Abstract
This paper examines the essentials of the ballad form, including the motif, theme, variance, rhyme, meter, repetition, vocabulary and structure. The paper compares the ballads of Sir Patrick Spence and John Henry based on these properties.

From the Paper
"Ballads are stories set to music and they usually have verses consisting of four lines each, but this can be extended to six lines, with sometimes a longer verse being inserted among the shorter ones. The ballad was originally an oral tradition and the use of traditional motifs and phrases was relied on heavily to flesh out the stories of the ballad."

Tags:John Henry, Sir Patrick Spence

Abstract
This paper provides an explication of the Dudley Randall poem "Ballad of Birmingham." The poem was written as a tribute to the lives lost when white racists bombed the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham Alabama, killing four young black girls and wounding twenty others.

From the Paper
"Imagine four young girls attending Sunday school in their finest clothes-Denise McNair Cynthia Wesley Carole Robertson and Addie MaeCollins aged .... to ...- safe in Church despite the Civil Rights chaos around them on the streets of Birmingham, Alabama. (Brunner) Imagine the shock and horror among the parents and friends of these four girls as bomb ripped through the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church on September ... killing all four and wounding twenty others. (Brunner) It is the shock and horror of one of the most heinous..."

Tags:atmosphere, tone, speaker, imagery, allusion, prejudice, African Americans, Civil Rights movement, violence, sacred

Abstract
The paper discusses Dudley Randall's poem, "Ballad of Birmingham," with an emhasis on the irony in the poem.

From the Paper
"In Dudley Randall's poem "Ballad of Birmingham" he actively portrays the life and death of one young girl in the space of eight quatrains. Martin Luther King Jr's church in Birmingham, Alabama was actually bombed by white terrorists. Four little girls died in the explosion. This poem is based on the real life events of that attack."

Tags:dudley randall, balad of birmingham, irony, martin luther king

Abstract
The paper discusses the movie "The Ballad of Narayama" (Narayama Bushiko), directed by Shohei Imamura, which portrays both an image of rural 19th century Japanese life and values, and the forces that began to change and shape this society. The paper comments that the movie is based on the book of the same name by novelist Fukasawa, which in turn was derived from an ancient folktale about a society in which the members traditionally abandon their elderly to die of exposure on a mountain top. The paper notes that from this evidence, we can then assume that Imamura brought this fictional legend to screen in order to present, perhaps even to the point of embellishment, the historical Japanese tradition of individual sacrifice for the good of the whole. This paper analyzes first Imamura's practice of appropriating natural images in order to explain the values and lives of the villagers, and secondly, his meticulous portrayal of the intricate relationships and attitudes present in both the family and village of traditional 19th century Japan.

From the Paper
"This internal conflict between the more modern humanism and historical Japanese personal sacrifice for the group as personified in Tatsuhei must have resonated with the 1930's audience of Japan, who were, at the time, in the midst of a war, and performing many personal sacrifices of their own on behalf of their country. It raised enough of a response in Europe also, who were then declaring the death of capitalism, and making a move to socialism, to win the grand prize at the prestigious Cannes Film Festival in France."

Tags:grudgingly, naturalistic, prestigious, Cannes, film, festival

Abstract
This paper is a biography of Edgar Allan Poe along with a literary analysis of his poem "Ulalume: A Ballad". This essay includes an extensive biographical sketch of Poe to perhaps aid the reader to better understand his works. In addition, the author examines Poe?s use of rhyme scheme, meter, and repetition, and overall interpretation of Poe?s intended meaning.

From the Paper
"The poet and critic, Edgar Allan Poe is considered one of the greatest American authors to have ever written throughout literary history. He composed many short stories and poems from the late 1820's to his death in 1849. Because of the believed complex nature of his psyche, it is vital that the reader know Poe's background and influences in order to analyze his poetry properly."

