THE MOTIF OF RECOGNITION IN ENGLISH AND THE ALBANIAN BALLADS

Abstract

Difficult war times and painful family events made people segregate. These events made folk singers create songs where they narrated how people recognized each other after a long time being far away from one another. This time period was known as a very dramatic process fulfilled with strong feelings. Different scops and bards created emotional songs with the motif of recognition between husband and wife (that will be explained with examples from Hind Horn and Aga Ymeri), between brother and sister (that will be explained with examples from Bonnie Farday and Gjon Petrika), and rarely between brother and brother. The aim of this paper is to make a comparative analysis with special emphasis on intersections and the dissimilar points of the English ballads and the Albanian ones which treat the motif of recognition. Since this papers goal is the comparative approach between ballads of two different literatures of different nations, our methods of analysis will be the narrative method and the comparative method. The narrative method will be used to point out the motif of recognition in each ballad particularly, while the comparative method will be used to make the comparison between ballads Hind Horn and Aga Ymeri where husband and wife recognize each other by a special sign as symbol of their true love, and between ballads Bonny Farday or Babylon and Gjon Petrika where with the help of a mark the identification of brother and sister occurs.