Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 07 Jul 11 - 12:01 AM

It wouldn't tho, Joe, be 'traditional song' as rubricated in the thread title, would it?

~M~

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Joe_F
Date: 06 Jul 11 - 09:12 PM

When I was little, in the age of Hitler, Mussolini, and Tojo, I wondered if history afforded any *women* of superlative wickedness. My mother thought a moment & suggested Lucrezia Borgia. It seems from Wikipedia that she had enemies who made up a lot of stuff about her for which there is no evidence. However, it turns out that there is also an opera about her in which she poisons five people. Perhaps there is a song in that.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 06 Jul 11 - 10:23 AM

Nice to see this up again. I've got nothing to add, just love these threads. Whatever happened to CS anyway??? Still off with the fairies no doubt, like she was ever anything else ;-]

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: reynard
Date: 06 Jul 11 - 09:38 AM

On the "Heartless girl dumps her longstanding boyfriend and marries another bloke" theme-

If "The week before Easter" counts then so does "Pretty Nancy of Yarmouth". She promised to wait for the sailor and he was only gone a few years...

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 06 Jul 11 - 03:56 AM

THE FEMALE FROLIC (English)
OR: An Account of a young Gentlewoman, who went upon the Road to rob in Man's Cloaths, well mounted on a Mare, etc.
Our first record of women taking to the highway for the purpose of robbery and crime is from the 14th century. Since the late 16th century, writers and street poets have been intrigued with the roaring girls, the Moll Cutpurses and those women who disguised themselves as sailors or soldiers, to follow their lovers or to avoid the more mundane cares of women. This kind of piece was probably to the 16th and 17th centuries what the cowboy films have been to our time - the wilds of Hampstead and Highgate were exotic and unmapped. Each heath or highroad had its denizens, and if the denizen was a woman so much the more exotic. This humorous song, known variously as "The Female Highwayman', "The Female Robber', was taken from the Pepys collection of broadside ballads. It is also printed in Alfred Williams* FOLKSONGS OF THE UPPER THAMES.


1    You Gallants of every Station,
Give ear to a Frollicksome Song;
The like was ne'er seen in the Nation,
'Twas done by a Female so young.

2    She bought her a Mare and a Bridle,
A Saddle and Pistols also,
She resolved she would not be idle,
For upon the Pad she did go.

3    She Cloathed her self in great Splendor,
For Breeches and Sword she had on,
Her Body appear'd very slender;
She showed like a handsome Young-man.

4    And then like a Padder so witty,
She mounted with speed on her Mare;
She left all her Friends in the City,
And steered her Course towards Ware.

5    The first that she met was a Grocer
Was walking with Cane in his Hand,
She soon to the Spark came up closer,
And boldly she bid him to stand.

6    She took from him but a Guinea,
And then met a Taylor with Shears,
And because the poor Rogue had no Money
She genteely clipt of his Ears.

7    The next that she met was a Tanner.
For loss of his money he cry'd,
And because he bawled in this manner,
She handsomely tanned his Hide.

8    And then she up with a Quaker,
She told him, she must have his Coin:
Quoth he, Thou silly Wise-acre
Thou shalt have no Money of mine.

9    She show'd him a Pistol to prove him;
He told her by Yea and by Nay,
That since the good Spirit did move him,   
She might take his money away.

10 An Excise-man then she accosted.
And bid him Deliver with speed;
He often of Valour had boasted,
But he was a coward indeed.

11 She Rifled him of his Money
Oh! This was a very rich Prize,
She took from him Four-score Guineys,
That he had for Excise.

12 The next that she met was a Padder,   
Well mounted upon a bay Nag;
Oh! This made her so much the gladder,
She told him she wanted his bag.

13 He thought she would certainly fight him,
Prepared himself out of hand:
But she was resolved to fright him,
She damn'd him, and bid him to stand.

14 He presently drew out his Rapier
And bid her to stand on her guard;
But quickly away she did Caper,
The High-way-man. follow'd her hard.

15 He followed and soon overtook her,
And searched her Breeches with speed;-
And as he did well overlook her,
He found her a Woman indeed!

16 The High-way-man stood all amazed;
But she had no cause to complain.
Tho' with her he did what he pleased,
He gave her the Money again.

Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: MorwenEdhelwen1
Date: 05 Jul 11 - 07:08 PM

What about the woman in "Stone Cold Dead In The Market", based on the traditional song "Murder in De Market," who murdered her husband because of battered woman syndrome?

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 02 Nov 10 - 05:21 AM

And there are several songs based on the tale of that well-known lupicide, Red Riding Hood*.

~Michael~

*Any truth in the assertion that she had a brother called Robin who was a famous king's-deer-icide?

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 01 Nov 10 - 05:46 AM

Another nomination, reminded by the married Out Of Hand thread ~~
the female convict married out of hand by the Captain on the way to Van Dieman's Land, who proceeded then to "give us all good usage Going to Van Dieman's Land". Wow!

~Michael~

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 31 Oct 10 - 08:28 AM

"Katy Cruel' now on my YouTube channel as promised 2 posts back.

~M~

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: GUEST,John Moulden
Date: 17 Oct 10 - 05:25 PM

For the only English printing of Fanny Blair that states it to be an Irish song, see the Bodleian Ballads website and search for "An Irish Song, called, Young Higgins Sentence"

http://bodley24.bodley.ox.ac.uk/cgi-bin/acwwweng/ballads/image.pl?ref=Harding+B+25%282134%29&id=10396.gif&seq=1&size=1

The ballad has no imprint but perhaps someone more versed in the woodcuts of English usage may be able to indicate its printer.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 17 Oct 10 - 03:44 PM

Following on some points made above, I shall in next couple of days be putting my version of Katy Cruel on my YouTube channel


http://www.youtube.com/user/mgmyer


~Michael~

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 17 Oct 10 - 03:27 PM

Just come back to this thread to check something, and would suggest that, in this last post by GUEST Patsy, the second stanza should read "You can shove your other Granny off a bus."

That's how Robin Hall used to sing it; & he specialised in Glasgow children's street ballads. & this seems to me a vital point from the semantic/interpretative point of view!


~Michael~

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: GUEST,Patsy
Date: 23 Aug 10 - 10:34 AM

You canna shove yer Granny off a bus,
No you canna shove yer Granny off a bus,
No you canna shove yer Granny cos she's your Mammy's Mammy,
No you canna shove yer Granny off a bus.

You can shove yer Granny off a bus,
Oh yes you can shove yer Granny off a bus,
Yes you can shove yer Granny,
Cos she's your Daddy's Mammy,
Oh yes you can shove yer Granny off a bus.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 22 Aug 10 - 06:37 PM

Having now reread the whole of Roly Brown's article mentioned above, it appears we do have the facts of the case or at least contemporary descriptions. These have been researched by John Moulden and the trial and execution were reported in the Belfast Mercury or Freeman's Chronicle, Vol III, No 19, Tuesday October 4th 1785, p3.

The ballad, like many other N Irish ballads, appears to have entered England through the port of Liverpool. The earliest and fullest version appears to have been printed by Armstrong of Liverpool in the 1820s, and from there spread around northern England, a truncated version ending up in the south and printed by the likes of Catnach and Pitts in London.

I have a copy of John's thesis, 'The Printed Ballad in Ireland' and as soon as I get time I'll check out the info he gives.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 22 Aug 10 - 05:53 PM

Michael,
I don't think any person using logic could take any other interpretation from this song than the one you give. We only have the text of the song to go on. All versions come from the same viewpoint and don't vary much in text. To try to apply other interpretations is therefore futile and is of the same order as those who try to place allegorical symbolism into perfectly straightforward literal ballads.

Higgins may well have been the villain, but with no evidence of any sort in front of us we can only accept the testament of the narrator.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 22 Aug 10 - 05:18 PM

Refresh ~~ I am still much exercised by this question as to whose version of events we should believe in Fanny Blair ~~any more views to adjudicate between my view & that of Crow Sister as expressed in posts above, 7 & 8 Aug? Do not wish to be a bore or flog any dead horses, but this seems to me a question worth pursuing.

~Michael~

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 08 Aug 10 - 07:35 AM

Worth a look indeed ~~ many thanks, Suibhne.

