Some Notes on the Role of George Lyman Kittredge in American Folklore Studies
Esther K. Birdsall
Journal of the Folklore Institute, Vol. 10, No. 1/2, Special Issue: American Folklore Historiography (Jun. - Aug., 1973), pp. 57-66
[Footnotes added at the end of the article. R. Matteson 2011]
Some Notes on the Role of George Lyman Kittredge in American Folklore Studies
ESTHER K. BIRDSALL
Anyone wishing to compile an anthology of the folklore of academe would have to devote a large section to George Lyman Kittredge, who was a legend in his own time at Harvard University. Nor would the anthologizer have much trouble getting material. A request in any folklore or literary journal would deluge him with responses from Kittredge's former students, and from their students as well. My own contribution would be one I heard many times from E. C Beck of Michigan lumberjack folklore fame:
You know, Kittredge could not stand anyone's coughing in his classes. And I mean anyone. There was the day that one of the Fleischman boys coughed in his Shakespeare class and Kittredge kicked him right out. And he stayed out, too. Not all of Daddy's money could get him back in.
Of course, there would be duplications in the responses for who has not heard Kittredge's famous rejoinder, "But who would examine me?" or that he bleached his beard with Clorox?
Paradoxically, anyone wishing t o compile an anthology of Kittredge's writings on folklore would encounter several problems. He would, for example, be hard-pressed to write an introduction justifying Kittredge's claim to fame as a folklorist. The problem may seem somewhat exaggerated because his folklore activities are a matter of record. He became president of the American Folklore Society in 1904, served as first vice president from 1911 to 1918 and assisted with the publication of the Journal of American Folklore from 1909 to 1940. Just prior to his death in 1941 he helped James Thorpe compile A Bibliography of the Writings of George Lyman Kittredge,[1] which lists thirty-eight folklore publications.
This output is somewhat deceptive, however, in that it includes some very brief reviews s uch as that of Andrew Lang's Magic and Religion[2] and brief annotations of ballad collections in Journal of American Folklore. However, a ccording to Thorpe," he provided m uch rewriting and annotating not identifiable."[3] Interestingly enough, the bibliography lists only three books: The Old Farmer and His Almanack, Popular English and ScottishB allads (in collaboration w ith Helen Child S argent) and A Study of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.[4]
Whether his fame as a folklorist has become greatly exaggerated is immaterial. That he played an important role in the shaping of American folklore cannot be denied, and it is the aim of this study, albeit brief, to examine the nature of that role in detail.
Kittredge's interest in folklore can be traced to 1878, when, according to his biographer, he started a collection of quotations and "indexed them under an amazing number of topics, such as . . . 'Ballad-making,'. . . 'Breath of witches is deadly,'. .."[5] His first folklore publication, "Arm-Pitting Among the Greeks," [6] set the tone for several later studies, namely the illumination of folklore with vast quantities of erudition drawn from sources too diverse to contemplate. This drawing upon extensive reading is especially noticeable in his "beast fables" entry in Johnson's Universal Cyclopediain 1894.
When Kittredge came to Harvard in 1888, Francis James Child was engaged in his monumental preparation of The English and Scottish Popular Ballads. He became very much involved in the project, so involved that Houghton Mifflin asked him to see part ten through the press after Child's unexpected death. In his tribute to Child, Kittredge stressed the number of manuscripts and books that had to be consulted to write as complete as possible a history of a single ballad.[7] The many manuscripts and books that Harvard Library acquired during Child's time served Kittredge well in subsequent folklore scholarship.
Of equal significance in the Child-Kittredge relationship w as the fact that Kittredge inherited several of Child's courses, including the ballad course. The influence of this course on American folklore activities cannot be overestimated. For example, it started John A. Lomax on his ballad hunting career. Furthermore, with Kittredge's encouragement, Lomax founded the Texas Folklore Society. In 1913, Kittredge read a paper entitled "The Study of Folklore: Its Meaning and Value" to the Society.[8] And as other parts of this study will show, Lomax was just one of several proteges. On the other hand, one has no way of knowing how many of Kittredge's students introduced ballad or folklore courses in their respective institutions or encouraged the founding of local folklore societies.
