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POEM:The Highwayman- Alfred Noyes:

The wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty

trees.

The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy

seas.
The road was a ribbon of moonlight over the purple
moor,
And the highwayman came riding—
Riding—riding—
The highwayman came riding, up to the old inn-door.

He’d a French cocked-hat on his forehead, a bunch of

lace at his chin,
A coat of the claret velvet, and breeches of brown doe-
skin.
They fitted with never a wrinkle. His boots were up to the
thigh.
And he rode with a jewelled twinkle,
His pistol butts a-twinkle,
His rapier hilt a-twinkle, under the jewelled sky.

S3 :
Over the cobbles he clattered and clashed in the dark
inn-yard.
He tapped with his whip on the shutters, but all was
locked and barred.
He whistled a tune to the window, and who should be
waiting there
But the landlord’s black-eyed daughter,
Bess, the landlord’s daughter,
Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.

S4:
And dark in the dark old inn-yard a stable-wicket creaked
Where Tim the ostler listened. His face was white and
peaked.
His eyes were hollows of madness, his hair like mouldy
hay,
But he loved the landlord’s daughter,
The landlord’s red-lipped daughter.
Dumb as a dog he listened, and he heard the robber say
—

(His eyes were hollows of madness- metaphor

Dumb as a dog- simile)

S5:
“One kiss, my bonny sweetheart, I’m after a prize to-night,
But I shall be back with the yellow gold before the
morning light;
Yet, if they press me sharply, and harry me through the
day,
Then look for me by moonlight,
Watch for me by moonlight,
I’ll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the
way.”

Stanza 6:
He rose upright in the stirrups. He scarce could reach her
hand,
But she loosened her hair in the casement. His face
burnt like a brand
As the black cascade of perfume came tumbling over his
breast; alliteration
And he kissed its waves in the moonlight,
(O, sweet black waves in the moonlight!)
Then he tugged at his rein in the moonlight, and galloped
away to the west.
NOTES:
The poem is set in 18th-century England, but was written
when Noyes was twenty-four.
In this poem, Noyes explores themes of love, loss of love,
and death. The action focuses on the lives and deaths of
the two main characters, a highwayman, or robber, and
his lover, the daughter of the landlord, Bess. These two
live for and die for one another. They are reunited in
death.
Structure of The Highwayman
‘The Highwayman’ by Alfred Noyes is a three-part poem
that is divided into one set of six stanzas, another of
nine, and a final concluding two stanza section
The sestets follow a simple rhyme scheme of AABCCB

Stanza 1
 The wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty
trees.
The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy
seas.
The road was a ribbon of moonlight over the purple
moor,
And the highwayman came riding—Riding—riding—
The highwayman came riding, up to the old inn-door.
In the first stanza of ‘The Highwayman,’ the speaker
begins by describing “The wind,” “The moon,” and “The
road”. Noyes uses metaphors to outline what each of
these is like. The wind is a “torrent of darkness,” referring
to the movements of a wind, as it howls past over the
land. In the second line he compares the moon to a
“ghostly galleon” that appears like a “galleon,” or large
ship, that’s being “tossed upon the clouds”. This brings
the image of water into the poem .

The third metaphor compares the road to a “ribbon of

moonlight” that is running over the “purple moor”. The

road is an important part of the poem that plays a major

role later on. It appears shining in amongst the previous

darker images.
Along the road comes the main character of the poem, the

highwayman. Noyes uses repetition to emphasize the

movement of the man and his horse. He is “riding— /

“Riding—riding—“. He comes all the way up to the “inn”.

The repetition of dark in each stanza has been written , to

imply and foreshadow evil, so the reader knows that the

poem will take on a sinister tone and setting.

S2:
He’d a French cocked-hat on his forehead, a bunch of
lace at his chin,
A coat of the claret velvet, and breeches of brown doe-
skin.
They fitted with never a wrinkle. His boots were up to the
thigh.
And he rode with a jewelled twinkle,
His pistol butts a-twinkle,
His rapier hilt a-twinkle, under the jewelled sky.
 In the second stanza, the physical description of the
highwayman begins. He has a “French cocked-hat on his
forehead” and “a bunch of lace at his chin”. These
phrases refer to his fancy clothes and the lace that’s
poking out from the top of his shirt. There are no
wrinkles, nor could there ever be, in his pants and he has
a “jewelled twinkle” about him. He is shining with
importance. The word “twinkle” is repeated( repetition)
thrice, in the last three lines to describe his pistols, rapier,
and general aspect .

