Fiddler's Dog: April 2015

Monday, 20 April 2015

The Fable of the Autoharp in the North NOTES

The Fable of the Autoharp in the North NOTES

I have been told that my Fable of the Autoharp in the North has become curiously invisible on the web. So, I have put the text here on my blog, where a web search will find it. The Fable was written as part of the lead-up to the Gargrave Autoharp Festival 2014.

And here are some notes...

Obsessive narratologists will recognise that the Fable of the Autoharp is a version of the very old story of the Sailor and the Oar – except that I have turned it on its head.

In the story the Sailor who is tired of the Sea – or is afraid of the Sea – puts an Oar on his shoulder, and walks inland, until he meets a passer-by who has never seen an Oar. The passer-by says, ‘Where are you going with that threshing flail?’ Or some such. And so the Sailor knows that he is finally safe from the Sea.

In literature most people come across the story in Homer, The Odysssey, where it is not so much told as foretold - twice.

First, during Ulysses' foray into the Underworld, where the blind (and dead) poet Tiresias tells Ulysses how he can make peace with the God of the Sea, Poseidon - he must journey, with an Oar, until he reaches a people and a land with no knowledge of the Sea, and there he must erect an altar to the God of the Sea.

Second, Ulysses himself tells the story to Penelope, that he must in the future make this one last journey out of Ithaca. These foretellings make for an odd choice of tenses.

Our guide to the background is William F. Hansen, who - in two splendid articles - shows that the story of the Sailor and the Oar is one of those widely spread folktales absorbed by Homer into Homer. Hansen shows the same story told about Saint Elias and Saint Nicholas, and turning up in the present day in anecdotes and in jokes - a pattern that will be familiar to readers of my own chapter, 'The Irish joke'.

Hansen pauses to note the oddity that many translations of Homer have the inlander mistaking the oar, not for a 'chaff-wrecker', a threshing flail or a winnowing shovel, but for a winnowing fan or a winnowing basket. Then the story is wrecked - no one can mistake a long wooden thing for a kind of basket.

When I was working on my version, the Fable of the Autoharp, my wife and I quickly worked out what kind of thing an autoharp might be mistaken for - 'cheese-grater' is the usual insult. The autoharp certainly has its limitations, and it would help if the thing would stay in tune. It is a difficult instrument for musicians to get their heads round, when they meet it first. With most musical instruments you are creating chords - with the autoharp you are unpacking chords

Hansen is very good on the notion that the 'Oar Test' works through silence. The Sailor just has to carry his thing, and walk, until others speak to him. Dialogue, Hansen wisely points out, would protract the tale 'uncomically'. And so it is with my Fable.

All this arose from my thinking through what it was we were trying to achieve with the Gargrave Autoharp Festival - the creation of a place where the autoharp would be known and be made welcome. Albeit with Yorkshire bluntness.

Patrick O'Sullivan

References

Incollection (Hansen1990Odysseus)
Hansen, W. F.
Edmunds, L. (Ed.)
Odysseus and the Oar: A Folkloric Approach
Approaches to Greek Myth, Approaches to Greek Myth, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990, 241-274

The Fable of the Autoharp in the North TEXT

The Fable of the Autoharp in the North

The story so far…

An autoharper put his autoharp into its bag, slung the bag over his shoulder and began to travel north. He came to a small and pretty village, took out his autoharp— but he did not play it. He sat on a bench, and put the autoharp on the bench beside him. So, they sat there, the man and his autoharp, until a passer-by passed by. I cannot tell you much about this passer-by — but I can tell you this: he had a very big nose. The passer-by paused, gave a nosy look, and said, ‘That’s a strange looking chili-dryer…’

The autoharper said not a word, packed his autoharp into its bag, slung the bag over his shoulder, and travelled on, north. He can be criticised for this, I know. But I think that his behaviour is understandable. In the circumstances.

And he came to a charming town, sat on a bench, took out his autoharp – but he did not play it. He put the autoharp on the bench beside him. And they sat there together, the man and his autoharp, ignoring each other. Until a passer-by passed by. I cannot tell you much about this passer-by — but I can tell you this: he had one eye bigger than the other. The passer-by paused, aimed a beady eye, and said, ‘That’s a strange looking pasta machine…’

And the autoharper sighed, and packed up his autoharp, and travelled, north.

