Barbara Allan a Typical Ballad Essay

To this day, ballads are still enjoyed by whatever individual although, many generations ago they were at the very heart of amusement. They were passed on orally, centring interesting subjects such as tragic love. Typically, ballads are fairly simple, they do no tend to focus on characterization, they have a speedy dialogue, they are usually in the form of quatrains, and rhyming in abcb.The song Bonny Barbara Allan is a common ballad since it follows the norm by applying 4 major elements it is written in quatrains, has an abcb rhyming scheme pattern, rapid dialogues, and a lack of characterization.Throughout the poem, some interchanges importance are accent by stresses such as in this stanza slowly, slowly raise she up gives us the impression that even as we read, it becomes slower and slower. Furthermore, we can invest easily the tragic love present which is again another typical element of ballads. We can notice this element especially in these 2 particular quatrainO its Im sick, and very, very sick,And tis a for Barbara AllanO the better for me yes never be,Tho you hearts blood were a spilling. (Line 13-16)O dinna ye mind, you man, said she,When ye was in the tavern a drinking,That ye made the healths gae round and round,And slighted Barbara Allan? (Line 17-20)In her stubbornness, Barbara Allan refuses to forgive Sir John Graeme for not heat up to her health even knowing he was ill. She left him to die without fill in peace, she held this grudge against him until he passed away. Despite the grudge she held, her love was genuine and thence chose to die for John. The action of dying for him is not written word for word although, we are not left guessing her fate, the use of symbolism in particular the bed suggest a funeral.All the elements needed for it to be a typical ballad are present. The format of the stanzas, the rhyming scheme, the precaution paid to characterization, and the speed of the dialogues all correspond to the norm.