A comparative analysis of two poems within the same poetic subgenre, showing how similar conventions may be used variously Thomas Hardy’s, ‘The Ruined Maid’ and ‘Lord Randal’ from the collection of Early modern ballads, both are ballads which use similar conventions. Although they are not poems that stick to the exact ballad traditions, they carry out many of the traits. Thomas Hardy was known to be musically inclined and his influence in ballad writing came from his various musical talents. In this specific poem, Hardy seems to use ballad conventions to make a statement about the position of women in society.
Although there are similarities between ‘The Ruined Maid’ and ‘Lord Randal’ in terms of the conventions used, the subject matters of the poems are quite different: where ‘The Ruined Maid’ is a moral tale, ‘Lord Randal’ is a Scottish Folk tale. Hardy uses rising metre to write the ‘The Ruined Maid’, which conforms to traditional ballad conventions. Specifically, the poem is an anapaestic trimetre; anapaestic means that there are two unstressed syllables followed by a stressed syllable and trimetre means that there are three stresses in that line.
The poem opens with the first speaker, ‘who could have supposed I should meet you in town’ (line 2), where ‘who’ is unstressed followed by ‘could’ which is stressed and the line is continued in the conventional anapaestic metre. The opening of this line, is an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed which is known as an iamb. This suggests that this poem is not a completely traditional ballad as it is not fully anapaestic. Hardy places an iamb right at the start of this line in order to grab the reader’s attention.
An iamb in contrast to an anapaestic metre is a shorter beat and therefore it keeps the reader interested, this is Hardy’s attempt in trying to bring light to the situation of the ruined woman. In contrast, ‘Lord Randal’ from the Early modern ballads, does not have a clear metre that transcends throughout the whole or even most of the poem. ‘Lord Randal’ is written in a non-traditional ballad form; the stresses of each line are not organised in an ordinary way, rather they are scattered randomly in the poem.
However, the poem does have four stressed syllables in each line which means it is written with a tetremetre. This is noticeable in, ‘where ha’ you been, Lord Randal, my son’(line 1) where the stresses placed on: ‘where’, ‘been’ ‘Ran’ and ‘son’ These poems use strong rhymes to illustrate, further, the ballad tradition. ‘The Ruined Maid’ uses rhyming couplets which provide base for the dialogue that takes place throughout the poem between two women. The poem is composed of quatrains with the rhyme scheme of: AABB, CCBB, DDBB, which evokes that the last two lines of every stanza rhyme with each other.
The rhyming couplets of the poem suggests a conversation that takes place in the poem, where one is ‘Melia’ and the other is a ‘raw country girl’. The rhyming couplet of ‘socks’(line 5) and ‘spudding up docks’(line 6) is suggestive of ‘Melia’s past which caused her to become ruined. It suggests that she was a friend of the second speaker before she became ruined and had to leave without even socks. Hardy uses another typical ballad convention with the phrase ‘spudding up docks’, which was local dialect in rural England in the time of the poem.
This phrase suggests that the second speaker knows how tired of digging up weeds ‘Melia had become and that she left to try and live a more luxurious life. Similarly, there are also rhyming couplets in ‘Lord Randal’, each couplet takes place alternatively each time there is a new speaker. The first set of couplets are as the mother speaks, ‘son’(line 1) which is a half rhyme to ‘man’(line 2). It is noticeable that the mother always repeats these two words every time her lines end.
It is arguable to say that the mother repeats this as a reminder to the son that she is his mother and perhaps in a somewhat greedy manner as she asks him what he has put in his will. Furthermore, both speakers; the mother and Lord Randal’s lines are incremental repetition which suggests that they both say the same thing over again but with a sight difference each time. It seems as if Lord Randal extends the length of time he takes to answer his mother as he repeats this refrain many times, arguably this is very unlike the typical ballad tradition as ballads tend to be very abrupt and straight to the point.
