ART APPRECIATION

​

​A ballad is a poem that tells a story, and the term popular ballads refer to those that originated from the common people rather than from the king`s court or the halls of the nobles. To the ordinary people of the Middle Ages , these ballads were more entertainment than literature and they were not written down. Instead, they were sung over and over by minstrels and troubadours in local celebration and events, which helped preserve the gist of each ballad.

​As part of the spontaneous oral tradition of the English people, their authors are unknown and each ballad has several versions, but they share the following common characteristics:

​

​1. The subject is dramatic , often focusing on love ,death, or the supernatural.

​2. The language is very simple.

​3. The story is developed through dialogue.

​4. It contains lines and stanza that is repeated throughout the ballad.

​5. Mystery is contrived by leaving out details.

​THREE ENGLISH BALLAD

​

​The following is a ballad widely known in both England and America. The central theme is a variation of the " poison - maid " motif; the girl in this poem poisons her lover by giving him poisonous snakes to eat.

​

​Lord Randal - An Adaptation

​This is a story of an unhappy love affair. The ballad employs two familiar motifs; (1) love - sickness or death from excessive love and (2) witchcraft.

​

​Bonny Barbara Allan

​

​Although ballads were often serious or even tragic, this ballad testifies that the comic was not entirely neglected by the balladers.

​

​Get Up and Bar the Door

​Identifying the Author's Purpose for a Piece of Writing

​

​The characteristics of ballads all works together to help the author, poet, or storyteller to accomplish his purpose for the piece. In that case of ballads, this purpose is to tell a story. Other pieces of writing will have different purpose. Some common purpose for writing are; to describe, to inform, to analyze or evaluate, to persuade or to entertain. We can often tell the author's purpose for a piece or writing by simply skimming through it and looking for the major ideas. In poetry, the use of images, repeated lines, and dialog also help us identify the author's purpose of writing.