Colleen Rue, The

DESCRIPTION: Singer meets and praises Colleen Rue. She rejects his "dissimulation and invocation." He says if he were Hector, Paris, or Orpheus he'd "range through Asia, likewise Arabia, Pennsylvania" to see her face.
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1965 (IRPTunney03)
KEYWORDS: courting rejection beauty
FOUND IN: Ireland
REFERENCES (2 citations):
Tunney-StoneFiddle, p. 118, "The Colleen Rue" (1 text, 1 tune)
ADDITIONAL: Kathleen Hoagland, editor, One Thousand Years of Irish Poetry (New York, 1947), pp. 258-259, "Colleen Rue"
Roud #2365
RECORDINGS:
Paddy Tunney, "The Colleen Rue" (on IRPTunney03)
ALTERNATE TITLES:
Colleen Ruadh
NOTES [108 words]: As in "Lough Erne Shore" and "Sheila Nee Iyer," there is no resolution for the Tunney-StoneFiddle version. - BS
A curious set of literary references, this. Orpheus of course went to Hell to bring back Euridice (and then lost her at the end); this very loosely inspired the ballad/romance "King Orfeo" [Child 19]. Paris (Alexander) was the Trojan prince who abandoned his first wife Oenone to hook up with Helen of Sparta (married name: Helen of Troy; for this see especially Ovid's Letter from "Oenone to Paris" in the Heroides). And Hector, while faithful to his wife as far as we can tell from the legends, was not a significant traveler. - RBW
Last updated in version 4.4
File: TSF118

Go to the Ballad Search form
Go to the Ballad Index Song List

Go to the Ballad Index Instructions
Go to the Ballad Index Bibliography or Discography