S3 :
Over the cobbles he clattered and clashed in the dark
inn-yard.
He tapped with his whip on the shutters, but all was
locked and barred.
He whistled a tune to the window, and who should be
waiting there
But the landlord’s black-eyed daughter,
Bess, the landlord’s daughter,
Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.

Noyes makes use of alliteration in the first line of the third

stanza in order to mimic the sound of the highwayman’s

movements over the cobblestones. He taps on the

shutters but there is no answer. Everything is “locked and

barred”or closed tightly to not allow anyone in. Instead, he

decides to whistle, and luckily for him the “landlord’s

black-eyed daughter, / Bess” shows up. She is braiding her

hair and she comes out to see him. There is a “dark red

love-knot” in her hair that is added in a symbol of her love

and the relationship to the man.

S4:
And dark in the dark old inn-yard a stable-wicket creaked
Where Tim the ostler listened. His face was white and
peaked.
His eyes were hollows of madness, his hair like mouldy
hay,
But he loved the landlord’s daughter,
The landlord’s red-lipped daughter.
Dumb as a dog he listened, and he heard the robber say
—
 (His eyes were hollows of madness- metaphor
Dumb as a dog- simile)

The fourth stanza introduces the third character into the

poem, “Tim the ostler”. He’s the man who takes care of the

horses and he was eavesdropping on this meeting. He has

a white face, eyes that make him appear insane or mad,

and “hair like mouldy hay”- describes the colour of his hair.

This is just one example of the powerful imagery that

Noyes refers to, throughout this poem. Tim, like the

highwayman, loves the daughter of the landlord. He listens

hidden from them, eavesdropping, on what they talk about.

There is a great contrast drawn between the lovely

daughter, the fancy and confident highwayman, and Tim,

the ostler.

Stanza Five -
“One kiss, my bonny sweetheart, I’m after a prize to-night,

But I shall be back with the yellow gold before the morning

light;

Yet, if they press me sharply, and harry me through the

day,

Then look for me by moonlight, Watch for me by

moonlight,

I’ll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the

way.”

This section of the poem contains the words of the

highwayman as he speaks to Bess. He’s going to go “after

a prize to-night”. This means that he will be robbing

someone and he plans on accomplishing it that night, and

then he plans to be back, to her, with the sunrise or ‘the

morning light’. His actions and life are clearly

romanticized by the poet.

The highwayman knows, and tells Bess, that the law might

“press” or follow him “through the day” and the night. If

this is the case, then he’s going to wait until nightfall to

come and see her again. But, he is determined even if “hell

should bar the way” to get there- No matter what, he’ll

come back.

Stanza Six – He rose upright in the stirrups.

He scarce could reach her hand, hardly

But she loosened her hair in the casement.
His face burnt like a brand
As the black cascade of perfume came tumbling over his
breast; alliteration/ metaphor / personification
And he kissed its waves in the moonlight,
(O, sweet black waves in the moonlight!)
 Then he tugged at his rein in the moonlight,
and galloped away to the west.
The sixth stanza describes his actions once more. He

tries to reach up and touch her and he can just barely do

so. The two are separated by their distance, but come

together through their mutual love. She lets down her hair

and he blushes at the scent of it. He kisses her hair in the

darkness of the night. The word “moonlight” is used in

three lines in this stanza, emphasizing light but also

darkness.( juxtaposition- light versus darkness) It helps to

create a specific atmosphere/tone, for these events to

play out in. He rides off into the “west,” which was not a

good symbol for one who wants to come back. The “west”

is often used to represent death and the afterlife as that is

the direction in which the sun sets.

Part 2 Verse/stanza 1:
 He did not come in the dawning. He did not come at
noon;
And out of the tawny sunset, before the rise of the moon,
When the road was a gypsy’s ribbon, looping the purple
moor,
A red-coat troop came marching—
Marching—marching—
King George’s men came marching, up to the old inn-
door.

