Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: gillymor
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 07:08 PM

I think we should all resolve to henceforth sing the fifth verse like this:
And a snivelling snotfaced, habitually traitorous, crawly, little sneak of a page named Gavin,
Hearing what was said,
Swore that Lord Donald he would know,
Before the sun would set.

Seriously though, this is an excellent question Catrin. A whole spectrum of human foibles on display here.

Frankie

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Llanfair
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 06:51 PM

I appear to be voting with the majority, here, as the villain is definitely the brown-nosed page.
Now, Liz, where on earth do you get this notion that the naked male form is scary? Have you had some bad experiences, dear? would you like to share them with us?(Apologies for slipping into Social Worker mode, I'm better now) How on earth can anyone take all those dangly bits seriously?
'Course if they are not dangling, it's a different story, but SCARY? Never!!!!!
Bron.
Perhaps it's me? Perhaps being a serial monogamist has affected my perception...............Nah!!!!

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 04:52 PM

One good guy in the whole mess -- the daring member of the Lord's platoon of merry men who blew his horn to warn the sleeping(?) couple of the Lord's approach. Seems to me he did that at some risk to his own well-being. All the rest of the cast were clearly self-indulgent.

The Lord, by the way, in the version Paul Clayton collated from the singing of Boyd Bolling and Finlay Adams (Wise County, Virginia), was "off in some foreign country learning the tailor's trade." Hence, it would appear that the entire tragedy stemmed ultimately from the woeful condition of Scotland's impoverished nobility. Up the rebels!

Sandy

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Ely
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 04:51 PM

Well, I'd be inclined to think that, as a servant of the lord, the page was probably under a lot of pressure to report everything. If Lord XX found out later that stuff had been going on and the page hadn't reported it, the page would certainly have lost his head and it could have affected the rest of his family adversely, too--lords were big on *seriously* heavy fines and things of that nature. While I certainly think it was underhanded, he might have felt he had no choice. And he was probably a young man (if Matty can use it as an excuse, why shouldn't the page?).

I don't admire this kind of society but it was there anyway. I don't blame any one of them in particular.

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Catrin
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 04:42 PM

OK, for what it's worth I think there's a kind of consensus arising here - which is that the real 'baddy' (if indeed we do have to use such a term) is the snivelling snot faced page. If it weren't for him, nobody would have been any the wiser and life would have continued as normal.

but then.............

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Ely
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 03:24 PM

Oh, the whole situation was pathetic.

The wife shouldn't have been looking for boys on the side, but she was probably 17 and married to the 55-year-old of her parents' choosing (not that I object to 55-year-olds, but I'm sure my heart wouldn't be in the marriage, either, if I'd been pawned off for political alliances). On the other hand, I don't think I would risk my head for it. I'm told life is much more dramatic when you're 17, but I don't remember.

Matty was headed to church, but he knew he was doing wrong--he asked her if the horn wasn't Lord Arlen's (Donald's, whatever your version calls him), so he was clearly on edge. My dad would call this "natural selection"--if you're dumb enough to get caught sleeping with somebody else's wife, your genes probably won't be much missed.

Lord Arlen/Donald/etc. got kind of overexcited. Wives as possessions is certainly not my favorite approach to marriage, but I can't do much about 400-year-old social views. I always thought that the fact that he was pained enough by her infidelity to kill himself, too, was rather remarkable.

In short, I don't know. I don't really like any of them.

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Kim C
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 01:46 PM

Okey dokey. In the Norman Blake version that I have, Matty decides he's going to have Lord Daniel's wife. She is not necessarily a seductress in this instance but she doesn't appear to put up too much of a protest. In the end, Lord Daniel not only kills his lady and Matty, but also himself. The lady and Matty are buried together with Lord Daniel at their feet.

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Jacob B
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 01:44 PM

I've heard an American version in which the page is clearly the baddy, because he's a habitual traitor. The page in this version is identified as being Robert Ford (the member of the James Gang who shot Jesse James in the back.)

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 01:02 PM

Then there's Conrad Black...Canada's answer to Darth Vader. His humanity is questionable.

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: catspaw49
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 12:36 PM

Well Ian, most of us are....except for Conrad Bladey #1 Super Pissant. I'm not sure he's even a life form.

Sorry Jeri....hehehheehehehehehehehehe

Spaw

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: IanC
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 12:32 PM

I never really thought of anyone as "to blame". Seems to me its a ballad with something of the "inevitable tragic sequence" to it. Does anybody have to be the baddy? Aren't we all just human?

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Jeri
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 12:25 PM

Catspaw, you're disgusting. Now, I realize that Matty and Shady must be related because they have the same damned tune. (Which is eating away my brain as we speak.)

