This is all proving very interesting. I have not a clue why I thought it was Irish but I am quite willing to accept it is not!
I find discussions like this very useful and valuable because I know so little about the music I sing.

I have a recording of Cilla Fisher singing it, Noreen and it caught my imagination completely. To be honest it gives me the shivers to sing it --because it is a truely awful picture it paints. Mainly, because the defiance within the Woman will never be actioned.

That is how I see it anyway but no doubt other's won't. Which would be good--and spark another discussion ;o)

Diz