Literary device a single object embodies an entire

institution- metonymy- red-coat troop
Epizeuxis is a rhetorical device that involves repeating a
word or phrase in quick succession to add emphasis -
‘marching’ in the above stanza

The second section of ‘The Highwayman’ begins with the

statement “He did not come in the dawning” which means

when the sun rose he wasn’t there as he intended , nor

was he there at noon or at the setting of the sun. This was

not a good sign, especially considering the determination

he showed in the previous stanzas, to be with Bess.

The speaker notices that rather than the highwayman

coming up the road, he sees ‘a red-coat troop marching’,

which is metonymy. They resemble a ‘gypsy’s ribbon’ of

red ,coming across the moor. They are ‘King George’s

men’ or the soldiers of the king and come right up to the

‘old inn-door’. They are searching for the highwayman.

Stanza 2-
They said no word to the landlord. They drank his ale
instead.
But they gagged his daughter, and bound her, to the foot
of her narrow bed.
Two of them knelt at her casement, with muskets at
their side!
There was death at every window;
And hell at one dark window;
 For Bess could see, through her casement, the road that
he would ride.

The soldiers do not talk to the landlord as they probably

should have, but they do drink his ale. They “gagged’ or

tied his daughter up and “bound her”or tied her, to the

narrow bed. These are the villains of the story, men who

are certainly going to create trouble for the happy

relationship. The men are setting up an ambush, waiting

for the highwayman to return. Noyes uses the lines, that

there is “death at every window, and hell at one dark

window,” meaning that from any point in the inn,the

highwayman could be shot and killed. He is in danger!

Terribly, Bess can see out a window the exact path that

her lover would use to return.

S3:
 They had tied her up to attention, with many a
sniggering jest.
They had bound a musket beside her, with the muzzle
beneath her breast!
“Now, keep good watch!” and they kissed her. She heard
the doomed man say—
Look for me by moonlight;
Watch for me by moonlight;
I’ll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the
way!
The men “snigger” and mock, as they do their job of
tormenting Bess. They are pleased with themselves and
cruelly taunt the young woman. Bess’s mind is on her
“doomed man” who she recalls saying “Watch for me by
moonlight”- he was going to come by night fall. She
knows that he could come at any moment and she quickly
thinks of a plan to save him. It is a dangerous one!

Stanza Four

She twisted her hands behind her; but all the knots held
good!
She writhed her hands till her fingers were wet with
sweat or blood!
 They stretched and strained in the darkness, and the
hours crawled by like years
Till, now, on the stroke of midnight,
Cold, on the stroke of midnight,
The tip of one finger touched it!
The trigger at least was hers!

In the fourth stanza, the narrator describes how Bess

tries to twist her hands out of the ropes. She struggles,

but she does get free. Rather than escape from the room,

she decides she’s going to reach for a gun. The “trigger at

least was hers!” the last line declares meaning that now

Bess has no choice to make a terrible decision- which is

explained next.

S5-
The tip of one finger touched it. She strove no more for
the rest.
Up, she stood up to attention, with the muzzle beneath
her breast.
 She would not risk their hearing; she would not strive
again;
For the road lay bare in the moonlight;
Blank and bare in the moonlight;
And the blood of her veins, in the moonlight, throbbed to
her love’s refrain.

Bess gets up, places the gun, and has it pressed to her

chest. She moves as quietly as possible, trying to keep

the men from hearing her. She “would not strive again,”

the third line says. Bess is going to end her life.

Noyes repeats the word “moonlight” three times again in

this stanza. There is also a good example alliteration with

the repetition of words beginning with “b”. There is a

focus in the last lines on the beating of Bess’s heart and

the blood in her veins.

Stanza Six
 Tlot-tlot; tlot-tlot! Had they heard it? The horsehoofs
ringing clear;
Tlot-tlot; tlot-tlot, in the distance? Were they deaf that
they did not hear?
Down the ribbon of moonlight, over the brow of the hill,
The highwayman came riding—
Riding—riding—
The red coats looked to their priming!
She stood up, straight and still.
In the sixth stanza, there is the sound of “horsehoofs
ringing clear”meaning that the sound of the horses
approaching was definitely heard. They were coming up
the path, from the distance, just as Bess and the soldiers
predicted. But, it does not appear that the soldiers realize
what the sound is. The highwayman is riding up the road
again just as he did earlier. There is again an emphasis
on the word “riding” via repitition. Finally, the redcoats
realized what was happening. Bess is prepared to put her
plan into action; her body becomes still, ready for killing
herself, to save him.