~M~

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 08 Aug 10 - 06:21 AM

Here's something worth a look: Glimpses into the 19th Century Broadside Ballad Trade. No 3: Fanny Blair

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 08 Aug 10 - 12:22 AM

Further thoughts next morning: I see the initial attraction of comparing Lolita ~ some obvious thematic similarities and analogies ~ Bert Lloyd & others have used Nabokov's coinage 'nymphet' in reference to Fanny. But Humbert is, explicitly, from the start, the 'unreliable narrator'. It seems to me that, if we don't regard Higgins as a reliable narrator, the whole point and dramatic impulse of the song are lost. To take Fanny's side is surely a perverse interpretation. I am reminded of a production of Measure For Measure I once had to review, in which Lucio recognised the disguised Duke from the start and just meant to wind him up with his libels. It flew in the face of the author's clear intention and simply didn't work. Similarly one of J M Synge's Shadow Of The Glen where the wife knew her husband wasn't really dead all along. The whole song is surely predicated on Fanny's lying and Higgins' innocence: I honestly don't think any other interpretation works.

~Michael~

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Gurney
Date: 07 Aug 10 - 10:14 PM

Michael, that 'Fanny Blair' was the song that got me into folk music. I was persuaded into a folk club -"Hey man, I'm into jazz!"- and heard Barry Skinner of Coventry sing it. Accusatory, and LOUD. Stunning, and as you said happened to you, followed by stunned silence!

I always thought 'Lovely Joan' was an absolute bitch. Con artist and horse thief. Ladies seem to like her, though.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 07 Aug 10 - 04:28 PM

I think not: it's just that we make more of a thing now than perhaps previously. Consider following from Wikipedia:-

'While sexual abuse has been prevalent throughout history, it has only become the object of such public attention in recent times.'

Humbert Humbert glories in his relations with Dolores Haze [who is, btw, noted, his step-daughter, not grandchild or any actual blood relation]. She was also 11+, not 8 ~~ same just-about-pubescent as Miss Blair, indeed. Higgins insists on his innocence, and is believed by all his contemporaries: had there been anything in her accusations, he would surely have been met with much more censoriousness than sympathy. "Young Higgins was innocent, of that I am quite sure."

~M~

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 07 Aug 10 - 04:07 PM

MtheGM, I thought you'd take the narrator's view *smile*..

But to offer a more modern counterpoint, clearly his *perspective* (the narrator of the song is the accused man) is no more valid than that of Humbert Humbert who utterly charms and seduces the reader, while simultaneously conniving to murder his young wards Mother in order to gain sexual access to her, fantasising about sexually molesting his own eight year old grandchild by her, and indeed proceeding to abduct her in order to fulfill his sexual fantasies through her.

I'm not suggesting that the man accused by Fanny Blair was as much of a charming pervert as Humbert Humbert, but that charming perverts are, well, charming, but nevertheless perverts.

The notion of an 11 yr. old simply "stirring up malicious bullshit" is also far more likely now, than it was back then.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 07 Aug 10 - 03:42 PM

Many thanks, CS. You requested me on another thread for my comments on this song 'Fanny Blair', & how it fits this thread.

I don't actually see Fanny Blair as an anti-heroine, but purely as a villainess. She seems to me to be one of those children that all teachers &c so much have to beware of these days [read the paper practically any week!], motivated by pure malicious intention to stir up all the trouble she can, by making a false accusation of child abuse {rape, presumably; or some sort of sexual interference in any event} against a randomly chosen neighbour, the unfortunate Higgins ~~ surely we are to believe his denials of having ever had 'dealings' with her. When the people, incensed by the judge's insistence on believing her against his denials, 'rise up against her', and call her 'a perjuring little whore', they do not presumably think her an actual prostitute, but use the word 'whore' rather as a piece of abuse against a dishonest woman. I also prefer the end of my version to the variant you give, in which it is Fanny's soul, rather than his own, which he prays God to pardon ~~ it is she, not he, we should surely infer from that, who is the sinner in the whole affair, with her 'false witness ... cruel perjury ... the lies she came out with' [=, in your version, 'the oath that she swore'].

