunnel, with a certain
Seedy appeal, is that all it is now? Not quite: … (ll. 44–50)
Read more about this topic: In Praise Of Limestone
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