long lankin - possible next project after the masks

Above is an initial sketch for a possible future project.

I still intend to write about the making of the masks to date and to continue to document the process of making them. After what must be close to a month the first mask has still to be completed and the project is likely to take months to finish.

But yesterday in the absence of anything else to work on I started to think about what the next project in my studio might be. The first one is likely to be something based on the Child Ballad Long Lankin that I may have mentioned here previously.

There are several variant texts and many recordings. The first one I heard at around the age of six or seven was the unaccompanied version sung by Martin Carthy on But Two Came By his record with Dave Swarbick. I recommend it very strongly, the starkness of this version perfectly suits the material.

Sadly this version is not available on YouTube, but there are a couple of good versions that capture something of the strangeness and darkness of the song. The first is my favourite of the two by a musician and story-teller I know nothing about called Sedayne.

The second is also good if slightly less visceral. It is by Fire and Ice, a group about whom I also know nothing.

There are also versions by Steeleye Span, which I don't much like, and by Alasdair Roberts, which I find preferable but not as sinister as it could be.

The second link at the top links to variant texts. The text I'm familiar with is reproduced. If you struggle with the accent in Sedayne's rendering, the words are broadly the same as this version with some of the verses removed.

Says mylord to mylady as he mounted his horse,

“Beware of Long Lankin that lives in the moss.”

Says mylord to mylady as he went on his way,

“Beware of Long Lankin that lives in the hay.”

“See the doors are all bolted, see the windows all pinned,

And leave not a crack for a mouse to creep in.”

Oh, the doors were all bolted, oh, the windows were pinned,

But at a small peep in the window Long Lankin crept in.

“Where's the lord of this household?” cries Long Lankin.

“He's away up to London,” says the false nurse to him.

“Where's the lady of the household?” cries Long Lankin.

“She's asleep in her chamber,” says the false nurse to him.

“Where's the heir of the household?” cries Long Lankin.

“He's asleep in his cradle,” says the false nurse to him.

“We'll pinch him and we'll prick him all over with a pin.

And that'll make mylady to come down to him.”

So they pinched him and they pricked him all over with a pin.

And the false nurse held the basin for the blood to drip in.

“Oh nurse how you slumber, oh nurse how you sleep,

You leave my little son to cry and to weep.”

“Oh nurse how you slumber, oh nurse how you snore,

You leave me little baby to cry and to roar.”

“Oh, I tried him with the milk and I've tried him with the pap.

Come down, my pretty lady, and rock him in your lap.”

“Oh, I've tried him with the rattle and I've tried him with the bell.

Come down, my pretty lady, and rock him yourself.”

“How dare I come down in the dead of the night

When there's no candles burning nor no fires alight?”

“You have three silver gowns all bright as the sun.

Come down, my pretty lady, all by the light of one.”

Oh, the lady came downstairs, she was thinking no harm.

Long Lankin he stood ready for to catch her in his arm.

There's blood in the kitchen, there's blood in the hall,

There's blood in the parlour where mylady did fall.

Her handmaid stood out at the window so high

And she saw her lord and master come a-riding close by.

“Oh master, oh master, don't lay no blame on me.

'Twas the false nurse and Lankin that killed your lady.”

“Oh master, oh master, don't lay no blame on me.

It was the false nurse and Lankin that killed your baby.”

Long Lankin shall be hanged on the gallows so high.

And the false nurse shall be burned in the fire close by.

More information on Long Lankin can be found at Wikipedia, from this site on English folk music, and at this site - which will automatically start to play a version of the tune without words.

Among the things that interest me about the song are the brutality of it, and the apparent arbitrariness of that brutality in the Martin Carthy version. I also can't think of another ballad I've heard in which a baby is murdered.

But whether Long Lankin is a bogey-man as in my favoured version, or a wronged mason, there is also an element of fear of the other, of class fear. The labouring man or the unknown man is a danger. He is someone that will come to your house and murder your wife and child for no good reason. There is something in this of the tabloid newspaper. There is also something of the more sensational chapbooks. While all of this makes for compelling art it doesn't necessarily appeal to the better parts of human nature.

I'm sometimes reminded of the play Arden of Faversham. Except that perhaps in Long Lankin male violence remains inexplicable and brutal, whereas in Arden of Faversham it is motivated by the behaviour of a woman. Which is not to try and read either work in the light of contemporary sensibilities.

The likelihood at present is that whatever I produce will be a three-dimensional structure. But like I already said, the masks will be finished first.