That has always been my take on the song, which I have always found profoundly worrying. The most successful performance I have ever given of it, I have always thought, was one at Linton Folk Club, near Cambridge, years ago, which was met, not with applause, but by a dead pin-drop silence.

~Michael~

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 07 Aug 10 - 02:38 PM

I'm unsure if anyone's flagged up Fanny Blair on this thread as yet, and I haven't checked. But here it is, and a most fitting submission it seems for the theme, sung by our own MtheGM: Fanny Blair

The lyrics are quite sad, I find myself siding with the child (presumably) prostitute "perjuring whore" for some reason, perhaps simply because the anti-heroine is a theme that always engages me or perhaps it's because of the gathered crowd's murmurings against her and the calls for her to be caught and "cropped".
I wonder what the crime was that he went down for, and what she accused him of? And was he innocent or guilty? And what could his young accuser have gotten out of the whole deal, if she had falsely accused him?

I think these lyrics differ slightly, to those MtheGM sings:

Come all you young men and maidens whereever you may be
Beware of false swearing and sad perjury
For it is by a false woman I am wounded so soon
And you see how I am cut down in the height of my bloom.

It was last Monday morning I lay in my bed
A young friend came to me and unto me said
Rise up Dennis Higgins and flee you elsewhere
For they're now down against you for the young Fanny Blair.

Fanny Blair is a girl of eleven years old
And if I was a-dying the truth I'd unfold
It's I never had dealings with her in my time
And it's I have to die for another man's crime

On the day of the trial squire Vernon was there
And it's on the green table he handed Fanny Blair
And the oath that she swore I am ashamed to tell
And the judge spoke up quickly you have told it well

Dennis Higgins of Branfield whither art thou flown
That you are a poor prisoner condemned and alone
If John O'Neil of Shane's Castle only was here
In spite of (Dawson) n'er known he'd soon set you clear

On the day that young Higgins was condemned to die
The people rose up with a murmuring cry
Go catch her and crop her she's a perjuring whore
Young Dennis is innocent we are very sure

One thing yet remaining I ask you my friends
To wake me in Branfield amongst my dear friends
Bring my body to lie in Merrylee mold
And I hope that great God will pardon my soul

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Larry The Radio Guy
Date: 17 May 10 - 02:34 AM

I don't think anyone's mentioned Frankie (of Frankie and Johnny). Although, to some perspectives, she's OK because after all Johnny had "done her wrong".   

But how about the Leaving Home variation (popularized by Charlie Poole in the 1930's). Here Frankie kills Johnny (underneath her silk kimona she drew a 44 gun) not because he did her wrong, but simply because he was going away ("never coming home, goin' away to roam". Probably a borderline personality disordered woman for whom abandonment was the equivalent to death.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Leadfingers
Date: 16 May 10 - 04:49 AM

100

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 15 May 10 - 08:55 AM

Can't recall if anyone's mentioned Child 95 'Maid Freed From the Gallows' or 'The Prickle Eye Bush' yet? But it just dawned on me as a perfect candidate for this thread. Bunch of variants at SacredTexts.Com: Maid Freed from the Gallows

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 10 Apr 10 - 06:45 AM

I guess I could ask Joe to alter the title to include Villainesses?

Otherwise I found this silly quiz for anyone interested in finally and scientifically determining whether a character in a song - or indeed they themselves - be a Heroine, Ant-Heroine or Villainess ;-)

I ended up an Anti-Heroine - yay!

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 10 Apr 10 - 06:31 AM

Eppie Morrie ~~ just a heroine; what's supposed to be "anti-" about her? She defies and defeats her dishonorable abductor & his companions ~~ what's anti-heroic there?

Fanny Blair ~~ a straight villainess: not any kind of heroine, even an "anti-" one.

I'm getting tired of pointing out that an anti-heroine is not the same thing as a female villain. Can people really not comprehend this vital distinction?

~Michael~

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: LadyJean
Date: 10 Apr 10 - 01:43 AM

Nobody's mentioned Eppie Maurie, a favorite of mine for years. You have to love a woman who beats the tar out of her abductor.
Then of course there's Mary Hamilton, the royal mistress who drowns her baby.

Then there's Fanny Blair who perjured herself to hang young Higgens.

