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Broadside ballad entitled 'Sweetheart May' |
CommentaryVerse 1: 'Long ago an angel I knew, if ever a one was seen, / She was a bonny sweet child of eight, and I was just eighteen: / And every night she'd sit on my knee, her arms round my neck and say / I love you, I love you, and when I grow big, now promise to marry your May.' This broadside was published by the Poet's Box in Dundee and priced at one penny. This song is based on the common phenomenon of young children making heroes of those a few years older than them. As the narrator suspects, when he returns after several years of travelling, his 'Sweetheart May' has grown out of her childhood crush, has forgotten all about him and is engaged to be married. It is not clear what the connection between the different Poet?s Boxes were. They almost certainly sold each other?s sheets. It is known that John Sanderson in Edinburgh often wrote to the Leitches in Glasgow for songs and that later his brother Charles obtained copies of songs from the Dundee Poet?s Box. There was also a Poet?s Box in Belfast from 1846 to 1856 at the address of the printer James Moore, and one at Paisley in the early 1850s, owned by William Anderson. Early ballads were dramatic or humorous narrative songs derived from folk culture that predated printing. Originally perpetuated by word of mouth, many ballads survive because they were recorded on broadsides. Musical notation was rarely printed, as tunes were usually established favourites. The term 'ballad' eventually applied more broadly to any kind of topical or popular verse.
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Probable period of publication:
1880-1900 shelfmark: L.C.Fol.70(64b)
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