Fame as a folklorist came to Kittredge in 1904 with his one volume edition of Child's English and Scortish Popular Ballads. He retained most of Child's notes, but he made an important contribution: he wrote an introduction. Sections of the introduction were a modification of Francis J. Gummere's c ommunal origin theory a s he had stated it in his introduction to Old English Ballads which Kittredge had reviewed enthusiastically. [9] Although Kittredge did not accept Gummere's theory in its entirety, he certainly found it most congenial and stated in his review that with modifications the communal theory would be acceptable. A careful reading of the review and of the introduction to English and Scottish Popular Ballads shows that Kittredge had not changed his opinion during the ten year period. Because of the popularity of the one volume edition, one is inclined to agree with D. K. Wilgus that Kittredge "was directly responsible for producing p erhaps m ore communalists than Gummere...."[10]
There is ample evidence that despite cautions about certain communalist ramifications, Kittredge's followers thought of him as a communalist. For example, after Louise P ound's Poetic Origins and the Ballad appeared in 1921, Mendal G. Frampton of the English Department at Pomona College in Claremont wrote to Kittredge: "I must confess that as a lay this book down, I felt much as if I had bade adieu to all my lares and penates. I even had a sort of feeling of grudge, in that she seemed not to have left even one minor god free from attack." Frampton added that worst of all, he could not marshall any evidence against it but assumed that Kittredge was telling his students how he felt about the book. He concluded with the following request: "At a ny rateI am wondering if you will be willing to tell me what your judgment of Miss Pound is, if you can do so briefly"(February 16, 1922).[11] Whether Frampton received Kittredege's estimation is not known, but Kittredge expressed the following opinion to Mellinger E. Henry:
I am pained to note that you think Miss Pound has exploded the communal theory. In my humble opinion, she has never understood what that theory is, so that what she has demolished is an imaginary structure not the communal theory at all. (March 19, 1930)
None other than Louise Pound attested to Kittredge's spreading the communal theory even after later scholarship had supposedly demolished. In "Literary Anthologies and the Ballad" she deplored the influence of the introduction to English and Scottish Popular Ballads on the many anthologies which quoted or paraphrased the sections p ertaining to the communal the ory. Concluded Miss Pound, "If Kittredge ever changed his mind about ballad origins and ballad transmission, he did not publish his change of mind.''[12]
Miss Pound's anguish over the introduction is nevertheless a very accurate description of the impact of the one volume edition. Others attested to its influence more enthusiastically. According to Clyde Hyder, Andrew Lang was so inspired that he composed two ballads.[13] Joseph Jacobs th anked K ittredge f or a copy of his one volume edition in a letter dated J une 8, 1904. H e wrote:
I find looking into the 'Ballads' again that as usual the author knows more about his book than the critic. There is really a decent amount of folklore in your introduction. Still, I will forgive you for being right, and maintain notwithstanding that it is a splendid piece of work.
Douglas Hyde exclaimed, "Your edition of Childs [sic] ballad book is a perennial source of delight to me"( October1 6, 1912). But the importance of the book was that it made parts of Child's labors easily accessible to teachers, students, and others interested in ballads. How many s ubsequent ballad collections it inspired is obviously impossible to ascertain, but it should be pointed out that the number of ballad texts published in the Journal of American Folklore increased considerably after 1904.
Kittredge's subsequent contributions to ballad scholarship did not involve matters of theory. In his editorial capacity with the Journal of American Folklore, he undoubtedly read most, if not all, of the ballad manuscripts, but the emphasisi n them was on the preservation of texts and annotation. Kittredge's contribution consisted mostly of annotations. For example, in the first footnote to Albert H. Tolman's article "Some Songs Traditional in the United States" Kittredge wrote:
Since it is obvious that many of the songs and ballads now orally current in America have passed into print and owe their circulation in large part to broadsides and song-books, numerous citations of such ephemeral publications have here been made....[14]
And, as the annotations indicate, his knowledge of ephemera was staggering. Other notes reflect his early interest in ballads. Commenting on a version of "The Mermaid," he noted that he had taken "it down Jan. 4, 1878, from the recitation of Sarah G. Lewis, who was born in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1799, but lived most of her days in Sandwich and Barnstable. Mrs. Lewis thoughts he learned t he song about 1808."[15]
However, K ittredge's impact on folklore publications went beyond the Journal of American Folklore. Having been appointed to the First Board of Syndics in 1913,[16] he was closely involved in the publications of the Harvard University Press. How heavily the press depended on him was made clear by Kittredge himself in a letter (May 9, 1927) to Arthur Palmer Hudson:
If Harvard University Press brings out the volume, I am afraid you will have to take my judgment about some little matters of inclusion and exclusion, for in these ballad books (of which Harvard University Press makes something of a specialty) the Syndics rather lean on me.
Because of the many gaps in the Kittredge correspondence, it is impossible to ascertain whether Kittredge received requests for help in editing ballad manuscripts because of his fame as a ballad because scholar or of his role as a Syndic. Perhaps some of the requests were on the basis of a combination of the two. For example, Mary Newcomb of Louisville, Kentucky, asked for assistance in editing a manuscript of folksongs[1] similar to Child's which she had collected from her family (October 29, 1927). Evidently she received no reply, for in her next letter (November 2 , 1928) she again asked for help and included a copy of a letter from Macmillan recommending Kittredge. She also mentioned that Dr. George W. Hibbitt of Columbia University and Mr. Robert W. Gordon with the Library o f Congress considered her manuscript good.