Stanza Seven
Tlot-tlot, in the frosty silence! Tlot-tlot, in the echoing night!
onomatopoeia
 Nearer he came and nearer. Her face was like a light.
Her eyes grew wide for a moment; she drew one last deep
breath,
Then her finger moved in the moonlight,
Her musket shattered the moonlight,
Shattered her breast in the moonlight and warned him—with
her death.

The tension is building in these lines as the poem reaches its

climax. Still, it is unclear what Bess is trying to do. It is in the last

lines of this stanza that becomes clear. She decides to shoot

herself and sacrifice herself in order to “warn…him—with her

death”. This is the action of a very desperate person, who has no

other choice and Bess willingly, does so! This is the tragic part of

the poem.

Stanza Eight

He turned. He spurred to the west; he did not know who

stood
 Bowed, with her head o’er the musket, drenched with her
own blood! syncope
Not till the dawn he heard it, and his face grew grey to hear
How Bess, the landlord’s daughter,
The landlord’s black-eyed daughter,
Had watched for her love in the moonlight, and died in the
darkness there.
It was at the sound of the gunshot that he runs, back to the

west from which he came. He doesn’t know what the

sound was, but the narrator does and the scene is a

gruesome, terrible one.

It was the next day that he heard what had happened. His

“face grew grey to hear” that his lover had died.

S 9:
Back, he spurred like a madman, shrieking a curse to the
sky,
With the white road smoking behind him and his rapier
brandished high.
 Blood red were his spurs in the golden noon; wine-red was
his velvet coat;
When they shot him down on the highway,
Down like a dog on the highway,
And he lay in his blood on the highway, with a bunch of
lace at his throat.

(‘Down like a dog’ the simile is used here- shows the

poet has no respect for the highwayman and he had to
referred to Tim - ‘dumb as a dog’, which is also use of
simile )
The highwayman goes back to the inn the next day after

hearing what had happened to Bess. He is enraged and wants

to take revenge. He rides and curses the sky, in his agony.

The highwayman also has his sword at the ready, prepared to

kill the red coats who were responsible and caused her death.

The highwayman, as one might expect, is finally killed by

the soldiers at the inn. He goes “Down like a dog on the

highway”. The white lace turns red at his throat giving an

image of a bloody death.

S10:
And still of a winter’s night, they say, when the wind is in
the trees,
When the moon is a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy
seas,
When the road is a ribbon of moonlight over the purple
moor,
A highwayman comes riding—
Riding—riding—
A highwayman comes riding, up to the old inn-door.

The last two stanzas of the poem are in italics, symbolizing

that they come after the main events outlined in part I and

part II. These lines describe how after the events of the poem

that the ghosts of the two lovers still reappear around the inn.

When the “wind is in the trees” and the environment is in the

right state, as it was at the beginning of the poem. The

highwayman comes back as he used to.

S11:

Over the cobbles he clatters and clangs in the dark inn-

yard.
He taps with his whip on the shutters, but all is locked
and barred.
He whistles a tune to the window, and who should be
waiting there
But the landlord’s black-eyed daughter,
Bess, the landlord’s daughter,
Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.

Just like in the past, when the two were alive, he tries to

get into the inn. These lines are almost word for word

those, that came at the beginning of the poem. Bess is

there just as she used to be, except now they are both
 dead. This is a hopeful and warm image at the end of the

poem.

Summary 1

The gilded statue of the Happy Prince stands on a pedestal

overlooking a town. Covered in gold leaf with sapphires for

eyes and a ruby on his sword-hilt, the statue receives

admiration from all passersby, including town councilors who

want to foster a reputation for artistic tastes.

Analysis1( deeper/implicit meaning)

: This establishes both the prominence of the Happy Prince in

the city and the admiration he receives. However, that

reputation comes from superficial places—first of all, the

statue is “gilded,” meaning that gold leaf has been added only

to the surface. Secondly, the councilors care too

much about their reputations, revealing how selfish they are.

This beginning sets up the central themes of greed and the

superficiality of beauty, which the later plot will elaborate.