Matty Groves, my little love,
Matty Groves my dearie
Come home with me, my husbands gone,
And you have naught to fear.

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Catrin
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 12:20 PM

What a WONDERFUL discussion - I even stayed fifteen minutes late at work because of it!

Anyway - gotta go now, I'll check in when I get home

Catrin

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 12:18 PM

I bet that sneaky page was really Lord Donalds' catamite, that's why he did it - he wanted her dead so he could have Lord Donald to himself - after all, who would LD turn to in his grief but the trusty page who warned him of the cuckolding......

LTS

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 12:17 PM

There's a song there, Spaw!

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 12:15 PM

1. Matty was just going to church to hear the gospel, like any good, god-fearing person, in the days when holidays were not your bank holiday beanfeast, but a day to spend in church = the origin of holiday is Holy Day..... This was the era when you were fined for not going to church, if your station required you to be there. Churchwardens could come and look for you and drag you to the pillory if you couldn't come up with a good reason (like being dead!) for not attending divine service - which is what the 'gospel for to hear' would indicate. Churchwardens these days are a little more lenient. I wait until your favourite TV programme is on before phone you up.....

2. He was just looking around a little light conversation, maybe just wanting to ask Mrs Jones about her Berts' lumbago, or see if there was a new cobbler in town..... when this woman he identifies as Lady Donald approaches him and invites him home.... she may have needed a jar unscrewed, or a spider removed from the bedroom.... who can say.

3 He did try to remind her that she was married - as the single person, he would have been reasonably OK, if it were Lord Donald, it would have been more than OK, it was sort of expected, but because she was a woman, she gets the ultimate punishment, a clear case of sexism and male nepotism. She knew that the punishment would be more severe for her, but still she enticed him in.

4. That servant, he didn't have to go sneaking round and spying, he could have turned a blind eye - he must have been a slimy bit of work to have been doing his job when the boss wasn't around. Think of the blackmail possibilities he could have had, wasted. And I hope he got something nasty from swimming in the broad broad stream without his boots on.

And after all that, the silly woman STILL insists that he is better than her husband.... all she had to do was fake it, and she'd have been alright!!

LTS

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: catspaw49
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 12:14 PM

I'm surprised you all have missed the complicity in all of this by Matty's harlot of a sister, Shady Groves.

....Sorry....Go on with your discussion........

Spaw

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Catrin
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 12:06 PM

Kim C - different versions - in the one I know she 'casts her eyes about/ and there she spies little Matty Groves wolking in the crowd/ then up to him she did go /as quick as e'er she might..... (and propositions him - come to bed with me - or words of that effect)

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Jon W.
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 12:05 PM

Kim, that may not necessarily be the sequence in other versions of the song. In the one I know best, he's just in church to ogle the ladies but Lord Barnard's wife makes the first move. Not to say that Little Musgrave put up any hint of resistance - he went into the situation with both eyes open.

The only thing bad about this song is that there were two people left standing at the end. Lord Barnard should have hung the page for betraying his mistress and then fallen on his sword in grief over killing his wife. Now that would have been a worthy ballad. ;-)

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: AndyG
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 12:05 PM

I've always understood that naked man in this usage meant unarmed and/or unarmoured. Hence LD then gives Matty a sword.

AndyG

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: GUEST,Russ
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 12:03 PM

Who is the baddy? Depends upon your version and your personal perspective.

Matty Groves in all its incarnations is one of my favorite ballads. One of the things I love about Matty Groves is that every version tells basically the same story, but presents the "psychology" in a different way. There seems to be a version for my every mood. Some versions present Matty as the "victim" of a strong willed woman's seductive wiles. Doc Watson's version has Matty smugly predicting that "Although she is Lord Daniel's wife, she'll be with me tonight," but Christy Moore's version has Little Musgrave proclaiming to Lady Barnard that "I have loved you dear lady, for long and many a day". The little page is always the informant but sometimes it seems to be for spite and sometimes it seems to be for honor ("Although I am a lady's page, I am Lord Barnard's man.") In most versions the cuckolded lord is eager for confrontation and revenge, but Ray Fisher sings a version in which he tries to avoid it. He makes as much noise as possible marching to the castle and upon reaching the courtyard proclaims that "He whose in bed wi another man's wife had best be on his way." When confronted Matty is sometimes a wiseass and sometimes terrified. After the duel, sometimes the lord is happy at the disposal of adulterous rubbish and sometimes he deeply regrets the course of action he took.

It is Roshomon in ballad form.

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 12:01 PM

"they were all helpless victims of a brutal society"

Right on, Sophocleese!

