Ballads as Vessels for Collective Cultural Memory: A Critical Comparison of Alfred Noyes’s “The Highwayman” and Federico García Lorca’s “Romance sonámbulo”
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.24197/ersjes.42.2021.55-79Keywords:
ballad, memory, twentieth-century poetry, Spain, EnglandAbstract
Alfred Noyes’s “The Highwayman” (1906) and Federico García Lorca’s “Romance sonámbulo” (1928), two early twentieth-century ballad poems, serve as literary vessels for the collective memory of historical periods and share aesthetic and narrative similarities. Common images and colors (red, green) also illustrate both texts. The shared imagery calls attention to the ballads’ roles in preserving and transmitting collective memories. This study references the way that ballads stabilize in cultural memory, in line with David Rubin’s assessments of memory and literature in Memory in Oral Traditions (1995), as well as the studies of other scholars (e.g., Benjamin, Boyd, Connerton).
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References
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Potter, Lois. “Robin Hood and the Fairies: Alfred Noyes’ Sherwood.” Robin Hood: Medieval and Post-Medieval, edited by Helen Phillips, Four Courts, 2005, pp. 167–80.
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Sencourt, Robert. “Alfred Noyes.” The Contemporary Review, vol. 179, 1 Jan. 1951, p. 216, ProQuest, www.proquest.com/docview/1294633674/ B66656BFF0AD457BPQ/47?accountid=14778&imgSeq=1/.
Sencourt, Robert. “Alfred Noyes.” The Contemporary Review, vol. 194, 1 July 1958, p. 118, ProQuest, www.proquest.com/docview/1294626952/ EBEAB09C0A2C4C48PQ/42?accountid=14778&imgSeq=1/.
Soria Olmedo, Andrés, editor. Treinta entrevistas a Federico García Lorca. Aguilar, 1988.
The Sleepwalker (Sonámbulo) [animated short film]. Produced and animated by Theodore Ushev, Les Productions Unité centrale, Bonobostudio, 2015.
Wahnón, Sultana. “La recepción de García Lorca en la España de la posguerra.” Nueva Revista de Filología Hispánica, vol. 43, no. 2, 1995, pp. 409–31, doi:10.24201/nrfh.v43i2.1884.
Waugh, David, et al. Children's Literature in Primary Schools. Sage Publications, 2016, ProQuest Ebook Central, ebookcentral.proquest.com/ lib/pensu/detail.action?docID=5601698/.
Allen, Rupert. “An Analysis of Narrative and Symbol in Lorca's ‘Romance Sonámbulo’.” Hispanic Review, vol. 36, no. 4, 1968, pp. 338–52, JSTOR, doi:10.2307/471911.
Álvaro, José Luis, et al. “The Role of Values in Attitudes towards Violence: Discrimination against Moroccans and Romanian Gypsies in Spain.” The Spanish Journal of Psychology, vol. 18, E63, 2015, pp. 1–12, doi:10.1017/ sjp.2015.65.
Applebee, Arthur N. Literature in the Secondary School: Studies of Curriculum and Instruction in the United States. National Council of Teachers of English, 1993. ERIC: Institute of Education Sciences, files.eric.ed.gov/ fulltext/ED357370.pdf/.
“Asesinado por homosexual, socialista y masón: las hipótesis del misterio que rodean el fusilamiento de Federico García Lorca.” La Sexta, Madrid, 18 Aug. 2018, www.lasexta.com/noticias/cultura/asesinado-homosexual-socialista-mason-hipotesis-misterio-que-rodean-fusilamiento-federico-garcia-lorca_201808185b77f5040cf271b0ab7d5acf.html/.
Benjamin, Walter. “A Berlin Chronicle.” Reflections: Essays, Aphorisms, Autobiographical Writings, translated by Edmund Jephcott, edited by Peter Demetz, e-book, Google Play, Mariner Books, 2019, pp. 49–89.
Benjamin, Walter. “The Storyteller: Reflections on the Works of Nikolai Leskov.” Illuminations: Essays and Reflections, translated by Harry Zohn, edited by Hannah Arendt, 9th ed., Schocken Books, 2007, pp. 83–109.
Boyd, Carolyn P. “The Politics of History and Memory in Democratic Spain.” The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, vol. 617, 2008, pp. 133–48, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/25098018/.
Colby, Elbridge. “Who Is Alfred Noyes?” The Catholic World, vol. 97, no. 579, 1913, pp. 289–304, ProQuest, www.proquest.com//docview/1908374715? accountid=14778/.
Connerton, Paul. How Societies Remember. Cambridge UP, 1989.
Davison, Edward, and Alfred Noyes. “The Poetry of Alfred Noyes.” The English Journal, vol. 15, no. 4, 1926, pp. 247–55, JSTOR, doi:10.2307/ 802500.
DeLong-Tonelli, Beverly J. “The Lyric Dimension in Lorca’s ‘Romance sonámbulo’.” Romance Notes, vol. 12, no. 2, 1971, pp. 289–95, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/43802430/.
Dúo Flamenco. “Romance sonámbulo” [song]. Verde, 2011, Spotify, open.spotify.com/track/6rdZNTlO95jWwJZhekJVLJ/.
García Lorca, Federico. Bodas de sangre, edited by Allen Josephs and Juan Caballero, Cátedra, 1985.
García Lorca, Federico. La casa de Bernarda Alba, edited by M. Francisca Vilches de Frutos, 2nd ed., Cátedra, 2006.
García Lorca, Federico. Gypsy Ballads / Romancero gitano, edited, translated and introduced by Jane Duran and Gloria García Lorca, Enitharmon, 2011.