Kittredge replied that he was interested in her manuscript, ... but I am too busy at this moment with pressing engagements to examine it. As to editing it, of course that I could hardly undertake anyhow. In view of what the Macmillan people say, it will be a pity apparently, if your material does not see the light. Why don't you get Mr. Robert Gordon to give it the editorial touch?(November 8 , 1928) Kittredge's reply did not discourage her completely, for she asked him to reconsider in a letter dated December 7, 1928. No response is on file.[17]
Kittredge's treatment of Mary O. Eddy's ballad manuscript is some- what puzzling because, unlike Miss Newcomb, she was a known folklorist. Miss Eddy of Canton, Ohio, had sent her 383 page manuscript, "not counting introductory matter and two indexes" to Alfred C . Potter, the librarian of Harvard College Library, and asked him to show the copy to Kittredge (January 20, 1934). In a letter dated July 15, 1937, she Kittredge asked to return her manuscript which he had had for two years. She was especially anxious to have it returned because she felt that the time elapsed made revision necessary. Again, Kittredge's response is not on file, but one seems justified in assuming that his treatment of Miss Eddy was neither in the best interesto f scholarship n or of common c ourtesy. However, there is a tantalizing sentence in D. K. Wilgus's the 'Foreword" to facsimile reprint of Eddy's Ballads and Songs from Ohio: "A manuscript collection sent to Harvard University was misplaced, but a later supplement is in the Houghton Library at Harvard."[18] Is this a reference to the manuscript hat Miss Eddy tried to retrievef rom Kittredge? If so, Kittredge must be at least partially absolved of his questionable treatment of Miss Eddy.
How dedicated a Syndic of Harvard University Press Kittredge really was can be seen in a note to Harold Murdock, Director of Syndics (April 27, 1927). He wrote:
Miss McGill's ballad matter from Kentucky is first rate material. It needs much editing. If I had nothing else to do, I should enjoy the work myself; but, having already edited three or four ballad books for other people, I fear I must lie back. He added that he was committed to the Davis's Virginia collection and was expecting W. R. MacKenzie's Nova Scotia ballad collection. More significant of his estimation of himself as a Syndic is his reminder to Murdeck that he had lost neither money nor reputation on folksongs for the Press, "but I don't want to let my predilection for this kind of thing obfuscate my business sense"[italics mine].
Nor did his business sense become obfuscated. For example, after having encouraged H. N. McCracken to submit his completed manuscript of Labrador and Newfoundland ballads to Harvard University Press, Kittredge, as a conscientious Syndic, suggested that he line up another publisher because "such books are expensive, and our Press has already put a good deal of money into this department" (November 13, 1929).
His business sense was also responsible for rejecting a manuscript from Helen Hartness Flanders: "They [Harvard University Press] have already spent a good deal of money in the publication of folksongs and have a number of projects that have been put to thein on which they have not acted" (November 26, 1930).
He cited tight finances in his rejectlon letter to Dorothy Scarborough (December 29, 1930). Although the foregoing may give the impression that Kittredge was grudging of his time and of the Press's money, there are testimonials of folklorists to the contrary. Mellinger E . Henry wrote in Folk-Songs from the Southern Highlands:
Genuine inspiration came from the kindly interest of my former teacher, Professor George L. Kittredge, in some of the songs that had been printed. He at once cheered on our quest for ballads. He has never ceased to encourage and to help us.
Another former student, W. Ray MaeKenzie, was more specific in his acknowledgment of Kittredge's help:
My debt to Professor Kittredge is such that my hope of paying it is as small as his desire that it should be paid. There has been no time during my experience as a collector of ballads when I have not looked to him for counsel and support, and no time when I have not freely received these benefits from him. In the present case I have had the advantage of his comments on the ensuing text, which he read in manuscript before it went to press. The value of these comments can be realized only by those who have profited in a similar way, but, even so, it will be realized by a very large proportion of the readers of this book.[20]
Arthur Kyle Davis, Jr. wrote:
It is a pleasure here to acknowledge c ertain indebtednesses. The first must go to Professor Kittredge, of Harvard University. Though this book was not, as have been so many ballad and folk-song publications, the offspring of his inspiration, he has throughout taken an interest not stepfatherly.[21]
Kittredge's endorsement of ballad books was also highly esteemed by publishers. For example, H. S. Latham, vice-president of Maemillan, wrote: "We have in the press for publication in 1938 a book to which we attach considerable importance and in whieh we are investing a good many thousands of dollars: Folk Songs of Old New England.[21] The colleeting and editing had been done by Mrs. Charles H. Linseott of Needham, Massachusetts. Was Kittredge familiar with her? Would he read the galleys? Would he write t he introduetion? If so, how much would he charge? Latham concluded: "We feel that Mrs. Linseott has done a valuable piece of work, but her name is unknown and a foreword endorsing what she has done and signed by yourself would help us take the first hurdle, the faet that the author is unknown in this field" (November 16, 1937). Whether Kittredge recommended publication of the collection is not known, but Macmillan published it on schedule without a foreword by Kittredge.
