The Glenbuchat ballads /

In the last 30 years or so, scholars have published a number of manuscripts unknown to Francis James Child, compiler of the monumental English and Scottish Popular Ballads (1882-98). These publications include Robin Hood: The Forresters Manuscript, ed. by Stephen Knight (1998); Andrew Crawfurd's Collection of Ballads and Songs, ed. by E. B. [Emily] Lyle (1975-96); and The Song Repertoire of Amelia and Jane Harris, ed. Emily Lyle, Kaye McAlpine, and Anne Dhu McLucas (2002). The Glenbuchat manuscript was discovered by the late Buchan (then at Canada's Memorial Univ.), who began the editing process here completed by Moreira (Univ. of Maine, Machias). Gathered by the Reverend Robert Scott around 1818, the Glenbuchat collection comprises 68 ballads from the remote Scottish Aberdeenshire parish of Glenbuchat. The collection includes full versions of rather rare ballads, texts reworked in traditional ways, fragments, texts close to broadsides, and ordinary texts of common ballads. Clearly the Glenbuchat community was attuned to both the older oral tradition and modern print influences. Readable, intelligent, thorough notes supplement an introduction that situates the collector, community, and ballads in Scottish history and culture and assesses the roles of Romanticism and nationalistic scholarship in the manuscript's final shape. Summing Up: Essential. Libraries supporting study of folk music and Scottish culture; all levels. W. B. McCarthy emeritus, Pennsylvania State University, DuBois Campus