This has turned into a really interesting discussion, so let me try and respond to a few of the points raised.
Dr Drake’s core objection seems to be that, by setting out the objective facts of Lee Shelton’s story, I’m somehow denying (or even undermining) the ballad Stagger Lee’s status as a living thing. If I understand him correctly, he feels I’m reducing the ballad to a mere list of facts, rather than acknowledging its constantly-evolving role in reflecting the various societies where its been sung.
This strike me as being rather like Keats’ view that Newton’s efforts to understand the mechanics of the universe were “unweaving the rainbow” – that is, removing the wonder from what Keats preferred to view as a supernatural process. It’s a matter of personal taste as much as anything, but I’ve never bought that argument.
Understanding a little of how the universe works acts to increase my sense of wonder rather than diminish it, and I think the same point holds for Stagger Lee. Knowing that there was a real Lee Shelton in St Louis in 1895 does nothing to sabotage my enjoyment of versions which contradict these facts. If anything, it deepens my appreciation and enjoyment of the song in all its various incarnations. The ballad is simultaneously (a) based on objective fact and (b) mutable enough to take on whatever fictional elements the singer and his audience demand. I have no problem holding those two ideas in my head at the same time, and I doubt most listeners do either. It’s not an “either/or”.
It’s certainly true that I’m not a professional folklorist, and that I have no formal training in that area. I’m actually a journalist by trade, and that’s how I’ve earned my living for the past 25 years. What I set out to produce here was an article for a general audience which they would find more readable that the purely academic treatments of this subject tend to be. Yes, I’ve read Cecil Brown’s book, but – as I think the list of sources with my Stagger Lee essay will show – I’ve read a great deal else on the subject besides. If Dr Drake would care to give any specific instances where he feels I’ve got my facts wrong, I’ll be glad to tackle them here.
My central idea was to combine a “True Crime” approach with a look at how the song’s interpretation has changed over the decades. One of the most interesting aspects of writing the essay for me was the discovery that it is possible to trace a clear direction in the way the song’s developed from Mississippi John Hurt through The Clash to Nick Cave, steadily becoming more sadistic, keener to step into the killer’s shoes, and less sympathetic towards Billy. Dr Drake mentions the way history in a ballad is “bent and shaped to reflect what the performers and their audience find noteworthy” and that’s exactly the point I had in mind here.
Similarly, I included a long discussion on St Louis’ history and changing demographics precisely because I wanted to acknowledge the importance of “the conditions under which Black Americans lived in the years during which these ballads were recorded”. Tipping the balance too far in favour of this material would have turned the piece into a completely different article, and that wasn’t what I wanted to write.
Others have already made the point that it’s a bit silly to complain that an essay about Stagger Lee is focussed primarily on that ballad, so I won’t belabour the point here. Eventually, I hope to have essays on a dozen or so ballads up on the site, so I think the whole will build to more than the sum of its parts.
Finally, thanks to everyone who’s taken part here – Dr Drake included – and please rest assured that I don’t feel remotely insulted by any of it. Rather invigorated, in fact.
