Textuality » 3A Interacting
Reading the title the reader can understands some information about the ballad. In fact I understand that the main character is a woman and that she is married. But I have a specific expectation and I go to read the poem.
The ballad is arranged into 12 quatrines, the rhyme scheme is ABCB, that is typical of the English ballads.
The first stanza introduces the main character: "there was a wife who lived at Usher's Well, she was rich and she had three sons who left home to go over the sea".
The pieces of information given by the composer regard the wife's social status, her home-town and her economic status.
From the phonological level in the second line there is the alliteration of the sound "w" ("wealthy", "wife" and "was") that speeds up the reading, on the contrary, in the third line there is the alliteration of the sound "s" ("stout", "stalward", "sons") that also contributes to speed up the reading.
From the syntactic level in the second line there is a syntactic deviation because it doesn't respect the ordinary word order; the subject is placed at the end of the line an gains importance, becoming a key-word.
The function of the second stanza is to inform the reader that her three sons had died.
According to the typical conventions of the ballad it starts with the climatic episode of the story; moreover there is an incremental repetition between the first and the second line.
The alliteration "but barely" underlines how soon they had died.
In the third line there is an alliteration of the sound "w", that recreates the sense of suffering of the mother.
In the last line prevails the alliteration of the sound "s", like in the previous stanza.
The third stanza is the same at the second but the function of the last line is to focus the attention of the reader on the tragic episode of the death of the three sons.
The fourth stanza is different from the previous because it is arranged into dialogue form: the wife speaks directly to the reader.
It expresses the wife's wish who hopes her sons to come back.
In the first line there is once again the alliteration of the sound "w" that creates the sense of suffering, on the contrary in the second line the alliteration of the sound "f" ("fashes" and "flood") that recreates the sound of the waves.
Moreover in the last line there is a particular aspect that comes out: "come hame to me in earthly flesh and flood". It is a consider this a relevant aspects because in the Middle Ages people wanted to save their soul.On the contrary in this line here is the physical desire of the mother who wants to see her sons alive.
In the fifth stanza the composer informs the reader about the time when the episode happened; it was November.
He uses a metaphor to hint at their death: "their hats were of the birk". The wife's three sons came back in a tomb made of birk.
From the phonological level in the third line there is an assonance ("came" "hame") that underlines the return at home but it isn't a positive event because they are dead.
The sixth stanza starts with the subject "it", that is referred to the birk bit the reader as to go to the end of the stanza to understand that.
The composer says that the birk grew at the gates of Paradise because talking about the birk he talks about the three sons.
He uses once again the metaphor, the tomb to refer to the sons.
The 7th stanza is arranged into dialogue form: the speaking voice is the mother. She orders to her maidens to blow up the fire and to bring water from the well because she wants to give a feast for her sons.
In this stanza and in the next one new element enters in the ballad: the supernatural.
It sounds as if the three sons had come back from the world of the dead and they're alive; the composer describes the behavior of the mother.
The alliterations are always the same sounds of the previous stanzas.
In the 9th stanza the setting is sketched: it is morning and the cocks are crewing.
The lady's behavior is like as if she is under a supernatural spell, like as if she has an hallucination.
In this stanza and in the next one coexist two element: the narrative form and the dialogue. The characters in all the ballad are three: the mother, the sons and the narrator.
There are also incremental repetitions in the last stanzas, as the typical ballads.
The last stanza is in dialogue form, the speaking voice is of one son and he says goodbye to her mother, the barn and byre and to a bonny lass. The sons were very closed to her mother and to some necessary goods of the life at that time (the barn and the byre).
Reading the characterization, the sons represent typical mentality of the man of the Middle Ages: connected to the mother and o material good and hey also like nice-looking girl.