"One of the finest works to come out in recent years on cowboy songs, in addition to being the first good collection of the cowboy's bawdy material. . . . A must for anyone who is a student of cowboy music--or anyone who just likes the sound of dirty subject matter rhyming." -- Hal Cannon, Journal of Country Music "A brave and honest step toward increasing our understanding of what cowboys really sing." -- Bob Bovee, Old Time Herald "A thorough piece of scholarship and collectanea and a valuable, welcome addition to cowboy song literature." -- Keith Cunningham, Mid-America Folklore "Logsdon has written the book with a scholar's attention to detail. But what shows through the scholarship is the collector's enthusiasm for the material. . . . A superb job in a difficult area." -- Angus Kress Gillespie, Journal of American History "A major contribution to the folklore and popular culture, history, and social psychology of American cowboy culture." -- Kenneth S. Goldstein, former president, American Folklore Society

THE GENTLEMAN ABOUT TOWN has performed a service of notable worth in preserving and giving definitive form to the wealth of latter-day folk-lore which is contained within the covers of "Immortalia." American folk-lore has of necessity sought cover, driven by the undiscriminating tirades and sadistic tyrannies of the Mrs. Grundys who are an irremovable part of this melange we know as modern civilization. Undoubtedly, much material of permanent literary value has been lost. Literary worth in folk-lore depends on just one thing -- its spontaneity. Folk-lore is no hot-house plant, to be fertilized with refined chemicals and maintained at constant temperature when the winds of reality blow. On the contrary, folk-lore seeks its nourishment in the fertilizing essences of nature, and springs triumphantly forth no matter how fierce the winds or how rigorous the frost. Just as some beautiful plants seem to grow in opposition to all efforts of the gardeners and the horticulturists, so does folk-lore thrive in the face of determined efforts of the sentimentalists to deny its very existence. Folk-lore is, after all, nothing but the literature of the people. It, more truly than any more polished side of literary effort, reflects the average standard of all the people at the time of its currency. The very fact of its existence is dependent upon the willingness of the people (not of the literary guildmasters) to keep it alive. Literature with a capital "L" has all the stabilizing factors of the printed word and of learned tradition to perpetuate it—folk-lore lives only in the voices of the people themselves— the source from which the material in this book has been drawn, from cover to cover. It is not the purpose of this book to override good taste — indeed, the fact that it is issued not for public sale, but for subscribers only, is a definite and willing concession to the prevalence of the same good taste which keeps a courtesan and a courtier alike from announcing their morning ablutions to an incurious world. However, good taste has nothing in common with good folk-lore. One is artificial, the other natural. One is the essence of refinement, the other is the rawest of raw material. The one is the glossy vender; all external handsomeness, the other the sturdy fabric from which all strength is drawn. In fact, almost all good folk-lore (and by that I mean all real folk-lore) is in distinct bad taste in drawing rooms and among the niceties of society. It is as much an outcropping of underlying fundamental strength as those deep-rooted rocks which are the farmer's despair even though they be the ribs of the earth. These "Immortalia" are homely; they are imaginative; they are couched in the most vigorous of language; they are crude in literary form, oftentimes ; yet they are what people—just ordinary people, undistinguished and unknown,—have been thinking and saying and singing for their own delectation during the last seventy-five years.

The thrilling third book in Chris Colfer's #1 New York Times bestselling A Tale of Magic... series Brystal Evergreen is running out of time. It’s almost been a year since she made a deal with Death to find and destroy the Immortal in exchange for her life and she still hasn’t found a single clue about who or where the Immortal is. To make matters worse, something dark and malignant has risen from deep within the earth that threatens life as we know it. To stop this new evil, the fairies and witches must work with all the kingdoms and territories, including the Righteous Brotherhood and their Army of the Dead. But is the threat more familiar than they expected? And why are a secretive group of Sorcerers convinced Xanthous Hayfield is connected to it?

A #1 New York Times bestseller An IndieBound bestseller A USA Today bestseller A Wall Street Journal bestseller The #1 New York Times bestselling series set in Chris Colfer's Land of Stories universe, perfect for both new and longtime fans, featuring A Tale of Magic..., A Tale of Witchcraft..., and A Tale of Sorcery... When Brystal Evergreen stumbles across a secret section of the library, she discovers a book that introduces her to a world beyond her imagination and learns the impossible: She is a fairy capable of magic! But in the oppressive Southern Kingdom, women are forbidden from reading and magic is outlawed, so Brystal is swiftly convicted of her crimes and sent to the miserable Bootstrap Correctional Facility. But with the help of the mysterious Madame Weatherberry, Brystal is whisked away and enrolled in an academy of magic! Adventure comes with a price, however, and when Madame Weatherberry is called away to attend to an important problem she doesn't return. Do Brystal and her classmates have what it takes to stop a sinister plot that risks the fate of the world, and magic, forever? Fall in love with an all-new series from Chris Colfer, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Land of Stories, filled with adventure, imagination, and wonderfully memorable characters both familiar and new.

If you've ever wanted to know the "correct" words to "Roll Me Over," or wondered where the melody of "Sweet Betsy from Pike" came from, this book can answer your questions. Extensively revised and including forty more songs than its predecessor, this new edition of The Erotic Muse is a unique scholarly collection of bawdy or forbidden American folksongs. Ed Cray presents the full texts of some 125 songs, with melodies for most of them and detailed annotations for all. His lively commentary places the songs in historical, social, and, where appropriate, psychological context.