I just loved Ruthanna Emrys’s novel A Half-Built Garden. It has a sort of hard-won optimism that meant a lot to me. By mainstream standards it is pretty “woke”. I mean, if respecting each other and the Earth is woke, then sign me up.
Anyway, at some point the main characters are on a perilous journey with nothing to do but cross their fingers that they make it through. To ward off the fear, they start singing the classic sea shanty Rolling Down to Old Maui. Despite being a fan of folks like Stan Rogers, who recorded a version, I hadn’t heard of this song before this book. However, after looking up recordings, I realized what the characters sing in the book is slightly different from tradition:
It’s a damn tough life full of toil and strife we sailors undergo
And we don’t give a damn when the gale is done how hard the winds did blow
’Cause we’re homeward bound from the Arctic round on a good ship tall and free
And we won’t give a damn when we drink our rum with our loves in Old MauiRolling down to Old Maui, my child, rolling down to Old Maui
And we’re homeward bound from the Arctic round, rolling down to Old Maui
Compare that to the first verse and chorus from the Stan Rogers version:
It’s a damn tough life full of toil and strife we whalermen undergo
And we don’t give a damn when the gale is done how hard the winds did blow
’Cause we’re homeward bound from the Arctic ground on a good ship taut and free
And we won’t give a damn when we drink our rum with the girls of Old MauiRolling down to Old Maui, me boys, rolling down to Old Maui
We’re homeward bound from the Arctic ground rolling down to Old Maui
The significant differences from tradition are:
- whalermen ➡️ sailors
- the girls of Old Maui ➡️ our loves in Old Maui
- me boys ➡️ my child
What narrative purpose do the differences serve? Is it just the woke brigade?? Well, let’s back up and first ask what narrative purpose the song itself serves. The main character reflects,
I’d sung it often enough — it was a good working song. A good rhythm for planting, or baking, or pacing the floor with a baby. But this was the first time I’d sung it as the original had been sung: in a vehicle in high wind, the hazards and comforts wound through our voices — the same ones that wound through our lives.
The novel is set in 2083, in a society of necessarily high ecological consciousness to weather the storms created by the ecological mismanagement that began the century. In this culture, the idea of hunting whales would sound crazy, and neither hard work, political power, nor social status is organized by gender. The people on the perilous journey are mostly women, and one is not even from Earth, but they are all choosing to undergo toil and strife because of shared, strongly held beliefs.
Singing this song together brings a comfort and solidarity that I imagine is identical to that of the whalermen who might have sung the original. However, the original lyrics would be unable to bring that value to this group of people, since they paint the following picture:
- a group of all men (“boys”)
- women as playthings or prizes — particularly indigenous women
- This is made more explicit later, see below
- killing whales as something necessary and worth celebrating
The first point on its own is not necessarily an impediment, because of course people enjoy songs and stories all the time that are from a different point of view (or at least, women enjoy songs and stories from a man’s point of view — less commonly the other way around). However, the next two points are cultural values which are not only not held by the characters, but seen as having done great harm in the past. In particular, the characters’ lives are defined by the ecological collapse caused by the philosophies of unlimited hunting and extraction that dominated previous centuries.
If those values couldn’t be separated from the core value of the song — comfort and solidarity in the face of peril — then the song would not have survived into this future. It would have faded into irrelevance. The changing of a few words not only preserves the comfort and solidarity for these characters themselves, but allows them to feel a connection with people from the past, despite the difference in values.
The only problem is, although the characters in the story presumably sing a complete version of the song during their voyage, the text of the book only includes an adaptation of the first verse. This book made me fall in love with this song, so I wanted to be able to sing the whole thing. How are the original lyrics?
The second and third verses are almost completely compatible with my values, but the last verse was quite a challenge, as alluded to above:
How soft the breeze through the island trees, now the ice is far astern
Them native maids, them tropical glades is awaiting our return
Even now their big, brown eyes look out, hoping some fine day to see
Our baggy sails running ‘fore the gales, rolling down to Old Maui
(To be continued)