My mother said I never should
Play with the gypsies in the wood.
If I did, she would say
`Naughty girl to run away’
The woods were dark, the grass was green
In came Sally with her tambourine,
The sea was wide, no ship to get across,
I paid 10 shillings for a blind white horse,
I was up on her back and was off in a crack,
Sally, tell my mother I shall never come back.
This rhyme’s been going through my head a lot lately as I try to puzzle out the connection between the Tory venom being poured out over the heads of Travellers and that being spewed from the same source on non-white immigrants. Among other things, it’s a rhyme about female independence – our heroine, the “naughty girl,” catches a glimpse of the world’s splendour, the darkness of its woods, its verdant grass, the unfathomable wideness of its seas. She glimpses a life that does not involve dying in the same town she was born in. And that’s it – she’s out of there so damn fast that the sparks fly up from her heels. Sally, tell my mother I shall never come back.
This isn’t the only rhyme out there about gypsies on this theme. The Three Gypsies is another. It tells of a rich woman, newly married, adorned with golden rings, silken gowns and high-heeled shoes of Spanish leather. A lovely picture of impractically-dressed docility and domesticity. And the very first chance she gets, she abandons all that to go “off with the wraggle taggle gypies.” When her new-wedded lord chases her down and asks why she left all her material comforts she replies defiantly
What care I for my new wedded lord? I’m off with the wraggle taggle gypsies-O!”
“Last night you slept on a goose-feathered bed, with the sheet turned down so bravely-O.
Tonight you sleep in a cold open field along with the wraggle taggle gypsies-O!”
“O what care I for my goose-feathered bed with the sheet turned down so bravely-O?
Tonight I’ll sleep in a cold open field along with the wraggle taggle gypsies-O!”
Choosing an uncomfortable freedom over a comfortable captivity.
These verses treat gypsies as romantic figures – I’m not interested in doing that here, or at least not only that. Well maybe a little – we’ll see. To be a female Roma (travelling or not) or a Traveller (Roma or not) is not to inhabit a feminist paradise. For that, we must evidently wait a little longer. And to romanticise the lives of Travellers is all-too-often to conveniently forget the quite extraordinary levels of social exclusion, ostracism, and flat-out-in-your-face discrimination that they routinely encounter. Much of which is aimed at making them sit down, shut up and above all else, stay put. The U.K. government provided a classic example of this last December, when it was revealed that Roma were 400 times more likely than non-Roma to be prevented from boarding planes to the U.K. from the Czech Republic, because of Home Office practices that have since been overturned as illegal discrimination.
But immigration restrictions, we are told with breathtaking, bare-faced sincerity, have nothing to do with racism.
But back to this puzzle – the connection between the venom directed at Travellers and immigrants. Yeah sure, lots of it is the racialised fear of the outsider, the interloper, the alien, the stranger who will steal “our” jobs, move into “our” neighbourhoods, take over “our” country, subvert “our” customs and seduce “our” children. Hmm. “O what care I for my goose-feather bed?”
And one thing is certain – where patriotism is planted, an abundant crop of xenophobia and racism soon becomes ripe for the picking.
Look, in a world where patriotism is virtuous, belonging stops at the borders. And people whose lives don’t align with the borders – who insist on having their feet in both camps, who have it in their hands both ways, who won’t stay put, who, for whatever reason, don’t accept geography as destiny – they are suspect. Because despite what you get told, patriotism has nothing to do with love: it’s about exclusion – and untidy people who can neither be included nor excluded throw the whole shebang into a state of ugly disarray.
But for my money, while patriotism explains a lot, it’s not the whole picture. I blame envy too. Not material envy. Most know that the immigrants and Travellers who bear the brunt of the hatred that the Tories are whipping up are, for the most part, desperately poor. Most also know in their heart of hearts that the asylum seekers they so revile have often fled for their lives from the most appalling of situations. But, nonetheless, envy is part of this – envy for knowing how to live in more than one place. Envy for a kind of knowledge that is incommensurate with unproblematic belonging.
After all, in The Three Gypsies it’s not the new-wedded lord who’s the hero, despite all of his riches and his finery. It’s the woman who abandons all of that to live under an open sky – it’s her life that we are invited to see as rich with possibility. Why? Because she will belong everywhere and nowhere. She will tell stories of distant places, and perhaps see some of the wonders of the world. Because borders will be just one more rule for breaking as she slips through the hole in the wire.
Well, you’ll note that my obsession with freedom of movement continues =/
Flame away.
First of all, GREAT post! Nais tuke for sharing your talent with earth residents. 🙂
I wonder if you are confusing patriotism with nationalism, though. True patriotism is more likely to say, hey this is a great place, come on in! Coke machine’s over there, your arrival speaks well of your good taste!
