Enoch Arden

DESCRIPTION: Enoch leaves his wife Annie to go to sea, but is shipwrecked for ten years. He returns home to find that Annie, who thinks him dead, has remarried happily. He does not reveal himself, but leaves them to live happily; he dies of loneliness and grief
AUTHOR: Original poem "Enoch Arden" by Alfred, Lord Tennyson
EARLIEST DATE: 1866 (Dime-Song-Book #17; the Tennyson poem was published 1864)
KEYWORDS: sailor husband wife separation reunion grief
FOUND IN: US(SE)
REFERENCES (9 citations):
Brown/Schinhan-FrankCBrownCollectionNCFolklore5 684, "Enoch Arden" (1 fragment, 1 tune)
Lane/Gosbee-SongsOfShipsAndSailors, p, 84, "Goodbye, Annie Darling" (1 fragment, 1 tune, expanded with words from Tennyson's text; it it not really clear that the single verse comes from this song)
Dime-Song-Book #17, p. 26, "Farewell Song of Enoch Arden" (1 text)
Mabel-Waltz-Songster, p. 39, "Enoch Arden" (1 text)
Sweet-Genevieve-Songster, p. 14, "Enoch Arden" (1 text)
Chapman-Sisters-Songster, p. 10, "Enoch Arden" (1 text)
Walking-Down-Broadway-Songster, p. 50, "Enoch Arden" (1 text)
Driven-From-Home-Songster, p. 35, "I'll Sail the Seas Over, for Thee" (1 text)
Kelly-Leon-Ching-Chow-Hi-Songster, p. 9, "Enoch Arden" (1 text)
Roud #17846 and 38059
SAME TUNE:
The Dutchman's Slate ("Kind friends, you was listen, I told you one story, What happened to me here one day, I keeps of this city a lager-bier saloon") (Rootle-Tum-Tootle-Tum-Tay-Songster, 26; Velocipede-Songster, p. 9; Old-Clowns-Whoa-January-Songster, p. 30)
NOTES [98 words]: Although the handful of traditional versions of this seem to be based on the plot of the Tennyson poem, it appears to me that the song is not actually Tennyson's but a separate piece based on it; none of the versions start where Tennyson starts, and the lyrics I've checked are not part of the Tennyson poem.
Steve Roud seems to break this up into two numbers, #17846 and #38059; the only difference I can see is that #17846 starts with the chorus, "Goodbye, Annie darling, Break off from thy sorrow," while #38059 starts with the verse, "Cheer up, Annie darling, With hopeful emotion." - RBW
Last updated in version 7.1
File: BrS5684

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