About “Miniver Cheevy”

On the surface, this is about a man who considers himself born in the wrong time period, who dreams of past periods of adventures and romance.

To be “on the town” has a secondary meaning – to be supported by the town, a charity case, the town loafer. He reasons that he could have been a great figure if born in the past. His lack of success is not his fault, the world is wrong!

But the author hints that he would not have achieved much anyway, through the verbs assailed, wept, loved, sighed, dreamed, rested (“from his labors!”), mourned, cursed, scorned; and the fact he spends hit time “thinking” and “drinking”.

The poem is usually considered a self-portrait, or self-satire.