The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, Volume 1 [Paperback]

Francis James Child (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 22, 2008

First published 1883-1898, Professor Child's monumental work on the ballad tradition of England and Scotland stands as a foundation document for all subsequent ballad scholarship and for trends such as the twentieth century folk revival.

The English and Scottish Popular Ballads presents 305 distinct ballads, -- Volume III contains 114-188 -- most with multiple variants, with commentary that traces the origins of the ballad stories through the literature and traditions of much of the western world. Professor Child's painstaking research ranges from ancient Greece to medieval Norway, with translations and detailed citations for all of the sources on which he draws.

Out of print for decades, editions of this seminal work have become scarce. Loomis House Press is pleased to present the first new (non-facsimile) edition of the Child collection, completely re-set and edited to include all of Professor Child's post-publication corrections and additions. Volume III includes 30 ballad texts from the additions and 20 ballad tunes drawn from Child's original sources.

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Francis James Child (1825-1896) was educated at Harvard, Berlin, and Göttingen, and taught at Harvard for fifty years, in Rhetoric, English, and Modern Languages. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 634 pages
• Publisher: BiblioBazaar (February 22, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 055410511X
• ISBN-13: 978-0554105116
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.8 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent "corrected" edition, April 21, 2006

By 

J. R. Brown (Cambridge, MA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, Vol 1 (Paperback)

Child's "English and Scottish Popular Ballads" is THE sourcebook for anyone interested in the traditional ballads of the British Isles, and also invaluable to all aficionados of European folklore and folksong in general. For those not up on their terminology, a ballad is a folksong with a plot, and Child's collection covers everything from foul murders to star-crossed lovers to Robin Hood, in five volumes.

I am extremely happy that someone has finally issued an edition incorporating the various addenda and corrections that Child made before his death. There is nothing here that Child did not write, so if you are looking for additional scholarship or commentary you will be disappointed; but the Loomis House edition vastly improves over the Dover facsimiles in completeness and convenience. Additional variants, comments and even some tunes (the one big omission in the original) are placed conveniently near the main text of each category rather than buried in appendices (most of which aren't included in the Dover editions at all). It's well worth the few extra dollars over the Dover books.

My one quibble is that they do not reproduce some of the typographical distinctions that Child occasionally used to indicate different features of a text, but this is overshadowed by all the good points of this edition.

Overall this is a wonderful and affordable edition; I fervently hope that all five volumes are issued as planned (it's been almost a year since Volume 3 came out...). I have no idea why Amazon makes these books so hard to find on their site: fix this, guys!

In summary: Buy this book. Now if someone would only reprint Bertrand Bronson's "The Singing Tradition of Child's Popular Ballads" as well....

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars English & Scottish Popular Ballads Vol 1 by Francis James Ch, May 22, 2003

By 

"blarneystoneplayer" (Shanghai China) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, Vol 1 (Hardcover)

Superb. For anyone interested in either the words or origins of English & Scottish folk music this is essential. You can settle those arguments (over a beer) as to who has the correct words or the origin.

The biblography needs some getting used to but when you understand it you will find this book a good companion.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars finally back in print, May 26, 2004

By 

Clover (Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The English and Scottish Popular Ballads - Vol. II (Hardcover)

I first heard of the Child ballads when I was about 13 years old and have been looking for a copy ever since. I was delighted to discover they have been brought back into print. This publication is particularly exciting since the editors have chosen to include musical notation collected by Child but not included in the original publication. Many of the ballads still sung today in Eastern Canada and the US were derived from these ballads, so these books are a facinating study of the earlier origins of these and many other ballads from the british iles.