Tags:biography, critical, gothic, history, poem

Abstract
This paper examines how "The Ballad of the Sad Cafe" by Carson McCullers is an interesting tale that focuses on strange nature of the emotion called love. It looks at how it deals with interesting yet complicated relationship between three people who are not our average protagonists where looks and appearance are concerned. It also discusses how relationships play an important role for the simple reason that author has taken up the uniqueness of this emotion of love as the central theme.

From the Paper
"Miss Amelia is not our usual female protagonist because she is neither beautiful nor rich. She is an ordinary woman with less than average looks and an unusual appearance. About 6'1 tall, she is not very feminine but is well respected in her town because of her small store where she sells wine. Marvin Macy is a handsome man who lacks morals since he is an outlaw and has often been convicted of stealing and robbing. However for some inexplicable reason, he falls in love with Miss Amelia and this brings us to the strangeness of this emotion."

Tags:marvin, macy, amelia, love

Abstract
"Ballad of Birmingham" is a poem written about a mother that tells her daughter to not march in the streets and allows her to go to a church. Sadly, the girl is killed at the church. This actually happened in Birmingham in 1963.

Abstract
By analyzing and comparing traditional and modern ballads, some characteristics of traditional ballads imitated by modern ballad writers can be found. The examples of the former are "Sir Patrick Spens" and "Lord Rendal," and those of the latter are "The Murder of Maria Marten" and "Ballad of Birmingham" by Dudley Randall. The discussion of the similarities between these four ballads in this paper focuses on the structure of a ballad stanza, the use of repetition and the manner of story-telling.

From the Paper
"Another interesting similarity between the ages of ballads is in the objectivity in which the stories are told. The composer has little emotional reactions and the focus is on the events of the story rather than the effects on the storyteller. In a ballad, therefore, the personality of the narrator is not important. The dialogue in "Ballad of Birmingham," which takes place between a mother and her young daughter, gives an example of a rhyme using a question and answer pattern (Laws 59-60). The little girl asks if she may "go downtown" to join "a Freedom March today?" and the mother answers, "No, baby, no, you may not go" ("Ballad of Birmingham" 1, 4-5)."

Tags:literary, broadside, reiteration

Abstract
The paper begins with a brief summary of the poem's plot, tone and message. The poem's musicality and rhythm is discussed, as is the effectiveness of the dialogue form. The purpose and meaning of the series of questions in the poem is explored. The paper concludes by looking at the use of exclamation marks instead of question marks in the later portion of the poem, along with two-line stanzas instead of four.

From the Paper
"Langston Hughes's father was the first black man to be elected to public office, in 1855. Therefore, the poet was heavily influenced by his experiences with racism and the relatively recent repeal of slavery. However, when Hughes wrote "Ballad of the Landlord" in 1943, he reflects society's continued prejudice toward African-Americans. "Ballad of the Landlord" is a sad allusion to the suppression of blacks in America. It progresses through a dialogue between the narrator and his landlord, who neglects his duties but continues to demand rent monies. The black narrator takes issue with the landlord, who calls the police instead of addressing the leaky roof and broken steps. The frustrated tenant is then accused not only of threatening the landlord but also of "trying to overturn the government." As a result, he lands in jail. The tone of the poem is bitter and exasperated; Hughes seems to recognize the futility of the black man's predicament while simultaneously trying to change the status quo."

Tags:plot, tone, message, musicality, rhythm, dialogue, form, purpose, meaning, questions, stanza

From the Paper
" Carson McCullers' story "The Ballad of the Sad Caf?" is written in a non-sensationalistic style, and its narrative voice is omniscient, objective, and descriptive. The subject matter has sensationalistic elements, including questions of sex and violence, but these are muted through most of the story. What the author does is create a strong sense of doom as well as suspense through a number of narrative techniques that on the one hand withhold information for a time to keep the reader interested while at the same time hinting at what is to come so the reader tries always to see the forces at work, to figure out how they will converge, and to recognize revelations as they are made.
The first element that contributes to this sense of suspense is the fact that the story is structured as something..."