Or the nameless lady of the Long Black Veil.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 09 Apr 10 - 09:46 AM

A second battered wife 'vengeance' song, though rather less tragic (or indeed realistic) than the first. This time she's not resorting to alcohol as a (rather disempowered) means to spite him, but her *wits*, and of course she wins out in the end too as "it's goodbye to a drunken husband". So arguably the comedic feel to the song, is less troubling. Or maybe not. That's my take on it anyhoo.

Stitch in Time

Oh there was a woman and she lived on her own,
She slaved on her own and she skivvied on her own,
She'd two little girls and two little boys --
And she lived all alone with her husband.

For her husband he was a hunk of a man
A chunk of a man and a drunk of a man,
He was a hunk of a drunk and a skunk of a man
Such a boozing, bruising husband.

For he would come home drunk each night,
He thrashed her black, he thrashed her white;
He thrashed her, too, within an inch of her life,
Then he slept like a log, did her husband.

One night she gathered her tears all round her shame
She thought of the bruising and cried with the pain,
Oh, you'll not do that ever again,
I won't live with a drunken husband.

But as he lay and snored in bed,
A strange old thought came into her head,
She went for the needle, went for the thread,
And went straight in to her sleeping husband.

And she started to stitch with a girlish thrill
With a woman's heart and a seamstress' skill,
She bibbed and tucked with an iron will,
All around her sleeping husband.

Oh, the top sheet, the bottom sheet, too,
The blanket stitched to the mattress through,
She stitched and stitched for the whole night through
Then she waited for the dawn and her husband.

And when her husband woke with a pain in his head,
He found that he could not move in bed,
Sweet Christ, I've lost the use of me legs!
But this wife just smiled at her husband.

For in her hand she held the frying pan
With a flutter in her heart she given him a lam;
He could not move but he cried, ``God damn!''
``Don't you swear,'' she cried to her husband.

Then she thrashed him black, she thrashed him blue,
With the frying pan and the colander too,
With the rolling pin just a stroke or two
Such a battered and bleeding husband.

She said, ``If you ever come home drunk any more,
I'll stitch you in, I'll thrash you more,
Then I'll pack my bag and I'll be out the door,
I'll not live with a drunken husband.''

So isn't it true what small can do
With a thread and a thought and a stitch or two?
He's wiped his slate and his boozing's through
It's goodbye to a drunken husband.

Here's the young Lucy Ward singing it A Cappella (flagged up by Leveller elsewhere). I was pretty taken with her delivery: A Stitch in Time

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 09 Apr 10 - 09:46 AM

There are other versions on Spotify, including Sheila Stewart's.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 09 Apr 10 - 09:32 AM

This was proposed as a possible song for this thread by Jack Campin elsewhere. Unsure if it strictly fits in here, but maybe it does? Anyway I decided to add it along with another traditional song about a woman wreaking her own form of vengeance on an abusive husband. Neither are possibly very PC, but then arguably neither is infanticide or any number of the themes covered by this thread..

Blue Bleezing Blind Drunk

I'll go and I'll get blue bleezing blind drunk
Just to give Mickey a warning
And just for to spite I will stay out all night
And come rolling home drunk in the morning

Now friends, I have a sad story
A very sad story to tell
I married a man for his money
And he's worse than the devil himself

For when Mickey comes home in the evening
He batters me all black and blue
He knocks me about from the kitchen
From the bedroom right through to the room

For of whiskey I ne'er was a lover
But what can a poor woman do
I'll go and I'll drown all my sorrows
But I wish I could drown Mickey too

Recorded by Sheila Stewart (Stewarts of Blair)
SOF

Blue Bleezing Blind Drunk

Including a link to the Winterset's rendition above. Personally I found the first half of this almost unendurable and as someone who quite frankly knows how it is to be both physically assaulted and get properly drunk too, I found the delivery impossible to believe. The second half clearly represents a shift in character however, though I find it too jaunty to describe anyone I know that's been genuinely knocked about. Anyway, it's possibly a tricky song to deal with, as has been mentioned elsewhere - but this is the only version on YouTube so I don't know how others have dealt with it.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: GUEST,mayomick
Date: 27 Feb 10 - 06:28 PM

The cruel nourice (nurse) in Lamkin .