García Lorca, Federico. Poema del Cante Jondo / Romancero gitano, edited by Allen Josephs and Juan Caballero, 24th ed., Cátedra, 2006.
García Lorca, Federico. Poeta en Nueva York, edited by María Clementa Millán, Cátedra, 1994.
The Highwayman [film]. Directed by Lesley Selander, Monogram Pictures, 1951.
The Highwayman [short film]. Directed by Oliver Chater, Vimeo, 2016.
“The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes, Translated into American Sign Language.” YouTube, uploaded by Crom Saunders, 14 June 2018, www.youtube.com/ watch?v=x_wyKwGcOv0/.
Johnson, Rose. Sleepwalking, 2004 [mural]. Outer wall of the Jonquil Motel, Bisbee, Arizona, The Jonquil, www.thejonquil.com/amenities/.
Jones, Griff Rhys. Foreword. The Nation’s Favourite Poems, BBC, 1996.
Kassam, Ashifa. “Federico García Lorca Was Killed on Official Orders, Say 1960s Police Files.” The Guardian, 23 Apr. 2015, www.theguardian.com/ culture/2015/apr/23/federico-garcia-lorca-spanish-poet-killed-orders-spanish-civil-war/.
Lockwood, Michael, editor. Bringing Poetry Alive: A Guide to Classroom Practice, Sage Publications, 2011, ProQuest Ebook Central, ebookcentral. proquest.com/lib/pensu/detail.action?docID=786858/.
McKennitt, Loreena. “The Highwayman”. The Book of Secrets, Verve, 2006.
Mallon, Thomas. “At Large and at Small: On Not Being a Poet.” The American Scholar, vol. 69, no. 2, 2000, pp. 5–11, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/ 41212990/.
Montague, John. “The Bag Apron: The Poet and His Community.” Fortnight, vol. 376, 1999, pp. 19–22, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/25559623/.
Noyes, Alfred. “The Highwayman.” Blackwood’s Magazine, no. 1090, vol. 180, 1906, pp. 244–47, Internet Archive, archive.org/details/ blackwoodsmagazi180edinuoft/page/n7/mode/2up/.
Noyes, Alfred. “The Highwayman.” Forty Singing Seamen and Other Poems. William Blackwood, 1907, pp. 35–43. Internet Archive, archive.org/ details/fortysingingseam00noye/page/n5/.
Noyes, Alfred. The Highwayman. Illustrated by Charles Keeping, Oxford UP, 1987.
Noyes, Alfred. The Highwayman [1929 audio recording]. Read by Alfred Noyes, The Digital Gramophone, Amazon Music, 2014.
Noyes, Alfred. Two Worlds for Memory. J. B. Lippincott, 1953, Internet Archive, archive.org/details/twoworldsformemo00noye/page/n9/mode/2up/.
Pastoureau, Michel. Green: The History of a Color. Translated by Jody Gladding, Princeton UP, 2014.
Pastoureau, Michel. Red: The History of a Color. Translated by Jody Gladding, Princeton UP, 2017.
“Poet Noyes to Join Princeton Faculty.” The New York Times, 26 Feb. 1914, Times Machine, timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1914/02/26/ 101382025.html/.
Potter, Lois. “Robin Hood and the Fairies: Alfred Noyes’ Sherwood.” Robin Hood: Medieval and Post-Medieval, edited by Helen Phillips, Four Courts, 2005, pp. 167–80.
Reid-Pharr, Robert F. “Lorca’s Deathly Poetics.” Archives of Flesh: African America, Spain, and Post-Humanist Critique. New York UP, 2016, pp. 72–117, JSTOR, doi:10.2307/j.ctt1bj4qsh.6.
Rubin, David C. Memory in Oral Traditions: The Cognitive Psychology of Epic, Ballads, and Counting-Out Rhymes. Oxford UP, 1995. ProQuest Ebook Central, ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/pensu/detail.action?docID= 272281/.
Sencourt, Robert. “Alfred Noyes.” The Contemporary Review, vol. 179, 1 Jan. 1951, p. 216, ProQuest, www.proquest.com/docview/1294633674/ B66656BFF0AD457BPQ/47?accountid=14778&imgSeq=1/.
Sencourt, Robert. “Alfred Noyes.” The Contemporary Review, vol. 194, 1 July 1958, p. 118, ProQuest, www.proquest.com/docview/1294626952/ EBEAB09C0A2C4C48PQ/42?accountid=14778&imgSeq=1/.
Soria Olmedo, Andrés, editor. Treinta entrevistas a Federico García Lorca. Aguilar, 1988.
The Sleepwalker (Sonámbulo) [animated short film]. Produced and animated by Theodore Ushev, Les Productions Unité centrale, Bonobostudio, 2015.
Wahnón, Sultana. “La recepción de García Lorca en la España de la posguerra.” Nueva Revista de Filología Hispánica, vol. 43, no. 2, 1995, pp. 409–31, doi:10.24201/nrfh.v43i2.1884.
Waugh, David, et al. Children's Literature in Primary Schools. Sage Publications, 2016, ProQuest Ebook Central, ebookcentral.proquest.com/ lib/pensu/detail.action?docID=5601698/.
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Published
08/11/2021
How to Cite
Fellie, M. C. “Ballads As Vessels for Collective Cultural Memory: A Critical Comparison of Alfred Noyes’s “The Highwayman” and Federico García Lorca’s ‘Romance sonámbulo’”. ES Review. Spanish Journal of English Studies, no. 42, Nov. 2021, pp. 55-79, doi:10.24197/ersjes.42.2021.55-79.
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