Author: Anne B. Cohen
Publisher: University of Texas Press
ISBN: 029273512X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 148
Book Description
The year was 1896, and nineteenth-century journalists called the murder of Pearl Bryan the "Crime of the Century." From the day Pearl's headless body was found to the execution of her murderers on the gallows, the details of the murder fascinated newspaper reporters and ballad composers alike. Often glossing over the facts of the case, newspaper accounts presented the events according to stereotypes that were remarkably similar to those found in well-known murdered-girl ballads, such as "Pretty Polly," "Omie Wise," and "The Jealous Lover." Events, characters, motivations, and plot were presented through this framework: the simple country girl led astray by a clever degenerate. Nearly all variants of the Pearl Bryan ballad point the same moral: Young ladies now take warning Young men are so unjust, It may be your best lover But you know not whom to trust. Representations of this formula appear in such diverse genres as the ballad "Poor Ellen Smith" and the novel An American Tragedy. As Anne Cohen demonstrates, both newspaper accounts and ballads tell the Pearl Bryan story from the same moral stance, express the same interpretation of character, and are interested in the same details. Both distort facts to accommodate a shared pattern of storytelling. This pattern consists of a plot formula—the murdered-girl formula—that is accompanied by stereotyped scenes, actors, and phrases. The headless body—surely the most striking element in the Pearl Bryan case—is absent from those ballads that have survived. Anne Cohen contends that a decapitated heroine does not belong to the formula—a murdered heroine, yes, but not a decapitated one. Similarly, newspapers made much of Pearl's "innocence" and tended to downplay the second murderer. Only one murderer, the lover, belongs to the stereotype. Poor Pearl, Poor Girl! is a ballad study conducted on historic- geographic lines; that is, it seeks to trace the history and interrelations of a series of ballad texts and to relate the ballads directly to their ideological and historical context in the American scene. It also compares the narrative techniques of ballad composition with the techniques of other forms of popular narrative, especially newspaper journalism.
Poor Pearl, Poor Girl!
Author: Anne B. Cohen
Publisher: University of Texas Press
ISBN: 029273512X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 148
Book Description
The year was 1896, and nineteenth-century journalists called the murder of Pearl Bryan the "Crime of the Century." From the day Pearl's headless body was found to the execution of her murderers on the gallows, the details of the murder fascinated newspaper reporters and ballad composers alike. Often glossing over the facts of the case, newspaper accounts presented the events according to stereotypes that were remarkably similar to those found in well-known murdered-girl ballads, such as "Pretty Polly," "Omie Wise," and "The Jealous Lover." Events, characters, motivations, and plot were presented through this framework: the simple country girl led astray by a clever degenerate. Nearly all variants of the Pearl Bryan ballad point the same moral: Young ladies now take warning Young men are so unjust, It may be your best lover But you know not whom to trust. Representations of this formula appear in such diverse genres as the ballad "Poor Ellen Smith" and the novel An American Tragedy. As Anne Cohen demonstrates, both newspaper accounts and ballads tell the Pearl Bryan story from the same moral stance, express the same interpretation of character, and are interested in the same details. Both distort facts to accommodate a shared pattern of storytelling. This pattern consists of a plot formula—the murdered-girl formula—that is accompanied by stereotyped scenes, actors, and phrases. The headless body—surely the most striking element in the Pearl Bryan case—is absent from those ballads that have survived. Anne Cohen contends that a decapitated heroine does not belong to the formula—a murdered heroine, yes, but not a decapitated one. Similarly, newspapers made much of Pearl's "innocence" and tended to downplay the second murderer. Only one murderer, the lover, belongs to the stereotype. Poor Pearl, Poor Girl! is a ballad study conducted on historic- geographic lines; that is, it seeks to trace the history and interrelations of a series of ballad texts and to relate the ballads directly to their ideological and historical context in the American scene. It also compares the narrative techniques of ballad composition with the techniques of other forms of popular narrative, especially newspaper journalism.
Publisher: University of Texas Press
ISBN: 029273512X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 148
Book Description
The year was 1896, and nineteenth-century journalists called the murder of Pearl Bryan the "Crime of the Century." From the day Pearl's headless body was found to the execution of her murderers on the gallows, the details of the murder fascinated newspaper reporters and ballad composers alike. Often glossing over the facts of the case, newspaper accounts presented the events according to stereotypes that were remarkably similar to those found in well-known murdered-girl ballads, such as "Pretty Polly," "Omie Wise," and "The Jealous Lover." Events, characters, motivations, and plot were presented through this framework: the simple country girl led astray by a clever degenerate. Nearly all variants of the Pearl Bryan ballad point the same moral: Young ladies now take warning Young men are so unjust, It may be your best lover But you know not whom to trust. Representations of this formula appear in such diverse genres as the ballad "Poor Ellen Smith" and the novel An American Tragedy. As Anne Cohen demonstrates, both newspaper accounts and ballads tell the Pearl Bryan story from the same moral stance, express the same interpretation of character, and are interested in the same details. Both distort facts to accommodate a shared pattern of storytelling. This pattern consists of a plot formula—the murdered-girl formula—that is accompanied by stereotyped scenes, actors, and phrases. The headless body—surely the most striking element in the Pearl Bryan case—is absent from those ballads that have survived. Anne Cohen contends that a decapitated heroine does not belong to the formula—a murdered heroine, yes, but not a decapitated one. Similarly, newspapers made much of Pearl's "innocence" and tended to downplay the second murderer. Only one murderer, the lover, belongs to the stereotype. Poor Pearl, Poor Girl! is a ballad study conducted on historic- geographic lines; that is, it seeks to trace the history and interrelations of a series of ballad texts and to relate the ballads directly to their ideological and historical context in the American scene. It also compares the narrative techniques of ballad composition with the techniques of other forms of popular narrative, especially newspaper journalism.
Poor Pearl, Poor Girl!
Author: Anne B. Cohen
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 131
Book Description
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 131
Book Description
Poor Pearl, Poor Girl!
Author: Anne B. Cohen
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 149
Book Description
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 149
Book Description
The Ladies' Repository
Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 614
Book Description
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 614
Book Description
Echoes of Life
Author: Mrs. Grace Townsend
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : English poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 642
Book Description
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : English poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 642
Book Description
Poems that Never Die
Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : American poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 570
Book Description
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : American poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 570
Book Description
ECHOES OF LIFE OR BEAUTIFUL GEMS OF POETRY AND PROSE
Author: GRACE TOWNSEND
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 686
Book Description
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 686
Book Description
Echoes of Life Or, Beautiful Gems of Poetry and Song
Author: Grace Townsend
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : English poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 570
Book Description
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : English poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 570
Book Description
Storytelling Rights
Author: Amy Shuman
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521030045
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 244
Book Description
Based on intensive fieldwork in an urban American junior high school, this original study explores the relationship between oral and written texts in everyday life by analysing tellings and retellings of local events, diaries, writings and discussions.
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521030045
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 244
Book Description
Based on intensive fieldwork in an urban American junior high school, this original study explores the relationship between oral and written texts in everyday life by analysing tellings and retellings of local events, diaries, writings and discussions.
The Pedagogical Seminary
Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Child development
Languages : en
Pages : 560
Book Description
Vols. 5-15 include "Bibliography of child study," by Louis N. Wilson.
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Child development
Languages : en
Pages : 560
Book Description
Vols. 5-15 include "Bibliography of child study," by Louis N. Wilson.