Medieval Lyrics and Ballads –Behind their Apparent Simplicity …

“Western Wind”

“Sir Patrick Spence,” &

“Barbara Allen” in different versions

Intensity and Blank Spaces for Imagination Intensity and Blank Spaces for Imagination

Group Assignments

Outline

Medieval Lyrics: Western Wind Child Ballad: Introduction

Ballad: Definition and Origin Its Characteristics and Form Its Kinds and Influences Sir Patrick Spens Barbara Allen

Medieval Lyrics

Brief and emotional Description of a moment, expressing a

common state of mind, for religious or secular purposes (Ref.)

Western Wind

Western wind, when will thou blowThe small rain down can rain? Christ, if my love were in my arms And I in my bed again!

先秦歌  南風歌 南風之薰兮 可以解吾民之慍兮 南風之時兮 可以阜吾民之財兮

1. Weather: Western wind brings spring rain.

2. Love and sex

1. Weather: Western wind brings spring rain.

2. Love and sex

Ref. 1. Westron Wynde, Anonimo 2. Camerata Delft - Westron Wynde (excerpt)

Ballads: Definition & Origin

Definition: a narrative song. Origins:

Usually in primitive societies such as that of American frontier in the 18th and 19th centuries and that of the English-Scottish border region in the later Middle Ages.

Revised and passed down orally during the 500-year period from 1200 to 1700

One of the first recorded versions in 18th century: Thomas Percy Reliques of Ancient English Poetry

Francis. J. Child’s The English and Scottish Popular Ballads (1882)

Ballads: Characteristics and Form

Structural Characteristics as an oral form of art: Spareness of plot –in media res (or even climaxes of

the story), through monologue or dialogue, no narratorial comments ( how “less” suggests “more”)

Use of repetition and refrain ( repetition with variation)

Simplicity of tune and rhythm (four stresses in one line; rhymes )

One ballad stanza -- with four lines, alternating between tetrameter--four iambic beats (da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM), and trimeter--three beats (da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM) per line. (source) variation

Archetypal symbols e.g. green/yellow leaves, sea, etc.

Ballads: Characteristics and Form

Characteristics as an oral form of art (2)

B. singing style

C. narrative

1) how the story is told—by a narrator or not;

D. ballad/poetic elements: the plot, symbol, repetition,

contrast, rhyme and rhythm

Ballads: Kinds

Historical –”Sir Patrick Spens” Outlaw – “Robin Hood” Romantic –”Barbara Allen” Supernatural --? “Ancient Mariner” Tragic –”Edward”

Ref: http://www.skell.org/explore/balladsF.htm

Ballads: Influences on the 19th-century poetry

Some 19th-c poems in Ballad form: William Blake's "The Tyger“ (six quatrains

in rhymed couplets. Trochee--hammering beat –forging the tiger in the smithy. 7 or 8 syllables each line);

Samuel Taylor Coleridge's "Rime of the Ancient Mariner“ (sometimes 6 lines, sometimes

with internal rhymes); John Keats's "La Belle Dame Sans Merci."

Sir Patrick Spens

Possible Historical Connections: 1. In 1281, Scottish King Alexander III's daughter

Margaret was married to Norway's King Eric, but on her voyage home, the ship sank and all perished.

2. (another version) Eric and Margaret were survived by a daughter, also named Margaret. She was to be married to a son of England's King Edward I, but died while sailing from Norway.

3. a famous shipwreck off the coast of Aberdour near Papa Stronsay Island, which claims to be the burial place of Sir Patrick Spens.

Dangerous journeys Song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rT1r-smQkzQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BesLCJECi4o Reading: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qs7nWKYyUFU

“Sir Patrick Spence”

THE king sits in Dumferling toune,Drinking the blude-reid wine:“O whar will I get guid sailor,To sail this schip of mine?"

Up and spak an eldern knicht,Sat at the kings richt kne:"Sir Patrick Spens is the best sailorThat sails upon the se."