Nationalism, on the other hand, tends to creep into jingoism, exclusivity, this is mine, its the bestest and you werent born here so you aren’t as good as me, so shoo! begone like the vermin you are!
Some glitches in transition during this period of changing global demographics would be inevitable in the best of circumstances, but a variety of factors have come together to escalate a patchy annoying rash into a necrotizing system wide life-threatening flesh-eater. Balkanization on steroids.
Ah — you have stumbled upon upon one of my other ongoing obsessions =)
Which would be patriotism and nationalism and whether there’s any difference between them.
For a whole variety of reasons, I’m not convinced that these two are really separate at all — I think that nationalism often acts as a kind of screen onto which all of the dangerous things about patriotism can be projected. Hmm. Have you come across Robert Jensen’s Saying Goodbye to Patriotism
I share a lot of his opinions on this one.
I have been a big fan of Jensen’s for a long time. An Austinite, he often writes op-eds for our local paper (which invariably set off a flurry of sputtering LTE’s from wingers). In the piece you link to, he says:
We can make that statement without having to argue that we are, in some essential way, better than everyone else. We can make that statement without arrogantly suggesting that other people are inherently less capable of articulating or enacting high ideals. We can make that statement and be ready and willing to engage in debate and discussion about the merits of different values and systems. . . .
If one wants to call that statement an expression of patriotism, I will not spend too much time arguing. But I will ask: If we make a statement like that, why do we need to call it an expression of patriotism?
As always, I find myself agreeing with Jensen about almost everything, except . . .
I think and feel strongly, exactly what he says so well:
and I don’t know what else to call it, other than “patriotism.” Of course, like Jensen, I am appalled by this definition of patriotism in his quote from Emma Goldman:
But if I declare myself to be an “internationalist” and refuse to describe myself any longer as “patriotic,” how do I express my “deep emotional ties” to America and to its “people, land, and ideals.” Those ties are deep and real to me. His writing is always thought-provoking, but having had my thoughts provoked, I’m going to continue to consider myself patriotic. I think he wanders from the main point and focuses too much on the word itself, when what is more important is “highlight[ing] the positive while working to change what is wrong.”
“But if I declare myself to be an “internationalist” and refuse to describe myself any longer as “patriotic,” how do I express my “deep emotional ties” to America and to its “people, land, and ideals.”
Exactly the way you just did, I think. Being internationalist isn’t about refusing to have an affection for particular places, but I think it is about refusing to appropriate human ideals as national ideals.
Part of why the Jensen article speaks to me fairly strongly — especially his critique of the “kinder and gentler style of patriotism,” because let’s face it, ‘crude patriotism’ is an easy target — is because he captures so much of what I found unwelcoming and awkward about the anti-war movement and the union movement in the U.S. (I was somewhat active in the former and very active in the latter). Certainly in my union, those of us who were non-nationals found that U.S. patriotism — even of the ‘kinder, gentler’ form — precluded any possibility of real solidarity.
Where I think he doesn’t go far enough is in thinking about patriotism and ownership — who is and who is not allowed to claim to be a ‘patriot’ and avail themselves of the legitimacy and the claim to be taken seriously that the mantle of patriotism affords.
For example, I lived in the MidWest for a good few years and I have considerable affection for the town where I lived. I miss bluejays and cardinals, deer in the woods near my apartment complex, lightning storms and tornado skies, February thaws and April snow. And I miss a lot of my friends terribly, especially since going back to visit is a difficult proposition. Does that make me a U.S. patriot? If you say ‘yes,’ I suspect you’d be in a very small minority. But if you say ‘no’ — what’s the foundation for that refusal? Because it’s not a lack of affection or emotional ties.
As for me, I’d say “No” with multiple exclamation marks and a cherry on top, but I’m not any kind of patriot for anywhere in the world.
A wonderful and thought provoking diary, and, as an added bonus it made me dig up a song by the Oyster Band that touches on similar themes, as well as some vintage Steel Eye Span-so I’m a swirl in music and wonder, great way to start the day! The SSpan version of the song you quoted uses Black Jack Davy in place of gypsies, with a leaning toward a woman leaving the traditional upper class blond to run off with the dangerous if thread bare brunette. And the OS updates the theme of a woman striking off on her own in lovely style
“And when she felt her wings unfold
All the tales that she’d been told
And the heavy shoes and the band of gold
Fell away like melting snow…”
People who break boundaries in general, women in particular scare people, that’s the best thing I can come up with. Everyone must stay in their own little spot and strictly defined role in same or, or…well who knows? Seems to me to be another version of why GLBT people scare some people, they don’t stay in the roles, they break boundaries just by existing.