However, we got a great folksong out of it. The only individual I would seriously censure in this tale, given the standards of the time and place in which it is set, is the little page. He should have kept his big mouth shut, and no one would have been the worse for it. I bet Lord Arlen had a few dalliances here and there on his looting and pillaging missions far afield, or his visits to the King's Court, or whatever. Of course, the double standard in those days was pretty extreme.

It's understandable that Lady Arlen would have been attracted to Matty Groves, and she probably felt rather like a bird in a gilded cage, longing for a taste of freedom.

It's totally understandable that Matty would fall prey to her charms...most men would have.

It's totally understandable that Lord Arlen would kill Matty and/or his wife upon returning...given the standards of the time, which were honour-bound and brutal in the extreme.

If this had been a Japanese tale it would have ended up equally tragically.

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Catrin
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 11:59 AM

It will never be said in fair England I slew a naked man...

D'you know sophoclese, it might sound surprising (and a bit embarrassing too) but I'd never noticed that contradiction - got me flummoxed that, a strange moral code indeed from a time about which I know little.

But 'Helpless victims' sounds a bit deterministic or something - not every member of that society would have made the decision to murder them both, surely. He could have (as in many songs) ran off to seek another life or even killed himself with his own broadsword (it happens) or he might have forgiven them and they both lived happily ever after (that doesn't happen)....

All this IMHO

Catrin

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Kim C
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 11:57 AM

All of them.

Now, I don't know that the woman necessarily enticed Matty. He's the one who says, See the fair one dressed in white? Although she is Lord Daniel's wife, I'll be with her tonight. He already had his mind made up.

It's a tragedy all the way around.

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: MMario
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 11:55 AM

1)- as stated, Matty was a man - so it wasn't his fault.

2)- Lady Donald - who can blame her? Lord Donald's off with his men-at arms and/or a flock of sheep (depends on the version) but where-ever he is he isn't home in bed with her.

3) - Lord Donald - hey, he was practicing his right to trial as lord of the land - couldn't be his fault

4) - it was the snively little page. If he'd kept his yap shut, Lady Donald could have presented Lord Donald with a whole string of children who looked nothing like him and everyone would have been happy.

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: AndyG
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 11:53 AM

Let's see,

Matty doesn't actually have many choices does he ? It's sort of;
"Hey, Big Boy, Do what I want or I'll use my social status to make your life unpleasant".
Followed by;
"What the F***? Who the F*** are YOU? Get up and die like a man!"

Lord Donald's Wife abuses power but if she's guilty of adultery then so is Matty.

Lady Donald's Husband over-reacts a bit granted but I'm not sure he'd want his private inadequacies dragged though the courts.

The Page. Well he's only doing his job you know. I mean a sworn vassal and all that. Can't go letting the side down can he?

All in all I think the villain is society for giving people holidays. It wouldn't have happened if Matty had been bringing the yearlings home with the boss instead of gallivanting about and hanging out round churches.

AndyG

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 11:53 AM

Male nudity is something that has always been considered scary - notice that the picture of the female nude is considered art, but the male nude is pornography. The Scots used this to great effect, as can be seen in the film 'Braveheart' although I understand that, like Kevin Costner in 'Robin, prince of thieves', Mel Gibson had a 'stunt bum' do those scenes. Funny that, cos Kevin did a full nudey bit in 'Dances with wolves'......

LTS, who tries to make a study of male nudity, purely in the interests of research.....

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: sophocleese
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 11:48 AM

I always wondered about a code of honour that suggested it was ungentlemanly to kill a naked, unarmed man but all right to kill an unarmed woman. They were all helpless victims of a brutal society.

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 11:43 AM

Ah but he was a bloke, men are notorious for being led astray at the drop of a consonant..... Weak willed and fickle, that's what he was.....

LTS

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Catrin
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 11:40 AM

Yeah LTS, I agree with both of those, but MG COULD have said no, couldn't he?

Subject: RE: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 11:36 AM

I think it is the woman for enticing him, and the page for being a crawly little sneak who would probably snitch on his own mother if he thought it would get him on in life.. I bet his name is Gavin....

LTS

Subject: Matty Groves - who's the 'baddy'?
From: Catrin
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 11:31 AM

I was about to nominate Matty Groves as a candidate for my favourite 'badman' song in that thread. However, I realised that it is difficult to pinpoint who IS the baddy in this one. Is it:-

a) Matty Groves - for sleeping with a married woman?
b) Lord Donald's wife for comitting adultary?
c) The little page for telling on them?
d) Lord Donald for murdering them both?
e) All of the above

I have had many interesting discussions with friends about this and opinions seem to differ depending on moral beliefs, historical knowledge and personal taste (to name but a few).

I know there are about a million different versions to this song but the story always seems to be the same - or is it?

I would love to hear mudcatters views on this.

Catrin