Preview

Edna St. Vincent Millay's The Ballad Of The Harp-Weaver

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
627 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Edna St. Vincent Millay's The Ballad Of The Harp-Weaver
A Report on "The Ballad of the Harp-Weaver"
By: Kelcie Roberts

Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892-1950) wrote the "Ballad of the Harp-Weaver" published by Flying Cloud Press and has a copyright date of 1922. "The Ballad of the Harp-Weaver" is known as a Narrative Poem. Millay won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1923. However, since Millay lived until 1950, her work is still under copyright in Canada and England. For "The Ballad of the Harp-Weaver" and several other works published in the early twenties, Millay won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1923. Millay was born in Rockland, Maine and had lived in Greenwich Village, New York her whole life. "The Ballad of the Harp-Weaver" has exactly three pages and one hundred twenty six lines. Check out other Edna St. Vincent Millay poems, such as "First Fig" and "Renascence".

"The Ballad of the Harp-Weaver" is a good example of a Narrative Poem because a Narrative Poem tells a story, except in poetic form.
…show more content…
In my own eyes the meaning of this poem is a message of hope, mothers love, and giving. The mother of the son has no cloth or thread to make clothing for her son. She does not have any money to go out and buy such materials. The cold weather is making it hard on the boy to even show up at school because of his lack of clothing. One night as the boy lye awake, he watched his mother as she wove children's jackets, a red cloak, a pair of pants, a pair of boots, a hat, a pair of mittens, and a little blouse. As she wove all through the night, it was as if nothing could stop her. The son was thankful for his mother's affection towards him and took the pieces of clothing as he cherished it with his heart and

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    The poem “How I Discovered Poetry” by Marilyn Nelson presents the theme of finding an interest or passion for something. Also another theme that can be wrapped around this poem is the power of words. The speaker is Nelson who is in the classroom while her teacher, Mrs. Purdy is reading from her desk. Mrs. Purdy becomes one of the main influence of her finding her passion for poetry. Mrs. Purdy seems to be a very genuine and loving teacher who cares about her students. This is shown when she brings in a poem specifically for the speaker and asks the speaker to read it in front of her classmates. The speaker also seemed to be different than her classmates in a way where she is more attentive and studious than them. This is portrayed when the…

    • 630 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The poem begins with the narrator telling herself, “A few more steps, old feet.” (line 1). The old feet she refers to are the ancestor’s feet, that appear to be old and worn out from the rigorous journey they take. The speaker then goes on to say, “In pale tea I’ll see / me with her, tasting wild grapes” (lines 4-5). This shows her reminder of her ancestors in nature. The pale tea is the symbol of the clean, clear simplicity of nature and when the speaker simplifies herself, to the bare nothingness of nature it reveals to her, her ancestors. Then in the following lines, “at dawn, tasting dew / on tender leaves, another year.” (lines 6-7). The dawn represents a new day, a new start where she can again acknowledge her heritage. After, the speaker says, “her hands still guiding me, / at sunset grinding seeds” (lines 11-12). These hands guiding the speaker, are her ancestors leading her through their stories and nature around…

    • 810 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Symbolism is a major technique that the author uses to get the meaning of the quilt across to the reader. In every stanza, Waniek likens the quilt to her family in order to describe how much the quilt reminded her of them. To her, her grandmother's quilt reminded her of her childhood. She describes how she remembered "play[ing] in its folds and be chieftains and princesses" (11-12). She uses these lines to demonstrate how the quilt represented her youthful and energetic days with her sister. In the second stanza she compares one of her new quilt's squares to "the yellowbrown of mama's cheeks" (17) to illustrate how the quilt symbolizes the racial diversity of her family. In the third stanza Waniek expects to have "good dreams for a hundred years under the quilt" (21-23) as her grandmother must have had under her quilt. This…

    • 571 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    A great deal of literary works are written with the purpose of telling story. A narrative poem simply tells a story from the perspective of a narrator who does not reveal their personal thoughts or feelings. A prime example of a narrative poem would be Out, out, by Robert Frost in which the story of a little boy losing his life with a detached narrator.…

    • 395 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The relationship between father and son seems to be one of tension and distance as conveyed to the readers at first. For instance, the narrator "looks down" at his father digging, as shown in the second stanza, which can either be interpreted in two ways. One way is that the narrator is situated above his father who is in the fields digging, or another way in which the narrator looks down upon his father and sees no value in his occupation. As shown, the narrator's position is above his father because he has an education, which is reinforced from the start: the narrator is a writer, and most likely received more education than his father who is a potato farmer. The mood reinforces the distant relationship between the father and the son. The mood of the poem at first is solemn and grave. This is exemplified in the onomatopoeia; "a clean, rasping sound" In…

    • 616 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    The mother chooses how to make her offspring through choosing what she will fit best. Just in the beginning of the poem, the mother must decide which piece fits best in her quilt. The mother "[. . .] shaped patterns square and oblong and round / positioned / balanced" (13-15) and each shape is a different piece and each piece is quilted together to form one quilt. This relates to human life in that the mother the act of choosing the best shapes relates to choosing the best characteristics to put into the final product of a child's identity. The mother not only has to choose shapes, but also has to decide on the colors of the pieces. She has to consider "whether to put the lilac purple of easter against the red plaid of winter-going- / into-spring / whether to mix a yellow with blue and white [. . .]" (31-33). The different choices of colors symbolize the various types of personalities in which a child is form with. The mother must choose the different shapes and colors or the different characteristics and personalities in order to form one quilt or one identity that she pieces together.…

