Narrative poetry is much more than a series of interesting tales. Do you agree? Make reference to style, language, tone and imagery.

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Michael Darbandi – English – 10S2

Narrative poetry is much more than a series of interesting tales. Do you agree? Make reference to style, language, tone and imagery.

Narrative poems have been around for hundreds of years and they all tell a story. Narrative poems were spoken out loud and not written down (usually because most people were illiterate), they were mainly told at night as it would add to a more mysterious atmosphere.  We believe they have been around for hundreds of years, maybe even longer as none were written down until today.

The titles, ‘The Listeners’ and ‘The Highwayman’, in their self’s are mysteries. The reader is immediately curious as to why the poem is named ‘The Listeners’ and the same for ‘The Highwayman’. Both titles are similar in that they name something, but it’s like a mini description of that something. Many questions arise in the reader’s mind, and similar questions for both titles. Who are the listeners? Who is the highwayman? What is their role in the story, what makes them so important? These kinds of titles give you instant curiosity and along with curiosity a title like ‘The Listeners’ arouses a mysterious scene.

After the initial mystery of the titles, the even more mysterious characters enter. In The Listeners, a traveller is introduced to us. The anonymous identity of the traveller further captivates the reader.  The way he is called ‘the traveller’ and not by name gives the impression he is a stranger who is probably new to the area. As a traveller we imagine the many voyages of which he has partaken have made him tired, worn out, and weary. We expect he just travels from place to place, with nothing but his horse’s company. The reader is immediately questioning the Traveller’s motives. The poet deliberately enclosed a very vague description of the traveller in his poem. This adds mystery, why not tell us everything? The main character of ‘The Highwayman’ is a mysterious and unknown character just like in ‘The Listeners’. The name, ‘The Highwayman’, again, gives the idea that he is a horse rider that spends most of his life riding from place to place. We know from the story line The Highwayman is a very caring, considerate and loving person. This image stays with us because throughout the entire poem, we don‘t know his name and the fact that we are told details or all his clothing and accessories yet not is facial aspects or name give the impression, similar to ‘The Listeners’, you do not want to know, this thought is considerably scary one. Unlike in ‘The Listeners’ we are told how he is dressed, he is dressed very well and carries extravagant and well polished weapons.

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“A coat of claret velvet, and breeches of brown doe-skin.”

“His pistol butts a-twinkle, his rapier hilt a-twinkle, under the jewelled sky.”

The quote above gives the effect that is almost rich and luxury. Both poems tell you enough about the characters so you understand the story line but still not enough so that you stop reading to see if you find out more or you keep reading to see what these mysterious characters do.

The scene is a very large part in setting the myserious scene in these poems, light/dark contrast is used a lot. In ‘The ...

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