Lines Indited with All the Depravity of Poverty
Lines Indited with All the Depravity of Poverty - meaning Summary
Wealth as Comic Solution
Nash presents wealth as a comic cure-all, contrasting the freedoms and impunity money buys with the humiliations of poverty. Through playful exaggeration and everyday examples—luxuries like orchids, careless spending, buying favors or a divorce—he underlines social double standards: the rich are forgiven eccentricity while the poor are mocked. The poem ends in a wry admission of envy, framing riches as both a practical advantage and a satirical wish.
Read Complete AnalysesOne way to be very happy is to be very rich For then you can buy orchids by the quire and bacon by the flitch. And yet at the same time People don't mind if you only tip them a dime, Because it's very funny But somehow if you're rich enough you can get away with spending water like money While if you're not rich you can spend in one evening your salary for the year And everybody will just stand around and jeer. If you are rich you don't have to think twice about buying a judge or a horse, Or a lower instead of an upper, or a new suit, or a divorce, And you never have to say When, And you can sleep every morning until nine or ten, All of which Explains why I should like very, very much to be very, very rich.
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