The freedom of movement type thing both repels and attracts. I imagine that it is especially repellent (as well as attractive) if you can’t do it… can’t figure out how to get out from under mountains of debt accumulated so that you can Live Your Dreams. Or children in school, community ties and so on. But it’s something many of us grow up with… or at least, attempt to grow out of. The dream of just packing up and leaving, stopping where you stop, going when you want to, and telling time only by the stars and sun and all that.
Romanticized, surely… but quite “respectable” to do if you are in a modern RV, and have plenty of money.
I think probably patriotism and nationalism are rather too close to each other to be easily separated. Both say, in essence, “This place, above all others”. I guess it’s mostly that one will just wave a flag at you and maybe invite you in, while the other will more likely wave a gun and tell you to get out.
Interesting diary. There is, of course, a long history of demonizing the Roma/Gypsies, although it would seem that it is more front and center there, mostly for election purposes, I take it? Sort of like the use here, by politicians and others, of Mexicans, Latin Americans, etc as the face of illegal immigration, as an easy way to instill fear of ‘others’, and thus get support for draconian policies and legislation.
Right, now a lot of is for national election purposes in the U.K., but it’s often something that rears its head in council elections too.
Part of what I take to be important about freedom of movement is that I see it as standing in a mutually sustaining relationship with other kinds of freedom.
For example, if you know that when push comes to shove, if you can get across a border you can get political asylum in another country, you’re more likely to insist on your right to do things like criticise the government, organise labour unions, speak out against injustices.
That’s very true, and something I’d not really thought of before, I don’t believe. Well, actually, I have too, only just recently when I heard that passports would be required for travel to Mexico and Canada now… to get back into the US though, not to leave.
While our situation here is deteriorating, we are not (yet) at the point where there is real fear of speaking out, or organizing unions and such, although there is opposition to those things. But in countries where the political situations are much more volatile, I can see how knowing there is somewhere safe you can go would free people up to speak out more.
I think we are headed for even more restrictions on travel and asylum and so on, though. Countries are using the excuse of terrorism to push through laws that not only adversely affect their citizens, but also asylum seekers and refugees. And with the apparent plans to cut the UN off at the knees, from doing even the things they are best at, it’s likely to get much worse. All while many people are not looking.
But hey, Michael Jackson wore pajamas to court, so you can’t say we don’t get the real story on things.
The song you posted seems to have some similarities with a Steeleye Span song I have. There are some of the same elements, but instead of Gypsies it seems to be a border ballard.
“Black Jack Davy
Late last night when the squire came home
Enquiring for his lady
Some denied and some replied
She’s gone with the Black Jack Davy
Go saddle to me the bonny brown steed
For the grey was never so speedy
I’ll ride all day and I’ll ride all night
Till I catch that Black Jack Davy
Chorus:
He rode up hills and he rode down dales
Over many a wild high mountain
And they did say that saw him go
Black Jack Davy he is hunting
He rode east and he rode west
All in the morning early
Until he spied his lady fair
Cold and wet and weary
Why did you leave your house and land
Why did you leave your baby
Why did you leave your own wedded lord
To go with the Black Jack Davy
Chorus
What care I for your goose feather bed
With the sheets turned down so bravely
Well I may sleep on the cold hard ground
Along with the Black Jack Davy
Then I’ll kick off my high healed shoes
Made of the Spanish leather
And I’ll put on my lowland brogues
And skip it o’er the heather”
I have found another version on the internet.
“Black Jack Davey
Black Jack Davey come a running through the woods
Singing so loud and gailey
Made the hills a round him ring
Then charmed the heart of a lady, charmed the heart of a lady
How old are you my pretty little miss
How old are you my honey
Answered him with a philly and a smile
I’ll be sixteen next Sunday, be sixteen next Sunday
Come go with me my pretty little miss
Come go with me my honey
I’ll take you across the deep blue sea
Where you never shall want for money, never shall want for money
She pulled off her high heeled shoes
Made of Spanish leather
She put on her low heeled shoes
And they both went off together, both went off together
Last night I lay on a warm feather bed
Side my husband and baby
Today I lay on the cold, cold ground
Side of Black Jack Davey, side of Black Jack Davey”
I suppose all these traditional songs were modified and adapted by different singers at various times for their own purposes.
Yeah — reworkings happen a lot with this kind of music (and with carols too actually, as well as ballads). And there are definitely resemblances to the ‘Black John Davey’ ballad
I can’t vouch for the ‘authenticity’ of the version I know — it was in a book of English folk songs arranged for piano that my mother had as a kid — I’d be interested to know if it turned up in any of Cecil Sharp’s collections. I have a feeling that the second of the one’s you refer to is also borrowing bits and bobs from a song called ‘I’ll be seventeen come Sunday,’ but I’m not sure.
Beautifully written. This strikes some very resonant notes for me – emotionally and intellectually. Thanks. I’mgoing to come back and read this a few more times.
Thanks for the kind words =)