But Kittredge's interest in folklore was not confined to ballads and folksongs. For example, he reviewed collections of folktales. [22] Students of English literature are still profiting from A Study of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Although modern scholarship has made some of his conclusions obsolete, his methodology remains valid. The book is still a "must" for students who wish to examine the relationship between folklore and literature.
Whether one thinks of his Witchcraft in Old and New England as a contribution to folklore or as a contribution to American studies, as Hyder does,[23] seems unimportant. It remains a valuable study of a highly complex problem and undermined some of the false notions about the reasons for witch-hunting on both sides of the Atlantic. The book was well received. Many years before its publication, Andrew Lang was favorably impressed with one of Kittredge's witchcraft pamphlets, which in a revised form was incorporated into the book. Lang wrote. [24]... I entirely agree with your argument" (October 15, 1907).
That The Old Farmer and His Almanack, first published in 1904, added to Kittredge's folklore fame is obvious from the many testimonials on file at Harvard University Library Archives. Since the old farmer was a New Englander, most of the testimonials came from Kittredge's New England friends and acquaintances and not from professional folklorists. The folklore in this work consists mostly of customs and beliefs. It is probably this material that prompted Joseph Jacobs to ask Kittredge whether he had ever considered doing a yearbook or book of days with American or New England antiquities (February 14, 1906).
As this brief study indicates, Kittredge's contribution to folklore cannot be pinpointed. If one uses his publications as a base, one must conclude that his folklore fame is all out of proportion. His indirect contributionw as much greater, but unfortunately it cannot b e accurately documented. No one, it seems, will ever know the extent of his editorial assistance on several ballad books or on the manuscript submitted to the Journal of American Folklore. Nor can one measure the inspiration he gave to his students and others interested in ballads. On the other hand, although his power as Syndic of Harvard University Press was considerable, most of the ballad manuscripts he rejected were eventually published.
It cannot be denied that he became famous for his one volume English and Scottish Popular Ballads in America, but his international fame was based on his activities as a Shakespeare scholar. Perhaps Richard Dorson unwittingly summed up Kittredge's real impact on folklore when he wrote, "George Lyman Kittredge, whose eminence as a Shakespearean scholar lent prestige to his studies of balladry, witchcraft and popular belief..."[24]
University of Maryland
College Park, Maryland
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Footnotes:
1. (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1948).
2. The Nation 73 (1901): 247-248.
3. A Bibliography of the Writings of George Lyman Kittredge,p . 55.
4. Like Thorpe, I do not consider Witcheraft in Old and New England (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1929) strictly a folklore publication.
5. Clyde Kenneth Hyder, George Lyman Kittredge: Teacher and Scholar (Lawrence: University of Kansas Press, 1962), p. 26.
6. The article was published in American Journal of Philology 6 (1885): 151-169. Hyder quotes extensively from the article on pp. 73-74 of his work
7. "Professor Child," The Atlantic Monthly 78 (1896): 741.
8. Hyder, p. 117.
9. The Nation 59 (1894): 235-236.
10. Anglo-American Folksong Scholarship Since 1898 (New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1959), p. 32.
11. All quotations from letters are from those in the University Archives of Harvard University Library, HUG 4486.12. Permission to consult these letters was given to me by Kittredge's daughter, Mrs. Conrad Wesselhoeft, to whom I am deeply grateful.
12. Southern Folklore Quarterly 6 (1942): 128.
13. George Lyman Kittredge, p. 104.
14. Journal of American Folklore 29 (1916): 155.
15. G. L. Kittredge, "Various Ballads," Journal of American Folklore 24 (1913): 175. Hyder, p. 132.
17. After having checked many ballad bibliographies, I could find no evidence of publication.
18. (Hatboro: Folklore Associates, 1964), p. v.
19. (New York: J. J. Augustin Publisher, 1938), p. 27.
20 Ballads and Sea Songs from Nova Scotia, facsimile reprint with foreword by G. Malcolm Laws, Jr. (Hatboro: Folklore Associates, 1963), p. viii.
21. Traditional Ballads of Virginia (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1929), p. ix.
22. See for example his review of Russische Volksmarchenin Journal of American
Folklore 24 (1911): 28.
23. George Lyman Kittredge, pp. 191-192.
24. American F olklore a nd the Historian (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970), pp. 3-4 Italics added.