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
LAMKIN

It's Lamkin was a mason good
As ever built wi' stane,
He built Lord Wearie's castle
But payment he got nane.

But the nourice was a fause limmer
As e'er hung on a tree;
She laid a plot wi' Lamkin,
Whan her lord was o'er the sea.

She laid a plot wi' Lamkin,
When the servants were awa'
Loot him in at a little shot-window
And brought him to the ha'.

"Oh whare's the lady o' this house
That ca's me Lamkin?"
"She's up in her bower sewing
But we soon can bring her down.

Then Lamkin's ta'en a sharp knife
That hung down by his gair
And he has gien the bonny babe
A deep wound and a sair.

Then Lamkin he rocked,
And the fause nourice sang
Till frae ilka bore o' the cradle
The red blood out sprang.

"Oh still my bairn, nourice,
Oh still him wi' the pap!"
"He winna still, lady,
For this nor for that."

"Oh still my bairn, nourice,
Oh still him wi' the bell!"
"He winna still, lady,
Till ye come down yoursel."

Oh the firsten step she steppit
She steppit on a stane;
But the neisten step she steppit
She met him --- Lamkin.

"Oh sall I kill her, nourice,
Or sall I lat her be?"
"Oh kill her, kill her, Lamkin'
For she ne'er was good to me."

"Oh scour the bason, nourice,
And mak' it fair and clean,
For to keep this lady's heart's blood,
For she's come o' noble kin."

"There need nae bason, Lamkin,
Lat it run through the floor;
What better is the heart's blood
O' the rich than o' the poor?"

But ere three months were at an end,
Lord Wearie came again;
"Oh, wha's blood is this" he says,
"That lies in my hame?"

"Oh, wha's blood," says Lord Wearie,
"Is this on my ha'?"
"It is your young son's heart's blood,
It's the clearest ava'."

Oh sweetly sang the blackbird
That sat upon the tree;
But sairer grat Lannkin,
When he was condemned to dee.

And bonny sang the mavis,
Oot o'the thorny brake;
But sairer grat the nourice,
When she was burnt at the stake.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 27 Feb 10 - 04:16 PM

"but I am finding that the links from that page to the music don't work."

Odd. When I posted that link, everything linked to on the mirror was working fine. But now even the score is missing. That's frustrating as I haven't memorised the melody yet.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Richard Mellish
Date: 27 Feb 10 - 01:34 PM

Crow Sister said

> Ah, this is much better. From Digital Tradition Mirror:

with a link to http://sniff.numachi.com/pages/tiCLRKCLVL;ttCLRKCLVL.html

but I am finding that the links from that page to the music don't work.

Then Jack Campin said

> That mirrored version of Clerk Colvil/Colven has been drastically rewritten, and not for the better - the one in Bronson (and the Digitrad) is the version to go for.

but the words on that page are exactly the same as those at http://www.mudcat.org/@displaysong.cfm?SongID=1213

Confused of Harrow

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 26 Feb 10 - 11:26 AM

American traditional song 'Sea Lion Woman' (See Line Woman / C-Line Woman etc.) which is thought to be a corruption of 'see the lying woman', I think fits in with the anti-heroine remit.

Lots of remixes out there of the Nina Simone classic (which is the way I first heard it), here's another take by Christine and Katherine Shipp She Began to Lie

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: theleveller
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 06:43 AM

Well, there's the "false woman" in Two Butchers who slew Johnson, the Queen of Fairies in Tam Lin amd the landlady in Radcliffe Highway.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 05:57 AM

That mirrored version of Clerk Colvil/Colven has been drastically rewritten, and not for the better - the one in Bronson (and the Digitrad) is the version to go for.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Artful Codger
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 05:56 AM

Eve features in "Man Smart (Woman Smarter)," but she's only one of the anti-heroines, and none of them are particularly evil, just temptresses getting what they want.

Similarly, "Don't Bring Lulu" and "Whatever Lola Wants".

