Do you find ballads or narrative verse more interesting? Using at least four poems, explain your reasons.

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Do you find ballads or narrative verse more interesting? Using at least four poems, explain your reasons.

Ballads and Narrative verse are types of poems that are individual compositions usually in some kind of verse or metre. The word poem has originated from the Greek word meaning 'something created'.

Narrative verse is simply verse that tells a story. Before the success of the novel in the eighteenth century, verse was a more common way for story telling than prose. A narrative was a tale or recital of facts. It was likely to include a dramatic incident, descriptions of people or places, dialogue and a report of events as seen by the narrator. The narrator is essential in bringing together these characteristics. It is the narrator who makes us understand the story, from his or her point of view and allows us to consider the connection between the plot and events. Both first person and third person narrative are commonly used.

There are traditional or oral ballads, broadside ballads and literary ballads: some scholars feel that the term 'ballad' should be used only to refer to the traditional or oral folk ballads.

Oral ballads, though probably composed originally by a brilliant individual, have been transmitted from singer to singer for centuries, and in the process are remade by the singer or reciter at every performance. There are, therefore, many variant texts, and no single text of any ballad. Nevertheless folk ballads share many themes and techniques, though no single ballad will exhibit every typifying feature.

The subject matter of ballads is usually tragic and often violent. The story is told through dialogue and action, with sudden transitions from point to point in the narrative called 'leaping and lingering'. Abrupt beginnings, starting with a climatic episode, are common. Imagery is sparse and immediate. Stock epithets are used and refrains and repetition are common features also.

Broadside ballads lack the timeless quality of the folk ballads because they often deal with topical events; they were also printed rather than orally transmitted. Many of the traditional ballads were also published as broadsides.

With the exception of a famous commendation by Sidney in his An Apology for Poetry (1595), ballads were largely ignored till the eighteenth century. In 1711 two essays by Addison in The Spectator aroused interest. Thomas Percy's Reliques of Ancient English Poetry (1765) established the ballad's literary respectability. Poets started to be influenced by the form. Many nineteenth-century poets wrote literary or artificial ballads, imitating traditional ballad features. Coleridge's 'The Rime of the Ancient Mariner' from his and Wordsworth's Lyrical Ballads (1798) are notable examples.
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From the examples of the ballads chosen for this comparison essay, I found it was common in many to notice that the beginnings often were abrupt, with open endings. An abrupt beginning can be seen at the start of Unquiet Grave.

"'O where have you been, my dear, dear love

This long seven years and more?'"

We have no introduction or explanation but are left to gradually work out the story line throughout the rest of the ballad, intriguing us to continue. Demon Lover shows an open ending. This involves the listener to complete it ...

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