1. Pick out all the details from the poem which help Lochinvar to hide
his real intentions.
Answers
Answer: He came unarmed, except for his broadsword. He came all alone.
Answer:
Lochinvar went to his beloved, Ellen's wedding to elope with her. However, he was faced by the bride's father. He had not carried any weapons lest her father believed he had come to wage a war. He knew that the bride's men, kinsmen and her brothers would be present at the wedding. So, Lochinvar made up a lie about how his love for Ellen was powerful as the tides of Solway, however, it ebbed away when her father denied him consent to marry Ellen. He told her father that he had merely come to drink a cup of wine and have a last dance with the bride. He also mentioned that there were maidens in Scotland lovelier than Ellen, and they would gladly marry him.
Explanation:
The poem ‘Lochinvar’ is set in this Age of Chivalry. It features a brave young knight Lochinvar who risks his life for his love. The poem narrates how Lochinvar successfully abducts his beloved Ellen.
‘Lochinvar’ is a literary ballad. A literary ballad may be defined as a ballad composed by an author, imitating the form of a traditional ballad. Hence it resembles the traditional ballad in many ways. It adopts the manner of storytelling used by traditional ballads. A major difference is that while a literary ballad has a known author, the traditional ballads are usually of anonymous authorship. In style and content, the literary ballad tends to be more modern.
Sir Walter Scott, one of the greatest writers to have emerged from Scotland, is the author of this poem. During a tour he undertook through the Scottish countryside, he collected famous songs and ballads transferred orally from one generation to another. He recorded them into a wonderful collection of ancient poems titled Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border.
During the Middle Ages, girls didn’t possess the right to choose their husbands. The girl was given in marriage to a boy selected by the girl’s parent/s. Neither love nor the choice of the girl was considered important. In most cases, the bride and the groom met for the first time only at the marriage ceremony.
The poem has a universal theme – a boy and a girl are in love and want to be together. The families apparently don’t support their love. The girl’s family try to give her in marriage to another boy. The lover appears just in time and runs away with his girl, leaving others fuming.
The poem ‘Lochinvar’ is written in iambic tetrameter. There are eight six-line stanzas in the poem. The rhyme scheme employed in the poem is aabbcc, ie, each stanza consists of three rhyming couplets. The last lines of all stanzas of the poem end with “Lochinvar”.