The king has written a braid [open] letterAnd signed it wi' his hand,And sent it to Sir Patrick Spens,Was walking on the sand.

The first line that Sir Patrick red,A loud lauch lauched he:The next line that Sir Patrick red,The teir blinded his ee.

Modern English version

“Sir Patrick Spence”

"0 wha is this has don this deid,This ill deid don to me;To send me out this time o' the yeirTo sail upon the se?

"Mak haste, mak haste, my mirry men all,Our guid schip sails the morne.""0 say na sae, my master deir,For I feir a deadlie storme.

"Late, late yestreen I saw the new mooneWi' the auld moone in hir arme;And I feir, I feir, my deir master,That we will com to harme."

O our Scots nobles wer richt laith [loth]To weet [wet] their cork-heild schoone;Bot lang owre a' the play wer playd,Their hats they swam aboone.

“Sir Patrick Spence”

O lang, may their ladies sitWi' thair fans into their hand,Or eir they se Sir Patrick SpensCum sailing to the land.

O lang, lang may the ladies standWi' thair gold kems in their hair,Waiting for thair ain deir lords,For they'll se thame na mair.

Have owre, have owre to Aberdour,It's fiftie fadom deip:And thair lies guid Sir Patrick Spens,Wi' the Scots lords at his feit.

Variation

After the stanza on the King’s sending a letter.

"To Noroway, to Noroway, To Noroway o'er the foam; The King's daughter of Noroway, 'Tis thou must fetch her home."

Sir Patrick Spens--Questions

Intensity (1): Contrast between Sir Patrick Spens, the King and the old knight?

Intensity (2): Irony in The knight’s suggestion: "Sir Patrick Spens is the best sailor

That ever sailed the sea." Intensity (3): Responses Sir Patrick Spens’s

response when getting the King’s order? And the Scots lords’? The first line that Sir Patrick read,

A loud laugh laughed he; The next line that Sir Patrick read, The tear blinded his ee.

Any impressive images? What lines are repeated to create some ironies or other effects?

Spaces for Imagination: What’s left untold

Sir Patrick Spens vs. the King and the Knight

Sir Patrick Spens—walk on the sand; the king “sits” and drinks “the blood-red wine”; the old knight – sits by the king’s right knee

Ironic contrast to Sir Patrick Spens with the sounds of “s”

Sir Patrick Spens’s response— Laugh—a joke, ridiculous; happy for being praised? Cry – tears blind him, but he is not blind to his fate. Question – suspects conspiracy Obedience –”make haste, make haste, my merry men all”

Sir Patrick Spens vs. Fate

Image -- the new moon with the old moon in her arm = , the dark shape of the old moon and only the hint of a crescent of the new moon. an evil omen that predicts bad weather “Rime of the Ancient Mariner”

He follows the order despite his awareness of death

Sir Patrick Spens vs. the Nobles and Ladies

1. The trivial concerns of the Scots nobles and their immediate deaths (suggested by the wetting of their hats) insignificance of lives:

2. The “play”? –at the court? Or the trick of life? O laith, laith were our guid Scots lords,

To weet their cork-heel'd shoon;But lang or a' the play was play'd,They wat their hats aboon.

2. The ladies – well decorated, helpless. Repetition of “lang, lang” may the maidens

sit/stand (inactive) With their gold combs in their hair and fans in

their hands

Final Tribute Paid to Spens

It's forty miles frae Aberdeen,And fifty fathoms deep,And there lies guid Sir Patrick Spence,Wi' the Sects lords at his feet!

1. A contrast to the King, who has the old knight and his people at his feet.

2. Repetition of the word guid

Spaces for Imagination: What’s left untold

The whole journey to death What actually happens in the ship; how they fought against the storm. Burial, monument set for them, etc. The reasons for the trip.

Compared with 古詩〈公無渡河〉

公無渡河，公竟渡河，墮河而死，將奈公何！ 

Similarities: noble death by nature and women’s passive role.

