Sacrificed Her Youth

Remember the last post? It was about the poem The Bailiff's Daughter of Islington? No? Click here! So I only listed down the meaning of the poem and glossary of difficult words. Oh, here's the poem:


In this post, I will discuss the language and style, as well as the main theme(s) that can be gained from the poem.


1. Language and Style

• uses ye 'olde English language: bailiff, esquire, puggish
  
• rhyme scheme : abcb (for most stanzas)
• 12 stanzas
  
• narrative of the story
• meaning is quite direct and clear
• a sense of irony when she told him that she was dead

2. Main Theme(s)

The poem basically revolves around LOVE; Love knows no bounds, Love grows with time and Sacrifices done for Love.

• love knows no bounds - the esquire's son, (despite his father only being a candidate of knighthood) falls in love with the governor's (bailiff's) daughter - and she falls in love with him too.
• love grows with time - even after SEVEN years of being apart due to him being sent for apprenticeship, both of them are still deeply in love with each other and are convinced that they are their true love.
• sacrifices done for love - she gave up her youth - 'sport and play' - to search for him in disguise of a beggar. he told her that if she was dead, he would give away his horse and go to foreign lands.
  

Well, that's all for this post (and maybe this blog).
Hope you were enlightened by this post and enjoyed both posts on the poem :)

I found the poem HERE.
The previous post can be found HERE.

Toodles ;)

And is ready to be thy bride

Hello readers!

The following is a poem that I find somewhat sweet. It's an old poem, so be wary of the language used :)

click image to see larger version of poem :D

Meaning of poem:

• A esquire's son fell in love with a bailiff's daughter
• She would not believe him in love
• His family had him apprenticed for seven years
  
• He believed that she did not think of him the whole time
• The women of Islington went out to the meadows to play
• The bailiff's daughter disguised herself and went toward London
• She met her true love and begged a coin from him
• He asked about 'the bailiff's daughter of Islington'
• She claimed that she was dead
• He said that he would give away his horse and go to foreign lands
• She tells him that she is alive and in fact, the woman speaking to him
• She announces that is ready to be his bride

Glossary

1. bailiff : governor or custodian (similar to sheriff)
   
2. esquire : a candidate for knighthood
3. coy : affectedly modest or shy (especially in a playful or provocative way)
4. countenance : the appearance conveyed by a person's face
5. puggish : messy, old-looking
   
6. bridle : headgear for a horse
7. prithee : pray thee (somewhat like 'pray, tell')

I will continue the analysis of this poem in the next post :D

References:
Poem
Definitions

Identification

Hi. So do you know how to identify the moral values of literary works?

Ahh. This time I'm going to teach you a few SIMPLE ways of identifying the moral values of a story.


1. Theme(s)

Yes, once you've identified the theme(s), it will be easy to identify the moral values.

EXAMPLE?
Theme: courage and determination bring success
Moral Value(s): 1. Be courageous in order to succeed (and/or) 2. Be determined to succeed

See? Simple enough, right? :D


2. Characteristic(s) of Character(s)

Oh I'm sure you guys can already figure this one out, right? hihi

EXAMPLE?
Character: Black Beauty
Characteristic: Loving towards mother, friends and owners
Moral value: Love your family and friends

3. Significant Event(s)

This actually works vice versa, in which you can find moral values in most significant events. On the other hand, you can also identify significant events from the moral values that it contains.

EXAMPLE?
Significant Event: Fire which James saves Black Beauty and Ginger from
Moral Value: Bravery can save lives



I hope you understand my very short guide. On the most part, this information is from me :) Hopefully if you have any other inquiries, feel free to comment :D

Image from Google Images

Acquire?

Hi readers.

Do you like learning different languages? What about the second language? I'm sure for most of the readers of this blog, English is your second language. So do you know the stages of acquiring a second language? Basically there are three stages in which you firstly go through the Native Language Effect, Interlanguage and also Communicative Competence.


1. Native Language Effect

- vital aspect of acquisition of a new language
- learner assumes that the 2nd language operates similarly to the 1st language
- can also facilitate the learning of a 2nd language - some structures of 1st language and 2nd language are similar

~This is basically when people do direct translation


2. Interlanguage

- systemic developmental process
- stage right before competence
- utilizes feedback from others

~ This is the stage which people catch on to the 2nd language, but have only grasped the basic conversational and contextual part, yet not much of the grammar and structure.


3. Communicative Competence

- able to display grammatical, pragmatic, strategic and psychomotor (pronunciation) competence
- best achieved by focusing on language use
- allow students to use language in unrehearsed context

~ In this stage, communication flows well and language is more structured - misunderstandings rarely occur



Hopefully now you know where you are in learning a second language. Fret not if you feel incompetent, there's always room for improvement :)

Reference:
Teaching by Principles - Douglas Brown

Which One?

