Best Tales Yukon Pb [Paperback]

Robert W Service (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 2003

In 1904, the Canadian Bank of Commerce transferred teller Robert W. Service to the Yukon Territory. Soon, he was famous as the poet who chronicled the Klondike gold rush and the savage beauty of the frozen north. His tales of hard-bitten propectors and sourdoughs in "The Land God Forgot" make vivid, exciting reading. Here are all the brawling, colorful characters that Service immortalized, including One-Eyed Mike, Dangerous Dan McGrew, Pious Pete, Blasphemous Bill -- and, of course, the lady known as Lou.

Editorial Reviews

Review

The Ballad Of Blasphemous Bill
The Ballad Of Gum-boot Ben
The Ballad Of Hard-luck Henry
The Ballad Of One-eyed Mike
The Ballad Of Pious Pete
The Ballad Of The Black Fox Skin: 1
The Ballad Of The Black Fox Skin: 2
The Ballad Of The Black Fox Skin: 3
The Ballad Of The Black Fox Skin: 4
The Ballad Of The Northern Lights
The Black Sheep
The Call Of The Wild
Clancy Of The Mounted Police
Comfort
The Cremation Of Sam Mcgee
Grin
The Harpy
The Heart Of The Sourdough
L'envoi
L'envoi
The Land God Forgot
The Law Of The Yukon
The Little Old Log Cabin
The Lone Trail
Lost
The Low-down White
The Lure Of Little Voices
The Man From Eldorado: 1
The Man From Eldorado: 2
The Man From Eldorado: 3
The Man From Eldorado: 4
The Man From Eldorado: 5
Men Of The High North
The Men That Don't Fit In
Music In The Bush
My Friends
The Parson's Son
The Pines
Premonition
The Prospector
The Reckoning
The Rhyme Of The Remittance Man
The Rhyme Of The Restless Ones
The Shooting Of Dan Mcgrew
The Song Of The Mouth-organ
The Song Of The Wage-slave
The Telegraph Operator
The Three Voices
To The Man Of The High North
The Trail Of Ninety-eight
The Tramps
The Wood-cutter
The Younger Son
-- Table of Poems from Poem Finder® --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Robert William Service (1874–1958) was a poet and writer, sometimes referred to as "the Bard of the Yukon". He is best-known for his writings on the Canadian North, including the poems "The Shooting of Dan McGrew", "The Law of the Yukon", and "The Cremation of Sam McGee". His writing was so expressive that his readers took him for a hard-bitten old Klondike prospector, not the later-arriving bank clerk he actually was. In addition to his Yukon works, Service also wrote poetry set in locales as diverse as South Africa, Afghanistan, and New Zealand. His writing has a decidedly British Empire point of view. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 160 pages
• Publisher: Running Press; 1st edition (January 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0762414596
• ISBN-13: 978-0762414598
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.1 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,214,952 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

26 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "There are strange things done in the midnight sun...", December 4, 2004

By 

Monika "equestrienne_23" (Davis, California) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Best Tales Yukon Pb (Paperback)

Robert William Service (1874-1958), the son of a Scottish banker father and English mother, moved to Canada in 1896 at the age of twenty-two. After a failed attempt at farming and several years of drifting, he got a job with the Canadian Bank of Commerce in the Whitehorse, Yukon Territory in 1904, and was later transferred to Dawson. During his time in Canada, Service wrote numerous poems about life in the north. Though the Klondike Gold Rush had been mostly over by 1898, tales of it still abounded and from these he drew much of his inspiration. His first book of poetry, "The Spell of the Yukon and Other Verses," was published in 1907 (printed under the title "Songs of a Sourdough" in London), and was followed in 1909 with "Ballads of a Cheechako." In 1912 Service left Canada to take a job as war correspondent in the Balkans. He continued to write poetry, but moved on to other subject matter and did not return to Canada. Eventually Service ended up in France, where he married and resided until his death.

An Alaskan by birth, I grew up on Robert Service's poetry. My father read selections to me at bedtime when I was little, and I was fortunate enough to hear some professional dramatic readings of Service's work as well (if you're ever lucky enough to get such an opportunity, don't pass it up!). His poems perfectly capture life in the frozen north. His imagery is so vivid that you can see the rugged beauty of the wilderness in your mind's eye as you read. You can feel the biting cold of winters, too: "You know what it's like in the Yukon wild when it's sixty-nine below; When the iceworms wriggle their purple heads through the crust of the pale blue snow; When the pine trees crack like little guns in the silence of the wood; And the icicles hang down like tusks under the parka hood" (pg. 131, from "The Ballad of Blasphemous Bill"). Someone who's never been very far north can't fully imagine what it's like, but Service's words will get you as close as is possible, short of an actual trip.

Service's work also encapsulates the spirit of the men who roamed the Yukon during the Gold Rush era. The wanderlust, the loneliness, the foolish enthusiasm, the futility, the madness and the insanity - it's all there. You'll feel "half dazed, half crazed" yourself as you read some of these pieces. It's like a window into the past, into another time and place. And what makes Service's work even greater is his magnificent wit. The poems are full of dark, morbid humor, and laced with irony. "The Ballad of Hard-Luck Henry" (pg. 112) is a great example.

This particular book, "Best Tales of the Yukon," is a combination of poems from Service's first two books, "The Spell of the Yukon" and "Ballads of a Cheechako." It consists entirely of pieces written during his Canadian period, and the editors have arranged them so as to provide a "chronological saga of the Gold Rush" (pg. ix). They've done a magnificent job, beginning with "The Men That Don't Fit In" (pg. 14) and closing with "The Law of the Yukon" (pg. 145) and "Lost" (pg. 150). In between you'll find "The Shooting of Dan McGrew" (pg. 57) and "The Cremation of Sam McGee" (pg. 126), the two that would become his most famous and most frequently recited poems. My other favorites include "The Trail of 'Ninety-Eight" (pg. 28), "The Spell of the Yukon" (pg. 119), and "The Ballad of Blasphemous Bill" (pg. 130). All in all, there are 47 great poems for you to sink your teeth into. There is also a useful glossary at the back, offering definitions of the various Yukon-isms sprinkled throughout Service's work. Definitely worth adding to any collection of poetry and literature.

20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Poems/ballads about the Yukon people.Sad,witty&funny.Bravo!, September 17, 1996

By A Customer

This review is from: Best Tales of the Yukon (Paperback)

(1986)I'm stuck in Sinop,Turkey. At the radar station we are bored 'cause it's winter and right now nothing is going on when suddenly a voice from behind me starts what sounds at first like a lethany but evolves into a ballad. No music,just a voice, and it's telling a story... "There's a race of men that don't fit in, A race that can't stay still; So they break the hearts of kith and kin, And they roam the world at will. They range the field and they rove the flood, And they climb the mountain's crest. Theirs is the curse of the gypsy blood, And they don't know how to rest." You'll find more stories: of love, revenge, perseverance and faith. For the near winter season, nothing beats this collection. Nice for reading aloud by a fire or if unavailable, in a room with the TV off. You don't need to be a proffesional story teller. The prose will take care of everything...

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A deep and inqusitive piece of literature., February 18, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Best Tales of the Yukon (Paperback)

I loved this book and encourage others to read it. This book can chill your soul and at the same time make you feel warm inside. From the Cremation of Sam McGee to the Shooting of Dan McGrew, Mr. Service had me admiring his work especially after I read 'Grin' which adopts a good perspective of life. Excellent!