"The Female Robber" and "The Female Smuggler" are closer to the mark.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 05:38 AM

Ah, this is much better. From Digital Tradition Mirror:

Clerk Colvill

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: freda underhill
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 05:37 AM

from a more reecent tradition.
Loreena's Lament

(sung to the tune of the Banks of the Ohio)

I told my love go take a walk
Take a walk just a little walk
Down beside where the waters flow
Down by the banks of the Ohio

CH
And only say that you'll be mine
And in no others arms entwine
Down beside where the waters flow
Down by the banks of the Ohio

I took a knife unto his dick
And sliced right through that cheatin'prick
He cried Loreena don't ya mutilate me
I'm not prepared for celibacy

And only say that you'll be mine
And in no others arms entwine
Down beside where the waters flow
Down by the banks of the Ohio

I drove my car through the lonely night
And tossed that old fella off to the right
He dialed triple 9 for emergency
They found his manhood beneath a tree

And only say…etc

The po-lice man he didn't blink
He said Loreena you need a shrink
He said Loreena that just wasn't nice
And he thrust that dick on frozen ice

And only say…etc

The doctor came and sewed him up
I wept into my empty cup
He made a million on cheap porn flix
They counseled me and I got nix

And only say that you'll be mine
And in no others' arms entwine
Down beside where the waters flow
Down by the banks of the Ohio

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 05:24 AM

Found lyrics to Clerk Colvill, but no Midi - which is a bummer:

Clerk Colvill

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 02:06 AM

,,, & Dick Greenhaus [& others who make similar suggestions] ~ the Mothers in Gregory & Malison are NOT 'anti-heroines'; they are VILLAINESSES: an important semantic & taxonomical distinction that must be maintained if this thread is to make any sense.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 11:02 PM

Worth mentioning here the retelling by C19 poet of The Lady Of Carlyle, Leigh Hunt's The Glove & The Lions, which draws a somewhat different moral from that of the folk version:

She dropped her glove, to prove his love, then looked at him and smiled;
            He bowed, and in a moment leaped among the lions wild:
            The leap was quick, return was quick, he has regained his place,
            Then threw the glove, but not with love, right in the lady's face.
            "By God!" said Francis, "rightly done!" and he rose from where he sat:
            "No love," quoth he, "but vanity, sets love a task like that."

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 09:20 PM

dick greenhaus here, from a different puder

Young Charlotte (the frozen one)

The Lady of Carlyle (who dropped a glove in the lion's den)

The mothers in Mother's Malison and in Lord Gregory And there's always Mrs. Todd, the barber's wife

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 08:59 PM

Come to think of it, it's consensual between Colven and the mermaid. The one whose leave he isn't asking is the girlfriend he's left at home.

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 08:02 PM

In a somewhat lighter vein and perhaps not quite traditional yet:

Tom Lehrer's "Alma"

(Most of Lehrer's songs have MIDI files with the lyrics, this one doesn't).

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 06:13 PM

Subject: RE: Anti-Heroines in Traditional Song?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 05:20 PM

Another one: Clerk Colvil (Child 42). Colvil has sex with a mermaid (and "nor of his lady speer'd he leave"), immediately develops an excruciating headache, and she gleefully tells him it will get worse and worse until he dies, which he does the same night.

I posted about this on uk.music.folk a few years ago, after reading Quétel's "History of Syphilis". I believe the medical evidence dates this song very precisely, from the mid-1490s to 1508 at the latest. The reason is that the early phase of the syphilis epidemic in Europe was a far more virulent illness, but it seems to have mutated to something milder within ten years. The characteristic symptom of the early form was that it attacked the bones in the subacute (secondary) phase, within a few weeks. The disease ate the bones away from inside, causing limb fractures and excruciating pain, often intense headache as the bones of the skull disintegrated. Other organ systems could also be affected (sometimes causing death from internal rupturing); Quétel also describes one case of a man whose penis swelled so much from the disease that he couldn't get the fingers of both hands round it. This early form was frequently fatal within months, something that virtually never occurred after 1510. (If you survived a couple of years, the pain would subside and you'd only have gummatous ulcerations to deal with, unless you lived long enough to have the disease affect the brain and nervous system - most people in the late Middle Ages would die of something else first).

So, Colvil's illness fits this early form of syphilis pretty well, allowing for a bit of poetic licence in killing him off the same day. The song is a public health warning about raping mermaids.