Remember my post on homophones? Well it's THERE. I'm going to continue with a few other words that may not be homophones but are easily confused with each other.

Let's start, shall we?

1. Lose/Loose

Lose: be deprived of
Loose: not firmly or tightly placed

Do NOT write: Did you loose your trousers? Those seem lose on you.


2. Breath/Breathe

Breath: the air that you take in and let out of your lungs
Breathe: the action of taking in air and letting air out of your lungs

Do NOT write: Breath please, you seem to have lost your Breathe from all that running just now.


3. Quiet/Quite

Quiet: silent
Quite: very or fairly

Do NOT write: Even though she is quite, she is quiet an intelligent girl.


4. Desert/Dessert

Desert: vast dry area of little water and plants
Dessert: sweet food eaten at the end of a meal

Do NOT write: Would it not be such a pleasure to have desert in the dessert.

Reference:
Google Dictionary
Google Images

Inspired by:
Christine Jalleh

Huff and Puff!

Ever been confused on how to identify the literary elements in a short story/novel/poem? Ever asked yourself countless times if a theme is a main theme or a minor one? Confused which character is more important than the other? Don't know which is the point of conflict/climax?

I'm going to explain how to identify those details.

So what is a THEME?

The theme is basically what the story revolves around.
It is the issue that is most addressed in the literary work.
Another way to identify would be what the MAIN CHARACTERS face.

For example, at the end of the Harry Potter books, good prevails over evil, thus one of the themes would be poetic justice.

Let's move on the MAIN CHARACTERS, shall we?

These are the people who turn up the most in the story.
If you notice someone's been talked about more than others in the story, then that's the main character.
Keep note that a main character may be THE ANTAGONIST too.
Also, the main characters are the ones who are most affected by the plot (especially the CLIMAX).

For example, in the comic Superman, Superman and Lois Lane are the main characters.



THE ANTAGONIST, what's that, you ask?

An antagonist is technically the bad guy.
This is the person who ruins the day and creates chaos.
Keep in mind that the antagonist could revert to the end of the story and with some characters it is unsure whether they are protagonists or antagonists until the end of the story.

For example in Three Little Pigs, the antagonist is the Big Bad Wolf.



No, I did not forget to explain the CLIMAX!

This is the turning point, or the peak of the story.
When all the conflicts (i.e.: issues) are piled up and the protagonist is in a rut.
It happens right before everything is resolved.
Also remember that some stories end at the climax for the author to amount to suspense (and allow readers to create their own ending)


So, do you understand? :) Hopefully you do. I'll try continue explaining more literary jargon to you in the next post. Just post questions in the 'comments' area if you have any.

References:
Literary Elements and Devices
Google Images [images]

Box Your Ears

Hi everyone! :)

The other day I was watching (a re-run of) The Ellen Degeneres Show in which she compared knowledge with Hugh Laurie on each other's slang. Below is the video :)

Well, actually I think that as people who watch a lot of American shows, we're quite used to the American slang like 'awesome' or 'sucks', or even 'badonkadonk' for that matter :P

I found out that I am at lack of knowledge with the BRITISH SLANG. I mean, we are supposed to use British English as it is the standardized version of English, so why not we learn the slang too, in order to be good communicators (and not embarrassed when we misunderstand)? :)

1. Well let's take CHIN WAG first. For starters, I'm sure if you were to say "Fancy a chinwag?" to a random Malaysian, they'd either a) stare at you long enough for their eyeballs to fall out; of b) start imagining you actually wagging your chin at them.

(I'd probably be the latter but that's besides the point)

CHIN WAG, as he says in the video, means to talk or chat


2. Next, GIVE US A BELL. This clearly does not mean someone wants you to give them a bell. Well, not necessarily. You never know if people do really ask for bells randomly.

It basically means to give me a call. Bell is probably due to people saying 'Give me a ring' in which a phone 'rings'

So please, do not go overseas and end up sitting around not knowing where to find a bell just because you don't understand


3. NANCY BOY / NANCY means someone who is being pathetic [for example, a NANCY BOY would cry because the cookies he baked didn't turn out right]

It can also mean a gay man. I doubt you need further explanation on that.

So if someone calls you a NANCY BOY, don't be too quick to see it as a compliment for being such a good detective. No way in heaven that an English man (or woman, for that matter) is talking about Nancy Drew when they call you a NANCY BOY.


4. When someone says that something is PEANUTS, it's to say that something is cheap. Yes, I know that in the Malaysian culture, PEANUTS means easy. However, for these English people, it means cheap.

Oh the origin of this word is from the saying 'if you pay peanuts, you get monkeys' meaning that if you give a small salary, then you would definitely get less skilled workers.


So do you feel enlightened? I sure was when I read through part of the list. :D

You can find more words with their meanings in;
The Very Best of British; and also
British Slang and Dialect [fun trivia]


p/s: Box Your Ears means a slap around the head for misbehaving