Use of repetition “Sir Patrick Spens” –

More reasons for his death are given; more people set in contrast/association

with Spens.

Barbara Allen –Questions

1) Can you identify the theme of 2 of the 3 versions? 2) Compare the characters in the three versions: e.g. 1) Barbara vs. John vs. the others/parents; 3) Explain Barbara’s responses at different moments A. story– recurrent motifs

1) why Barbara Allen refuses to be kind to the dying young man; “slowly, slowly” her matter-of-fact response to his death

2) the young man’s response to Barbara Allen’s unkindness;

3) the other people’s responses and the church bell; 4) Barbara Allen’s final response –laugh, or cry, or die5) ending –repentance or resolution and union (The red

rose and the briar.)

Version (1) -- Child’s 84B (song Dan Tate’s)

Bonny Barbara Allen—Her Hard-Heartedness and Repentance

A story of a hard-hearted woman and a young man obsessed by love

Young man-- ’Come pitty me, As on my death-bed I am lying.’

B’s response – 1. Then little better shall he be/For bonny Barbara Allen. ”So slowly slowly she got up.”

2. I cannot keep you from [your] death; So farewell,’ 3. on seeing the corpse

– laugh -- repent –“For his death hath quite undone me. ‘A hard-hearted creature that I was,/To slight one that lovd me so dearly; I wish I had been more kinder to him,

The time of his life when he was near me.” Social Condemnation– The bell and Her friends: Unworthy

Barbara Allen!

Version (2) (song Gilbert, Art Garfunkel)

–Irony of Fate

Barbara Allen-- cannot forget being slighted. -- Went to William by herself. 1. "Young man, I think you're dying." Irony of fate: Barbara Allen – feeling slighted Young man--“I toasted all the ladies there, /Gave my

love to Barbara Allen." --* sound effects: feminine rhymes;

William – ready to die -- He turned his pale face to the wall,/Be nice to Barbara Allen

-- * sound: In this stanza, alliteration is used, with a "d" sound occurring in the words "death," "dealing," "adieu," and "dear."  

Version (2) (song Gilbert, Art Garfunkel)

–Irony of Fate

B’s responses –

2. feels guilty herself -- psychological – “And every toll they seemed to say,

"Hard-hearted Barbara Allen." 

3. Actively searches for the coffin: “She looked east, she looked west,/She saw his corpse a-comin'.”

4. Actively welcome death: “make me a bed long and narrow”; “I'll die for him tomorrow

Version (3): (song Sarah Makem)

stopped by her parents

Social pressures: parents urge her to go (Get up, get up, her mother

says,Get up and go and see him); later when she bursts out laughing, she is

condemned by ‘his weary friends.’ Reason –the parents stopped her from going near

him. Barbara Allen –very stubborn and realistic: “One word

from me you never will get,Nor any young man breathin',For the better of me you never will be,Though your heart's blood was a-spillin'. ”

John – die more dramatically. “Bloody sheets and bloody shirtsI sweat them for you, Allen my gold watch and my gold chain I bestow them to you, Allen”

Barbara Allen: The Four Versions

Social influences stronger in versions 1 & 3 – e.g.

1. the narrator, social condemnation of a cruel woman

2. the parents’ role, social condemnation of an obedient girl

Fate and miscommunication:

Versions 2 & 4 Common points:

setting in May, BA – hard-hearted for

different reasons.

Ref. “Edward”— the breaking of kinship

The dialogue between a mother and her son, Edward. --incremental repetition+ suspense Blood: hawk’s steed’s (other versions: dogs, my brother

John) father’s To avoid penance he has to leave behind his property

and his family (let them beg through life) Curses his mother, who suggests the idea of killing his

father. The mother’s intention in her questions –to see if

her goal is reached, to pretend innocence, etc.. Oedipus complex? Music:

http://www.contemplator.com/child/edwrdbrl.html