The Husband's Message is not an epic because many Anglo-Saxonists contend that the poem is a "love lyric" to be celebrated for "its ingenious form and its emotive power". Conversely, other scholars contest that the sense of "loss," especially that of time due to unfortunate circumstances and "happiness," make The Husband's Message seem more like an elegy. An elegy is a form of poetry that mourns the loss of someone. Anne L. Klinck classifies this poem as optimistic, focusing on love and lamentation, but still places it among the elegies in the Exeter Book. Niles groups The Seafarer, The Wife's Lament, Wulf and Eadwacer and The Husband's Message together as being all the elegies found in the Exeter Book. Niles also states the 50 riddles in the Exeter Book resembles the first person speaker, just like The Husband's Message. This is significant because within all the riddles and this poem, the reader has to discover who the speaker is.