My Shadow Summary

Summary of My Shadow

This article discusses My Shadow summary which is a poem written by Robert Louis Stevenson. The poem revolves around a child and his shadow. He is fascinated by his own shadow that moves with him. The child starts noticing things about his shadow. He notices that it resembles him. Moreover, he also sees that the shadow does the same things as the child. For instance, when he gets in bed, the shadow does the same as well. Sometimes, it gets into bed before the child can. However, some things still confuse the child. It is that the shadow keeps changing its size. Sometimes, it grows very tall and other times it turns small. One day, the child decides to get up early. He notices dews on flowers but the shadow is missing. Thus, he assumes that his shadow is so lazy that it is still sleeping in bed.

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My Shadow Summary in English

The poem is about a little boy who starts fantasizing about his own shadow. He is very good at observing the things it does. The little shadow is always by his side. Further, even when he goes out, it follows him. He also notices the resemblance between the shadow and himself. Everything from head to toe is the same in his shadow. He notices that sometimes when he jumps into bed, the shadow gets in before he can. The feeling of his shadow following him excites him a lot.

After that, one unusual thing is what the boy notices. The size of the shadow varies. He says that sometimes it grows tall and the other times, it gets small in size. It is not like the normal kids who grow at a normal rate. This getting bigger and smaller excites the boy too. It is because he has not seen anything like this before. This is when he realizes that the shadow is not like other children. It does not have normal behaviour.

He thinks the shadow plays tricks on his mind. When the boy is playing, the shadow is always nearby. The boy even assumes that because the shadow is a coward, it does not leave him ever. Moreover, because the shadow stays behind and always follows him, this strengthens his assumption. At last, the boy’s morning experience is told. He gets up early in the morning one day, before sunrise.

The morning is beautiful and dewy and he can see the dew on every leaf. As the sun is on the horizon, there is not much light around the boy. Thus, the shadow is not present. Being the naïve child that he is, the boy is excited as the shadow did not follow him for the first time. He assumes that the shadow is so lazy that it did not get up in the morning and is still sleeping in bed. He thinks so because the shadow always jumps into bed with him so he assumes it is still asleep.