(Class teacher said one theme is true happiness and that

happiness is not always linked to pleasure)

to gain a reputation for having artistic tastes- he wanted the

public to admire him as a man who liked fine, expensive

Lest- in case

In Oscar Wilde's ‘The Happy Prince’, the swallow and the statue

of the Happy Prince are personified as living beings that can

speak and feel

S 2- A Swallow flies over the city on his way to Egypt. He had

been delayed after falling in love with a Reed, attracted to her

slender waist and gracefulness. When she wouldn’t

accompany his travels, the Swallow left alone, but ended up

stopping under the statue of the Happy Prince to rest.

A 2- The Swallow’s backstory with the Reed establishes the

centrality of romantic love as a theme in this story. However,

his love for the Reed was also based on artificial qualities—

her external beauty— rather than a deeper connection the two

shared. His aspirations( desires) toward Egypt continue to

show a relative selfishness on the part of the Swallow, as he

puts his own needs and desires over either the health of his

relationship or any higher goals.

S 3:

Surprised at what he takes to be rainfall on a clear night, the

Swallow realizes that the Happy Prince has been crying. They

introduce themselves, and the Happy Prince describes his

childhood in a gated palace, when he lived in San Souci and

played in a walled garden—a time full of superficial ( fake)

pleasures, when he was ignorant of the suffering in his city.

The Swallow is surprised to learn that the Statue is not made

of solid gold, but he agrees to help the Happy Prince after he

describes his pity for a seamstress sewing passion-flowers

on the satin gown, of a lady in waiting. She lives in a poor

house and cannot care for her sick son, so the Swallow

agrees to deliver the ruby from the Prince’s sword hilt to her.

A3- Although the Prince bears an epithet describing his

“happiness,” these tears and the story he tells show that this

name is merely ironic. The Swallow’s firstly is surprised that

the Prince’s beauty exists only on the surface shows his

naivety—like the Prince in his boyhood, the Swallow focuses

on superficial pleasures and beauty and cannot see beyond

the surface. Nevertheless, he experiences pity—the first stage

of compassion—for the Prince, and agrees to help him serve

this seamstress. She represents the real irony of the town’s

poverty, as her job is to beautify the world for the aristocrat

ladies, but she does not earn enough in doing so, to protect

her sick son.

Setting-

“The Happy Prince” is set in a fictional city marked by a

deep inequality between the poverty of the townspeople

and the riches of the wealthy. In keeping with the fairy

tale genre, the lands described are fictional and full of

fantastical elements, and the events play out over an

unspecified timeframe, through the story.

Situational Irony- Wealth vs. Poverty -

is shown by Wilde that the seamstress is stitching gowns

for the rich but can’t afford a decent life, herself.

T E- ‘ Her face is thin and worn, and she has coarse, red

hands, all pricked by the needle, for she is a seamstress.

She is embroidering passion-flowers on a satin gown for

the loveliest of the Queen’s maids-of-honour to wear at

the next Court-ball. In a bed in the corner of the room her

little boy is lying ill. […] His mother has nothing to give

him but river water, so he is crying.’

S4: On the way to deliver the ruby, the Swallow sees “old

Jews bargaining with each other.” He delivers it and stays

in order to cool the feverish boy, by flapping his wings.

After delivering the ruby, the Swallow returns and

describes feeling “quite warm” in spite of the cold, due to

his good deed. He still intends to go to Egypt and

describes to the Happy Prince what marvels await him

there, from the iver-horses to the God Memnon on his

great granite throne. Nevertheless, the Prince begs him

to stay and help a young playwright freezing in his garret.

He needs to finish a play for the theater director but felt

too cold. In the end, the Swallow agrees to stay another

night and plucks out one of the Prince’s sapphire eyes to

deliver to the young man.

A4:

The Swallow’s decision to help the boy in addition to

delivering the ruby shows a positive spiritual

transformation in him. The Swallow begins to receive a

moral education (learning that it feels good to help

others) from following the Prince’s requests. This first

task has not completely diverted him from his plans to go

to Egypt, where he paints an exotic picture of their fauna

and religious traditions. This, combined with the Prince’s

compassionate desires to assist the downtrodden

townspeople, strengthen the story’s connection to values.

However, this time a playwright requires assistance- the

very people producing art for the richer class, languish in

poverty.( irony)

S5- The Swallow returns once more to bid farewell to the

Happy Prince, who pleads with him to deliver his other

sapphire eye to a little match-girl who has dropped her

matches. Without any help, the child’s father will beat her.