Then he came to another pretty town, and — as before — sat and waited, with his autoharp beside him. And there was a bystander. I cannot tell you much about this bystander — but I can tell you this: he needed a shave. And the bystander pointed a whiskery chin, and said, ‘That’s a strange looking cheese grater…’

And the autoharper said not a word, not a word. He packed up his autoharp and travelled on, still north.

And he came to a very pretty village, with everything you would want, a pub, an old stone church, an old stone bridge over a clear river, a tea shop. And the autoharper took out his autoharp, and put it on the bench beside him. And he waited. And there was a passer-by. I cannot tell you much about this passer-by — but I can tell you this: she had a very good ear. And she said to the autoharper, ‘Are you going to play that autoharp or not?’

And by this he knew that he had finally reached Gargrave, where everyone knows what an autoharp looks like. And they like to hear the autoharp played, in the pub, in the church and in the tea shop. And, of course, in the Gargrave Village Hall.

And the autoharper picked up his autoharp, cuddled it to his chest, and played and played and played. Until his fingers bled.

Which was not wise. But is understandable. In the circumstances.

Friday, 17 April 2015

Article Published: Visualising the Emigrant Letter

An article reporting on the first parts of the Irish Emigrant Letter projects has at last been published in the Revue Européenne des Migrations Internationales (REMI)- there were many delays on the journal side, and the article finally appears with a 2014 publication date.

Revue Européenne des Migrations Internationales, 2014, 30 (3 & 4), pp. 49-69

Emma Moreton, Niall O’Leary and Patrick O’Sullivan

Visualising the Emigrant Letter

ABSTRACT - see below..

http://remi.revues.org/?lang=en

The article, as published, is a compact summary of much discussion, and incorporates many different kinds of expertise from the research network - notably of course the expertise of the three co-authors...

Emma Moreton

Linguistics, digitalisation and annotation...

Emma Moreton

Niall O'Leary

IT/Digital Humanities Consultancy, Visualisation

Niall O'Leary

Patrick O'Sullivan

Irish Diaspora Studies - for example at...

Patrick O'Sullivan ARCHIVE

You can see some of Niall O'Leary's visualisations at

http://development.nialloleary.ie/correspondence/correspondence.php

For me participation in the research network was part of the neverending quest for enlightenment - in this case, a better understanding of the Digital Humanities. I have written formally to Emma Moreton, thanking her for that.

So, yes, I wanted a better understanding of the technologies and the processes, but in the back of my mind there were two questions:

did the amount of effort that had to be put into a Digital Humanities project genuinely answer existing research questions, and explore research issues?

did that effort create new research questions and new methodologies for the traditional humanities?

The answer to both questions is, Yes.

This becomes very clear, easily clear, within Irish Diaspora Studies.

I am currently writing the more considered, 'Irish', version of the material, with a much larger word count, which can expand on the detail. We like detail.

The journal, the Revue Européenne des Migrations Internationales, has made its entire collection, dating from 1985 to 2001, available online at Persée.fr. Since 2002 every issue published has been added to the free public portal Revues.org,

funded by the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) and the Ministry of Research, and designed to be a home for the most prestigious French journals in the field of the Humanities and Social Science. The latest issues published are available for online sale at Cairn.info, with a three year restriction. I am sorry about that - but at least the French are making an effort.

Patrick O'Sullivan

Revue Européenne des Migrations Internationales, 2014, 30 (3 & 4), pp. 49-69

Emma Moreton, Niall O’Leary and Patrick O’Sullivan

Visualising the Emigrant Letter

ABSTRACT

Emigrant letters are a rich resource for teaching and learning, transcending disciplinary and methodological boundaries. They are expressive and indicative of correspondents’ identities, values, preoccupations and beliefs, providing a powerful source of information about migration issues and shedding light on processes of language change and variation. Although many emigrant letter collections have now been digitised, not all are properly archived; some are reduplicated and others are in danger of being lost. The documentation and preservation of such letters is, therefore, a particularly pressing need. In 2013, an AHRC research network was established to look at ways of improving interconnectivity between digital collections of migrant correspondence. This paper reports on work carried out so far, focusing on how emigrant letter projects might move beyond the digitisation stage to exploit text content and enhance usability and searchability through the use of visualisation tools.