This repetition suggests that Lord Randal wants to extend the period of time one can feel sad and sympathetic for him as he has been ‘poisoned’(line 23). In comparison to ‘The Ruined Maid’, the rhyming couplet in this poem suggests a new speaker but in Hardy’s poem the rhyming couplets simply transcend throughout the poem. Furthermore, to the idea of local dialect, ‘The Ruined Maid’ uses nineteenth century, rural England dialect. Not only does the second speaker use ‘spudding up docks’(line 6) as a term for digging up weedy herbs but she also refers to the ‘barton’(line 9) which is the farm that the ruined maid used to live on.
It emphasises the now different social standings of the first and second speakers. Where the first speaker no longer uses these words of local dialect, the second one still does. The second speaker also mentions that in the country ‘you’d sock’(line 17) and have ‘megrims’(line 19), where ‘sock’ suggests sighing and ‘megrims’ refers to low sprits. This portrays the type of melancholy life one leads in the country and Hardy contrasts this with a ‘pretty lively’(line 20) ‘ruined’(line 1) city life . Lord Randal’ uses the same convention of local dialect; Scottish dialect. However, it is arguable to say that rather than portraying social status, the dialect here is used to authenticate Lord Randal and his mother. In stanza one, Lord Randal wants to ‘fain wad lie down’, which suggests that he’d really like to lie down. This enforces the idea of the extent to which he has been poisoned due to which he cannot even stand and also, is the first moment in which the poem uses this archaic Scottish dialect.
In ‘The Ruined Maid’ is a poem that can be said to have the subject of moral tales; perhaps in relation to injustice and suffering. This is not only a somewhat typical ballad theme but also a theme that Hardy seems to write about often in his poems. The repetition of the word ‘ruined’ is used to describe ‘Melia, however, Hardy makes it apparent that the second speaker is envious of her ‘fair garments’(line 3) and ‘prosperi-ty’(line 3) because even though, it is suggested that she is a prostitute, she is in a better position than the second speaker.
Hardy uses satire to express the conventional thoughts of women and prostitution in the Victorian era; ‘Melia is completely opposite to what would be acceptable and yet still the second speaker envies her. Furthermore, Hardy presents two different women; one who is materially comfortably due to prostitution and is therefore condemned from society, and the other, who lives in poverty that leaves her face ‘blue and bleak’(line 13). This illustrates the degrading way in which women were looked upon and Hardy criticises that.
Both women are treated in a degrading manner no matter how they work to earn their living. Although both poems are (somewhat) traditional ballads, ‘Lord Randal’ is more of the folk tale subject rather than of moral tale. ‘Lord Randal’ was initially a Scottish song- which is why many of the rhymes don’t sound like rhymes to us: for instance, ‘soon’ (line 3) and ‘down’ (line 4) which to the modern English reader are half rhymes, but to the Scottish reader would be a full rhyme as ‘down’ would be pronounced differently.
This poem is about death as Lord Randal asks his mother to ‘mak m bed’ (line 3) which is an euphemism for his death bed. The poem is a tragic love story which is very conventional for a ballad, Lord Randal is ‘sick at the heart’ (line 24) which connotes not only literal aspect of him being poisoned by his lover but also suggests that his lover has rejected him and his heart is metaphorically ‘sick’.
In both poems, the eponymous protagonist is experiencing a tragic fate where one is dying and the other is looked down upon in society. To conclude, it can be argued that although both poems are from the same poetic subgenre, they can create different effects. Where, Hardy uses local dialect in ‘The Ruined Maid’ to promote awareness of the social standings of women in the nineteenth century, ‘Lord Ballad’ is made to seem more realistic due to the use of local dialect.
The use of similar conventions creates different end results even though both poems can be classified as ballads. Arguably, ‘The Ruined Maid’ ends in a positive nature in comparison to ‘Lord Randal’ where the opening is left ambiguous and the reader can decide whether Lord Randal dies or not. ‘The Ruined Maid’ ends in a manner that would oppose any ordinary Victorian Century poem about a women- especially one who is a maid- as it is quite positive and the ruined maid is told that she ‘ain’t ruined’.