Interpreting Poetry Essay

Ballads have been a popular invention of troubadours since the inception of poetry. A ballad is a folksong typically with a tragic ending or a lovers getting married ending. This paper provide break down the ballad of Bonnie Barbara Allen in a stanza by stanza presentation, as hale as present how the ballads narration pertains to modernity through folk singing. Ballads are an interpretation of a putting green emotion. In Barbara Allen the main characters are Barbara and Sir whoremaster Graeme.Sometimes the ballad shifts in the humannesss name in other versions of this same ballad the man is called Willie Grove, sweet Willie Graeme, Sweet William, Jemmye Grove (Diary of Pepys paragraph 4). With such differences in names to describe the man in this ballad, and by use of the adjective sweet to describe him, it may be surmised that the sympathies of the ballad-singer as well as the audience, lie with the man in the story and not with Barbara Allen. It is no motion that in this ballad, the female is given the characteristic of world cruel.This is shown as her finally leaving Sir can buoy Graeme on his deceasebed without re call oning his love. She spurns him because he slighted her in a public tavern ( just about versions are different) and it is this slight which makes her maintain her cruelty. Sir privy Graeme dies, and Barbara Allen is so stricken with grief that she too dies (in some versions of the ballad, either lovers grave grows a rose and a thorn and they intertwine, and in another version Sir jakes Graeme dances on Barbara Allens grave). The musical theme of the ballad is quite perceptibly nigh forgiveness.In essence, as with most ballads, Barbara Allen tries to moralize the story under the cruelest conditions. In analysis the creativity of the ballad through use of word choice, view and narrative, the endorser is bombarded with Old English (for the ballad was created in the 12th snow when it was written into Pepys Diary of Ballads, bu t had been travelling through England, Scotland and Ireland via oral tradition hundreds of years prior to it being written down). The first stanza places the listener or reader in a timeframe (Martinmas time, or November 11th (Wollstadt 315)).In the conniption of the nip the singer goes on to describe that the green leaves were a locomote (Pepys paragraph 1). Although the first stanza tells of baths love for Barbara, there is an present(prenominal) swift change of scene from love to stopping point between the beginning(a) and 2nd stanza (Oliver 10-11). Barbara is bid to come to the my master dear (Pepys paragraph 1). The symbol of the green leaves falling and of Johns body being so close to death represents a great use of metaphor by the writer. What should also be noted is that typically when a leaf falls, it is not in fact green, but of various colours including red, yellow, orange.This is because the chlorophyll has been sucked back down into the point for the winter (its like the tree harvesting health for the upcoming frostyer months). Thus, for the green leaves to be falling would suggest that the tree has suffered some plight instead of them falling simply because of the season. This allusion of the ballad mirrors Johns broken heart (Oliver 11-12). He is a young man, in the old of his days, but he dies of a broken heart. What is of hike up interest is that a tree will keep the green in its leaves, even when the tree is dying of what is called heart rot.Thus, the reader is prepared for the upcoming scene of sorrow for both John and Barbara. The 3rd stanza reveals a somewhat cold Barbara Allen. She does go to Johns side, on his bequest, and when she arrives, all the ballad says, she says, juvenile man, I think youre dying (Pepys paragraph 1). The motions with which she uses to go to Johns deathbed are very revealing to the reader. The stanza relays that she behindly (hooly) got up upon being requested to Johns side. We must assume she k new he was dying, or that she was reluctant to see him, because of the way she feels he slighted her.However, upon the true revelation of Johns state of death, all she can say is Young man, I think youre dying (Pepys paragraph 1). It is in the 4th stanza that the reader is revealed to Johns state Hes dying of a broken heart. This is an actual medical concern known as of takotsubo cardiomyopathy, or broken heart syndrome. It may safely assumed that this is indeed what is the death of Sir John Graeme, for, upon Barbara Allen leaving him, without returning his love, the death toll rings. In turn then, Barbara Allen may also have died from takotsubo cardiomyopathy.Sir Johns statement further supports this notion as in the 4th stanza he states, Im sick/And tis a for Barbara Allan (Pepys paragraph 1). If Johns heart in truth is breaking, it does so in the fifth stanza as Barbara states that she doesnt love him (or hides it because shes angry with him) because of the injustice she feels s he suffered at the tavern when John slighted her. The 4th and the 5th stanzas are full of dialogue and not much narrative. This is do in order to get the back story of these two tidy sum and to know the emotional reasoning for Barbaras actions.The narrative of the 6th stanza reveals more the dialogue between the couple as revealed in their actions. John turns his memorial tablet to the way when Barbara tells of why she doesnt love him. This action may be interpreted as being shame on Johns part for what he did while drinking at a tavern. The consummate 6th stanza in fact reads like a domestic argufy reconciliation (or what may be a reconciliation). What is interesting to note is that John doesnt ask for forgiveness from Barbara for what he may or may not have done while he may or may not have been drunk.Thus, in turn, Barbara doesnt forgive him. Thus, the theme of forgiveness comes back into play meaning, if either one had forgiven the other, perhaps their black Maria would n ot have broken. However, both characters have too much ostentation to ask for forgiveness and thus they inevitably befall a tragic ending. It is interesting to not however that while John is dying his pull round request is for people to be kind to Barbara Allen, which signifies his fault as well as her stubbornness. (i. e.because she wouldnt grant a dying man his detain wish). The repetition in the 7th stanza of Barbara moving slowly leaving John was seen early in the ballad when she slowly came to see him. Thus, once she was slow to see him and now she is reluctant to leave him. It is in the 7th stanza that the reader begins to see the human side of Barbara Allen appear. It is with this movement and her statement in the 9th stanza of dying tomorrow, that the reader may begin to sympathize with the woman.Her cruelty can scarcely be redeemed through her dying as well, and it is in her death that the reader realizes that she did love John, but could not forgive a man who did not a sk for forgiveness. Works Cited Diary of Samuel Pepys. Barbara Allen. (2009). Online. 29 March 2009. http//www. pepysdiary. com/p/9570. php Oliver, Mary. Poetry Handbook. (1994). Harvest Books. New York. Wollstadt, Lynn. Controlling Women Reading Gender in the Ballads Scottish Women Sang Western Folklore, vol. 61, no. ? (Autumn 2002). Pp. 295-317.