The Swallow agrees and promises also to remain in the

town by the Prince’s side forever, as he cannot bear to

leave him alone and blind on his pedestal.

A5: This third instance of the Prince’s compassion

reaches a climax of his willingness to sacrifice everything

—even his ability to see—for the good of others. The

victim in this case makes up the picture of innocence: a

young girl undeserving of the suffering that has befallen

her. The Swallow’s change into a morally upright being

also ends here in his promise to remain by the Prince’s

side. This great act of sacrifice—as the Swallow knows he

won’t survive the winter—proves the depth of his love and

loyalty to the Prince.

Literary device of Foreshadowing-

The increasing coldness of the city is referred to several

times to foreshadow the Swallow’s eventual death and

emphasizing the virtue of his sacrifice. When the Prince

first asks the Swallow to stay a night, the Swallow

objects, saying he is awaited in Egypt. However, when the

Prince pleads with him to stay to help the boy in the city,

the Swallow relents( give in):

“It is very cold here,” he said; “but I will stay with you for

one night, and be your messenger.”

S6 _ The Swallow sits on the Prince’s shoulder and

recounts tales of Egypt and faraway lands. He tells of the

red ibises on the Nile, the Sphinx, “who is as old as the

world itself,” and a great green snake who “has twenty

priests to feed it with honey cakes.” Though the Prince

calls these stories “marvellous,” he asks for tales of the

suffering townspeople instead, as “there is no Mystery so

great as Misery.”

A 6 - The Swallow tries to use these tales of art and

beauty to distract the Prince and to improve his life now,

that he can no longer see. However, the most magnificent

tales fail to resonate( to have an effect) with the Prince,

who prefers a harsh reality to beautiful fantasy. The reality

they confront replaces mystery with misery—the real

world is full of injustice and inequality, and one ought to

treat knowledge of that , as more valuable than ignorance

and fantasy. This decision emphasizes the moral

teachings at the heart of this story.

Faraway Lands:
When the Swallow tells the Prince stories about the

“strange lands” he has seen on his travels, he uses rich

visual imagery that appeals to the senses:

He told him of the red ibises, who stand in long row

S7

The Swallow flies over the city and reports of the rich

making merry while beggars starve at their gates,

including young boys trying to warm themselves under a

bridge while a passing Watchman tries to clear them out.

Upon hearing these tales, the Prince wishes to distribute

the fine gold leaf gilding him, to alleviate (to lessen)

some of this misery. The Swallow agrees to help him and

he delivers sheets of gold leaf to the children. While the

Prince grows “dull and grey,” the “children’s faces grew

rosier and they laughed and played games in the street.”

A7:

Winter has just begun in this northern European town,

making the contrast between the rich and the poor all the

more acute—whereas the wealthy can celebrate and feast

in warmth, those without resources suffer in the most

unbearable conditions. Although those inside could be

accused of mere ignorance, the Watchman who scolds

the starving boys betrays his duty, and displays

corruption. While his job is to protect the weak, when

faced with innocent children he chooses to scream at

them for loitering—indicating that he would prefer empty

streets and the appearance of peace, to actually solving

the problems caused by inequality. The Prince, of course,

opts to sacrifice the very last of his finery—his golden

skin—to feed the starving children, and this time the

Swallow helps him without complaining, which indicates

that his moral education is complete.

S8-

Winter finally arrives, and the Swallow grows far too cold.

Knowing that only limited time remains to him, he asks to

kiss the Prince’s hand. Instead, the Prince says, “you

must kiss me on the lips, for I love you.” The Swallow

does so and falls down dead at his feet, at which point the

Prince’s leaden heart “snap[s] right in two.”

A8:
This moment, which had been foreshadowed all along,

marks the tragic climax of the story. The Swallow dies

due to his love of the Prince and his refusal to move

somewhere warmer for the duration of winter, but he

receives one final kiss.

S9-

The next morning, the Mayor spots the grey statue with

the dead Swallow at its feet and complains of its

shabbiness. The Town Councillors agree, calling the

statue “little better than a beggar,” and they decide to

have the Happy Prince melted down and recast into a new

statue (though they fight as to whom he should represent

—the Mayor wishes a statue of himself, but each of the

town councillors think it should be of them instead). The

Art Professor at the University goes so far as to say, “as

he is no longer beautiful he is no longer useful.”

