Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?

DESCRIPTION: "They used to tell me I was building a dream...." The singer worked to build a railroad, a tower. He was a soldier in the war. The listener used to cal him "Al" and be his pal. Now, it has all come crashing down; he begs, "Brother, can you spare a dime?"
AUTHOR: Words: E. Y. "Yip" Harburg / Music: Jay Gorney
EARLIEST DATE: 1932 (source: Hischak)
KEYWORDS: hardtimes request money
FOUND IN: US
REFERENCES (1 citation):
DT, BRODIME*
Roud #23551
NOTES [497 words]: Gardner, p. 393, estimates that this was the eighth most popular song in America in December 1932 (#1 for the year being John Young, Little Jack Little, and John Siras's "In a Shanty in Old Shanty Town"). Ironic that a song that didn't make much of a splash on the pop charts (Gardner estimate it as #41 for the year as a whole) appears to be far better remembered than any of the songs that were more popular at the time.
According to Hischak, pp. 38-39, this "is one of the first theatre songs to have a potent sociological message, and it remains one of the most poweful of the genre. Jay Gorney (music) and E. Y. Harburg (lyric) wrote it for the revue Americana (1932), where it was sung by Rex Weber and a male chorus as they wait in a breadline." "Gorney used strains from a Russian-Jewish lullaby in his chantlike music that casually sneaks up on you until it becomes a howl of lost faith." "The song was deemed too serious for the usually escapist nature of the Shubert brothers' revues and was nearly cut in rehearsals. The Depression was at its lowest point when Americana opened, and the audience immediately seized on the gripping number. Just as many were disturbed by the song, and the Republican administration was particularly worried with an election less than a month away. Attempts were made to ban the song from radio play, but it was already spreading due to popular recordings of it by Bing Crosby and Al Jolson. 'Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?' became the unofficial theme song of the Depression era...."
The use of a Jewish melody is interesting, because this phenomenon of "forgetting" a person who is poor is found in the Hebrew Bible. Perhaps the best example is Proverbs 19:7, which the King James Version renders, "All the brethren of the poor do hate him: how much more do his friends go far from him? he pursueth them with words, yet they are wanting to him." In the New Revised Standard Version, this becomes
If the poor are hated even by their kin,
how much more are they shunned by their friends!
When they call after them, they are not there.
(The meaning of the third line is uncertain; the Hebrew is probably corrupt, and the Greek translation seems to ignore the line.)
The idea shows up in English as early as the time of Chaucer; the Man of Law's Prologue in the Canterbury Tales tells us
If thou be povre, they brother hateth thee,
And alle thy freendes fleen from thee, allas! [Fragment II/B1, lines 120-121, p. 88 in Chaucer/Benson.]
i..e.
If you be poor, your brother hates you,
And all your friends flee from you, alas!
Similarly in the Tale of Melibee,
And if thy fortune change that thou wexe povre, frewel freendshipe and felawshipe [Fragment vii/B2, line 1595, p. 232 in Chaucer/Benson.]
i.e. "And if your fortune change, so that you become poor, farewell friendship and fellowship!
The idea of course is still remembered, as exemplified by songs such as "Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out" and "Money Is King." - RBW
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File: DTbrodim

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