Origins: Fairy Ballad Book by Coleridge, maybe

Subject: Origins: Fairy Ballad Book by Coleridge, maybe
From: GUEST
Date: 29 May 18 - 02:38 PM

Does anybody know anything about this book, the Fairy Ballad Book. It is said to be by the "author of Endymion's Dream" which would be Samuel Taylor Coleridge but it seems not to have been published until 1891 and he died in 1834. It is a set of ballads, or poems in ballad style, based on stories from the Brothers Grimm. I was especially interested in the Six Swans, starts on page 4.

Here is a link to the text
Fairy Ballad Book
https://books.google.com/books?id=c6ssAQAAMAAJ
Author of Endymion's dream - 1891
I hope that link works.
I'm going to add a link in case that one doesn't.
Fairy Ballad Book

Subject: RE: Origins: Fairy Ballad Book by Coleridge, maybe
From: leeneia
Date: 29 May 18 - 10:30 PM

Thanks. I will check it out tomorrow.

Subject: RE: Origins: Fairy Ballad Book by Coleridge, maybe
From: Joe Offer
Date: 29 May 18 - 11:41 PM

Boy, I dunno. My searching suggests that Keats is also a possibility, but that's not clear at all.

Subject: RE: Origins: Fairy Ballad Book by Coleridge, maybe
From: Greenie
Date: 30 May 18 - 02:06 AM

It would seem that the author is yet to be identified.

A search of Copac, the online catalogue of all the major UK libraries, produces three books by the same author:

Copac - Fairy Ballad Book

Endymion's Dream;
Fairy Ballad Book; and,
East and West; or, Alexander's death.

If any of the cataloguers had identified the author, and the British Library usually tries very hard to do so, it would be noted in the record.

It might be worth emailing one or all of the copyright libraries:

    British Library, London.
    Bodleian Library, Oxford.
    Cambridge University Library.
    National Library of Scotland, Edinburgh.
    Trinity College, Dublin.
    National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth.

If that fails, someone needs to search the archives of the publisher, George Bell and Sons.

Sorry I can't be more help.

Greenie

Subject: RE: Origins: Fairy Ballad Book by Coleridge, maybe
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 30 May 18 - 03:01 AM

Date's a bit awry but is this a hint

John Keats 1795-1821 (Eng poet): Adonais - Beware of the Soldier - Byron - Choral Symphony (Holst) - Come Sleep - Endymion - Endymion’s Dream - Endymion’s Narrative - Hyperion - Isabella - Lamia - La belle dame sans merci - Lontano - Nocturne (Britten, n.7) - Ode to a Nightingale - Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings (n.6) - Sommcrnacht - The Eve of Saint Agnes - Two Odes of Keats.

Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Origins: Fairy Ballad Book by Coleridge, maybe
From: leeneia
Date: 30 May 18 - 09:15 AM

Well now, what difference does it really make who wrote it? Is it worth reading? Are the poems worth setting to music or reciting?

I've read the first poem and am not certain yet. Today's a busy day.

Subject: RE: Origins: Fairy Ballad Book by Coleridge, maybe
From: Jack Campin
Date: 30 May 18 - 10:47 AM

"Endymion's Dream" is a cantata by the African-English composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor. No relation to Samuel Taylor Coleridge. The text was by C.R.B. Barrett, whoever that was.

Subject: RE: Origins: Fairy Ballad Book by Coleridge, maybe
From: Mick Pearce (MCP)
Date: 30 May 18 - 06:34 PM

Charles Raymond Booth Barrett 1850?- so says entry for Endymion's Dream at IMSLP.

He seems to have written several books on places and history and maybe some illustration too.

Mick

Subject: RE: Origins: Fairy Ballad Book by Coleridge, maybe
From: GUEST,Greenie
Date: 31 May 18 - 09:20 AM

Mick,

Unlikely to be the same "Endymion's Dream" - that link you provided states "First Publication 1910, Novello and Co", nineteen years after Fairy Ballad Book was published and so at least 19 years after this author's "Endymion's Dream" was issued.

Greenie

Subject: RE: Origins: Fairy Ballad Book by Coleridge, maybe
From: Mick Pearce (MCP)
Date: 31 May 18 - 10:01 AM

He published Essex highways, byways, and waterways in 1892, Charterhouse, 1611-1895 : in pen and ink in 1895 and Battles and Battlefields in England in 1896, so I don't think that rules him out.


Mick

Subject: RE: Origins: Fairy Ballad Book by Coleridge, maybe
From: Lighter
Date: 31 May 18 - 12:52 PM

The (London) Athenaeum printed a review of "Endymion's Dream: A Comedy Masque," from the same publisher, in its issue for Aug.16, 1890, p, 236.

The author was not identified.

The critical verdict, in part, was "excruciating."

Subject: RE: Origins: Fairy Ballad Book by Coleridge, maybe
From: GUEST,guest, Six Swans
Date: 01 Jun 18 - 07:23 PM

thanks, everybody, I really appreciate it. I also noticed that the British Library record did not give any proper name for the author which I thought was odd. It might be a case of people pretending to be Chaucer to sell more copies. Here is a little more about it, I was hoping to find music for it. There is some music by Peter Quinn titled Six Swans, along with music for titles to other Grimm Fairy Tales, but it didn't look like a fit to me. Anyway, it's beyond my ability to play it.

The Six Swans

Drop, drop salt tears, but voice be dumb,
Toil weary hands till morning come,
My six fair brothers fly white swans,
And I alone may loose their bonds.

Rude stinging nettles must I reap,
And on my back the burden heap,
And beat the hemp and spin the thread
Until six years are come and sped.

That’s the first two verses. It really doesn’t look too singable, to be honest.

I meant that the link I posted before should take you directly to the poem not just to the whole book on the internet. This link might take you to page 4, the beginning of this song or poem.
https://books.google.com/books?id=c6ssAQAAMAAJ&pg=PP15

Six Swans

Thanks again, I'll look up some of the stuff people mentioned.

Subject: RE: Origins: Fairy Ballad Book by Coleridge, maybe
From: GUEST,Greenie
Date: 05 Jun 18 - 02:08 AM

I took my own advice and emailed the British Library.

This is the reply:

"I'm afraid that I haven't been able to find any further information about the author of The Fairy Ballad Book, Endymion's Dream and East and West; or, Alexander's Death, all of which have been published anonymously. If this information was readily available I would have expected it to have been recorded either in our catalogue record, or in the catalogue of the Bodleian Library, Cambridge University Library or the National Library of Scotland (all of which hold copies of at least one of these books).

This may be a bit of a long-shot, but I wonder whether the archives of George Bell & Sons, the publisher of The Fairy Ballad Book, might help to shed further light on the identity of the author? The National Archives' Discovery platform suggests that material relating to this publisher is held at the University of Reading Library's Special Collection's Department ( http://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/results/c?_aq=George%20Bell&_dss=range&_st=faadv ), so it might be worth getting in touch with them for further advice: https://www.reading.ac.uk/special-collections/ "