A9-

The arrogance that the Mayor and Councillors display

here is simply ridiculous—they make light ( fun)of the

enormous and touching sacrifices that the Swallow and

Prince have made for the betterment of the town, and

instead notice only that the Prince, no longer appears

beautiful on the outside. To emphasize their shallowness,

they fight over whom the new statue should represent,

caring only for their own reputations, and showing no

regard for any other concerns or considerations. Their

lack of compassion in comparison to the grand sacrifices

of the Swallow and Prince marks them as antagonists in

this story. Significantly, this problem extends past the

government and into the university: the art professor

claims that the statue lost his usefulness with his beauty,

even though any reader knows that the Happy Prince’s

real value was embedded in his compassionate heart and

giving character.

S10-

The overseer of the workmen at the foundry melts down

the statue but notes with shock that the broken lead heart

refuses to melt. Giving up, he tosses the heart aside on a

dust-heap along with the body of the Swallow. Soon after,

God asks one of his Angels to bring the “two most

precious things in the city.” The Angel brings the leaden

heart and the dead bird, and God agrees that he had
rightly chosen. The Happy Prince and the Swallow would

be rewarded eternally in Paradise for their compassion

and sacrifice.

A10-

The attempt to melt the leaden heart serves two

purposes. It drives home the ignorance and inferiority of

the townspeople, who wish to destroy the most valuable

entities in the town—not out of evil or malice, but out of

ignorance. Second, it highlights the heart’s symbolic heft.

In not melting, it proves to be steadfast and loyal—almost

magical in its durability, the heart persists while all of the

jewels and finery that were so admired disappear. God

confirms this value in his final appearance when he

chooses to reward both the Swallow and Prince with an

eternity in Paradise. In this moment, the fairy tale alludes

to Biblical parables. Whereas earthly pleasures

disappear, actions undertaken out of compassion last.

Literary devices:

1)Allegory- Christian Sacrifice :

“The Happy Prince” is a story with a clear Christian

message, that can be read as an allegory of the sacrifice

and compassion of Christ.

1)Anthropomorphism -The Happy Prince's love: The

world of “The Happy Prince” is one where it is taken

for granted that animals and inanimate objects can

speak and feel. The use of such anthropomorphism

 works both to create the whimsical setting of the

story’s fairy tale genre .

2)Foreshadowing-The Swallow's Death: The increasing

coldness of the city is referenced several times to

foreshadow the Swallow’s eventual death and

emphasize the virtue of his sacrifice. When the

Prince first asks the Swallow to stay a night, the

Swallow objects, saying he is awaited in Egypt.

However, when the Prince pleads with him to stay to

help the boy in the city, the Swallow relents:

“It is very cold here,” he said; “but I will stay with you for

one night, and be your messenger.”

 3)Imagery- Faraway Lands:

When the Swallow tells the Prince stories about the

“strange lands” he has seen on his travels, he uses rich

visual imagery that appeals to the senses:

‘…..He told him of the red ibises, who stand in long rows

on the banks of the Nile, and catch gold-fish in their

beaks; […] of the merchants, who walk slowly by the side

of their camels, and carry amber beads in their hands; of

the King of the Mountains of the Moon,( metaphor) who is

as black as ebony, and worships a large crystal; of the

great green snake that sleeps in a palm-tree, and has

twenty priests to feed it with honey-cakes.’

4)Irony- Deceptive Appearances:

“The Happy Prince” is steeped( full of) in irony, with the

story repeatedly flipping readers’ expectations. This irony

is introduced immediately through the Happy Prince

himself, who, despite his name and the townspeople's

perception of him, is miserable. Although a mother scolds

her son for crying by saying “the Happy Prince never

dreams of crying for anything,” when the Swallow meets

the Happy Prince there are “tears […] running down his

golden cheeks.”

6)Setting- “The Happy Prince” is set in a fictional city

marked by a deep inequality between the poverty of the

townspeople and the riches of the wealthy. In keeping with

the fairy tale genre, the lands described are fictional and

full of fantastical elements.

7) Simile: Jewels
The Swallow promises the Happy Prince he will return
from Egypt one day, bringing with him jewels that would
replace the ones taken out. He says, "The ruby shall be
redder than a red rose, and the sapphire shall be as blue
as the great sea"