The Boasts of Hywel ab Owain Gwynedd

Introduction 

 The title of the poem The Boasts of Hywel ab Owain Gwynedd has a context background to it.  Hywel ,  (d. 1170), Welsh warrior-prince and poet who was the first to develop the courtly love lyric in Welsh in the manner of the troubadours. Among his eight extant compositions is a gorhoffedd, or “boasting poem,” which gives exuberant expression to his love for his country. The son of Owain Gwynedd, Hywel played a major part in the occupation of Ceredigion (Cardiganshire) by the house of Gwynedd (c. 1153).

How this connects with the poem is that the speaker is boasting about all the different women he has been with in only a week

Themes 

• Love - He shows love for each women differently 
• Betrayal- He uses the women then betrays them 
• Unfaithfulness - He does not stay with one women 
• Sex/passion 

Structure 

The structure in the poem seems to be simple, yet unordinary. This as each stanza has different amount of lines in, making it ‘awkward’. Also the two words, ‘’her’’ and ‘’quiet’’ are on a line of there own, perhaps focusing the readers attention on them, specially as the poem is about all the different woman ‘her’, and how not any of them know just how much this man gets around, keeping ‘quiet’. A lot of end stop lines are also used along with enjambment and caesura allowing the speaker control of how the poem is supposed to be read. 

Analysing the text 

my busty next” – describes the first woman very physically, and describes her chest, what he can see and not how he feels and her ‘’whiteness’’, suggesting a pale woman, by comparing her to be better than ‘’pear blossom’’. 

“Not to love her is a sin” – talks about the second woman, and although love is mentioned, it perhaps refers to her physical appearance, and physical actions and not emotion – may not be respecting the woman at hand. The speaker himself also can be seen as a ‘flirt’ and ‘tease’, as she ‘’pigeon-coos” and he knows how to impress her ‘’woo’’ in turn making the woman’s cheeks ‘’flush like rosy apple skin’’.

“dry old hymns” – For the third woman he will go to extents but using hymns to ‘’please her”, as ‘boring’ as they maybe. 

“Friday, worried Hawis my epic regular” – suggesting how this is normally the woman he ‘has’ and thus refers to her being ‘regular’, therefore suggesting, the is your ‘ordinary, everyday woman’ that falls for his ‘’poetry of endearment’’.

‘’let her name be secret’’ – suggesting not only does the speaker go for single woman but also married and only keeping it secret for ‘’husband’s sake’’ – although he himself feels a sense of accomplishment, smug even in what he is doing. 

‘’lick up juices’’ – a sexual innuendo is used, to express his passion, and show his feelings for all the woman, and that he can have who ever he want, along as his ‘’busy tongue keeps quiet’’.