Ballads — Definition, Form, and Examples
What are ballads in poetry?
Ballads are a type of narrative poem that tells a plot-driven story. They were originally folk songs meant to be performed by musicians and passed down orally. Traditional ballads were anonymously written and commonly recounted a dramatic event within a hero's story.
While many different types of ballads exist, two of the main categories of the form are folk and literary:
Folk: Folk ballads originated before the widespread recording of written language; therefore, they were most popularly sung as a way to commit them to memory. Due to the oral tradition, most folk ballads were anonymously written. The narrative song of a folk ballad focused on stories of love and adventure.
Literary: Literary ballads reappeared in the 18th century when the form gained traction among English Romantic poets like John Keats. The subject matter of these ballads deviated from the musical rhythm of folk ballads and focused on everyday subjects rather than those characterized by excitement.
Literary ballads
History of the ballad
Minstrels in the Middle Ages cemented the form of the ballad as a narrative song with rhyming alternating lines. The ballads of this time centered on legends of adventure or a hero’s journey.
Broadside ballads became popular in 15th century England when poets or composers would write ballads about current events and print them on broadsides to sell.
In the 20th century, ballads turned into love songs in popular music. The 1970s and ‘80s gave rise to rocks bands’ “power ballads,” usually romantic songs.
Ballad form
Ballads usually include the following characteristics:
Length: There is no set length for a ballad; however, since they were initially sung, they tended to be shorter poems consisting of four-line stanzas (quatrains). However, contemporary ballads that were not written to be sung tend to be longer.
Rhyme: Ballads frequently have an ABCB or ABAB rhyme scheme. Regardless of the rhyme scheme, the second and fourth lines within a quatrain should rhyme.
Meter: Most ballads use an iambic meter, which consists of one unstressed syllable followed by one stressed syllable (also known as one foot). Poets would alternate between four feet (8 syllables) and three feet (6 syllables).
Refrain: Ballads often include a refrain, which is a repeated section that separates the segments of the poem.
Dialogue: As a narrative poem, ballads include multiple characters who participate in the dialogue.
Speaker: Ballads typically have a third-person objective speaker who only provides insight into what they can objectively perceive without giving an emotional reaction.
Ballad examples
Folk Ballads
“Bonny Barbara Allen” by Anonymous
In Scarlet town, where I was born,
There was a fair maid dwellin’,
Made every youth cry Well-a-way!
Her name was Barbara Allen.
All in the merry month of May,
When green buds they were swellin’,
Young Jemmy Grove on his death-bed lay,
For love of Barbara Allen.
He sent his man in to her then,
To the town where she was dwellin’;
“O haste and come to my master dear,
If your name be Barbara Allen.”
So slowly, slowly rase she up,
And slowly she came nigh him,
And when she drew the curtain by—
“Young man, I think you’re dyin’.”
“O it’s I am sick and very very sick,
And it’s all for Barbara Allen.”—
O the better for me ye’se never be,
Tho’ your heart’s blood were a-spillin’!
“O dinna ye mind, young man,” says she,
“When the red wine ye were fillin’,
That ye made the healths go round and round,
And slighted Barbara Allen?”
He turned his face unto the wall,
And death was with him dealin’:
“Adieu, adieu, my dear friends all,
And be kind to Barbara Allen!”
As she was walking o’er the fields,
She heard the dead-bell knellin’;
And every jow the dead-bell gave
Cried “Woe to Barbara Allen.”
“O mother, mother, make my bed,
O make it saft and narrow:
My love has died for me today,
I’ll die for him tomorrow.”
“Farewell,” she said, “ye virgins all,
And shun the fault I fell in:
Henceforth take warning by the fall
Of cruel Barbara Allen.”
“Ballad of the Cool Fountain” by Anonymous Spanish Poetess
Fountain, coolest fountain,
Cool fountain of love,
Where all the sweet birds come
For comforting–but one,
A widow turtledove,
Sadly sorrowing.
At once the nightingale,
That wicked bird, came by,
And spoke these honied words:
"My lady, if you will,
I shall be your slave."
"You are my enemy:
Begone, you are not true!
Green boughs no longer rest me,
Nor any budding grove.
Clear springs, where there are such,
Turn muddy at my touch.
I want no spouse to love
Nor any children either.
I forego that pleasure
And their comfort too.
No, leave me; you are false
And wicked–vile, untrue!
I’ll never be your mistress!
I’ll never marry you!"
From “As You Came from the Holy Land” by Sir Walter Raleigh
"As you came from the holy land
Of Walsinghame,
Met you not with my true love
By the way as you came?"
"How shall I know your true love,
That have met many one
As I went to the holy land,
That have come, that have gone?"
"She is neither white nor brown,
But as the heavens fair,
There is none hath a form so divine
In the earth or in the air."
"Such an one did I meet, good Sir,
Such an angelic face.
Who like a queen, like a nymph, did appear
By her gait, by her grace."
"She hath left me all alone,
All alone as unknown.
Who sometimes did lead me with herself,
And me loved as her own."
"What’s the cause that she leaves you alone
And a new way doth take,
Who loved you once as her own
And her joy did make?"
"I have loved her all my youth,
But now old as you see,
Love likes not the falling fruit
From the withered tree."
Literary Ballads
“Bridal Ballad” by Edgar Allan Poe
The ring is on my hand,
And the wreath is on my brow;
Satin and jewels grand
Are all at my command,
And I am happy now.
And my lord he loves me well;
But, when first he breathed his vow,
I felt my bosom swell-
For the words rang as a knell,
And the voice seemed his who fell
In the battle down the dell,
And who is happy now.
But he spoke to re-assure me,
And he kissed my pallid brow,
While a reverie came o'er me,
And to the church-yard bore me,
And I sighed to him before me,
Thinking him dead D'Elormie,
"Oh, I am happy now!"
And thus the words were spoken,
And this the plighted vow,
And, though my faith be broken,
And, though my heart be broken,
Here is a ring, as token
That I am happy now!
Would God I could awaken!
For I dream I know not how!
And my soul is sorely shaken
Lest an evil step be taken,-
Lest the dead who is forsaken
May not be happy now.
From “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge
It is an ancient Mariner,
And he stoppeth one of three.
"By thy long gray beard and glittering eye,
Now wherefore stopp'st thou me?
The Bridegroom’s doors are opened wide,
And I am next of kin;
The guests are met, the feast is set:
May'st hear the merry din."
He holds him with his skinny hand,
"There was a ship," quoth he.
"Hold off! Unhand me, gray-beard loon!"
Eftsoons his hand dropt he.
He holds him with his glittering eye–
The Wedding-Guest stood still,
And listens like a three years’ child:
The Mariner hath his will.
The Wedding-Guest sat on a stone:
He cannot choose but hear;
And thus spake on that ancient man,
The bright-eyed Mariner.
The ship was cheered, the harbor cleared,
Merrily did we drop
Below the kirk, below the hill,
Below the lighthouse top.
“The Second Coming” by William Butler Yeats
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?