The Wanderings of Oisin and Other Poems (1889) Literary Elements

The Speaker in the poem "Down by the Salley Gardens" is the admirer of a lover whom he lost and is now regretful about , telling the story from his own point of view.
The Narrator in "The Wanderings of Oisin" is a third person narrator telling the story from Oisin's point of view.

The poem is written in three parts. Part I is an iambic tetrameter, Part II is an iambic pentameter and Part III is an anapaestic hexameter.

"She bid me take life easy, as the grass grows on the weirs" is a simile taken from "Down by the Salley Gardens" and suggests that the Speaker lets life happen naturally and in its own time.

"To the waters and the wild" is alliterative and is an image created in "The Stolen Child".

Oisin wants to revisit his old friends and so goes back to Ireland but does not realize that although he is still a young man they are long dead, and so his sacrifice and his trip are wasted.

Irish poetry; epic poetry.

The poems are set in metaphysical locations. For example, although Oisin begins and ends the story in real-life Ireland, the majority of the poem is set in the supernatural immortal islands populated by metaphysical characters such as giants.

The tone of "Down by the Salley River" is melancholic and regretful. Oisin is also very melancholic at various points in the poem about him and this is by design in that the poet wants to demonstrate how anyone leavning Ireland will ultimately yearn for it.

Oisin is the protagonist of the poem; the passing of time is the antagonist.

There is conflict between Oisin and the demon that lasts for one hundred years.

Oisin falls from the horse and therefore touches the ground. This breaks the immortality spell and he finds that he is three hundred years old.

The breaking of the saddle strap foreshadows Oisin falling from Niamh's horse, and therefore foreshadows the breaking of the immortality spell.

In "The Stolen Child" it is suggested that the child will find his new surroundings unfamiliar which is an understatement in that the newness of the faerie world and the fact that he will miss the familiarity of his home will be terrifying and traumatic for him.

The poem "Down by the Salley Gardens" alludes to the real life location in Sligo where the residents planted trees specifically to provide materials for the thatching of their roofs.

The Immortal Islands is the way in which all of the different metaphysical characters are referred to in the poems.

There is no specific personification, but metaphysical characters such as giants and faeries are given human characteristics and emotions.

The beauty of the faery world is hyperbolic in its description because the faeries are intent upon conveying how much better their world is than the human world.

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