    • 554 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Therefore proving the fact that she is standing up to society with this dress. The use of the repetitions "walk," "I" and "me" shows the narrator's desire to go wherever she wants in this dress to benefit herself. The sameness in these words show an increase in her determination to become an individual. The use of binaries in this poem creates a way for the author to express differences. "Birth-cries" and "bury me," "fear" and "love," "tight" and "flimsy" are all examples of words that contradict each other yet enhance this text. It's ironic how the word "birth" and "bury" are used within the same sentence since they are complete opposites. However, this word choice increases the narrators drive to not stop at anything until she has this dress. The "love" the narrator has for this red dress is so strong that the "fear" of being judged for her choice in clothing is masked. In order to wear something that is "tight" or fitted a women must have confidence. Either in oneself or in the fact that they can look past the judgmental looks and comments and feel comfortable in their own…

    • 605 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The quilts were made by the authors mother and they made the author feel safe like anything was possible. This quote is connected to the poem because it shows how when she was growing up she counted on theses quilts and used them against the thrashing of the worlds words action and anything else that it could throw at her. Another quote that can be used is “They were meant as covers in the winter as weapons.” In the winters these quilts physically covered and protected them when they used them against the cold but, these quilts also figuratively protected the author and her siblings from the thing that world brings. The poem “My Mother Pieced Quilts” supports my claim because the quilts that were made by the Authors mother for the author and her siblings were made so that they were literally and figuratively protected from the world no matter how they saw the world they knew that the quilts…

    • 1016 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    My Papas Waltz Analysis

    • 668 Words
    • 3 Pages

    This gives the audience an idea of the intensity that the little boy is experiencing. Roethke the moves to the third stanza were he incorporates a metaphor “At every step you missed” meaning because of the fathers bad habits he missed parts of his sons life that were important to the son. The author whether he meant to generalize the sons age or not, he gives us a clue of this when he says” My right ear scraped a buckle “. You should notice that Roethke uses the syllable “a” instead of “his” this points out the boys love for his father, and his attitude that his dad could do no wrong. As the author moves to produce the forth stanza he emphasizes the fact that his dad did work hard with imagery “With a palm caked hard by dirt”. Roethke then moves to create an assonance effect by rhyming “hard by dirt “and “to your shirt”. The author then ends with capitalizing on that perfect parent attitude, “Still clinging to your shirt “. This could also be a son wishing for the return of his father. The lucidity and cheerfulness of the rhythm succeed to some extent in hiding the pathos and resentment in the poem. It also exhibits cause and effect because of dad’s alcoholism, the boy’s life was harder than those with sober parents.…

    • 668 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Tragedy is just the beginning of common festivities for the protagonist in the narrative, “The Harp”, written by Carol Shield. With continuous annual commemoration of occasions, isolation may lead anyone into a depressive downfall. The nameless central character begins to feel isolated when she is overwhelmed by the full attention of the entire crowd. In specific, the harp landed on her as she recalls with irony, “The crowd around me applauded. What could they be thinking? That I, wounded on the street, ambushed, had decided to perform an impromptu concert?” (Shields) There were abundant numbers of witnesses; In result, she immediately feels that she had no support throughout the public and continues to isolate herself due to her self loneliness.…

    • 211 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Edna St. Vincent Millay

    • 1143 Words
    • 5 Pages

    When Millay's poems were published she gained literary recognition and earned a scholarship to Vassar. At Vassar she continued to write poetry and became involved in the theater. In 1922 one of her plays The Harp Weaver was awarded the Palitzer Prize. Millay also published a book of poems in 1922 called "A Few Figs from Thistles" in this volume, she described female sexuality in a way that gained her much attention, as she put fourth the idea that a women has every right to sexual pleasure and no…

    • 1143 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Those Winter Sundays Love

    • 660 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The poem begins with the speaker's recollection of his father in the morning. Greeted by the "blueblack [sic] cold (line 2)" the father begins his morning labours in "the weekday weather (Line 4)" in order to bring warmth to the household via fire regardless of his "cracked hands that ached from labour" (Line 3). This expresses the typical youth found in familial love in which the child is cared for by his or her parent lovingly, but such love is often overlooked…

    • 660 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In “Mother to Son,” Langston Hughes uses figurative language like metaphors and tone to enhance the theme that you must keep going even through hard times. This poem relates to an important theme in life and in the poem of that you must keep going forward in life and not giving up. This theme is so important in life and in society because if you just give up during hard times you will never go anywhere in life except down. This poem shows us how we should never give up and I believe in that…

    • 431 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Ballad is a poem or song narrating a story in short stanzas. Traditional ballads are typically of unknown authorship, having been passed orally from one generation to the next. Ballads are written for entertainment and meanwhile there is a moral theme. Each ballad has its own characters, settings, events, and theme. Here are two examples of ballads: "Robin Hood and the Three Squires" and "Get up and Bar the Door." Both have similarities and differences.…

    • 333 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Ballads Are

    • 848 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Ballads are poems that tell a story. These ballads are distinguished by such features as few characters, dramatic plots, and may include dialogue, as well as action because it tells a story. They are considered to be a form of narrative poetry. They are often used in songs and have a very musical quality to them.…

    • 848 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays

Related Topics