"It's
a long way to Tipperary" is remembered as a song of the First World War, although
it was composed before the war in 1912 for British music halls. In August of 1914, a British news
correspondent heard the Irish Connaught Rangers singing the song as they
marched through France on their way to the front lines, and after his report, the
popularity of the tune spread, especially after it was recorded by tenor John
McCormack (click here
for a recording).
Much
like "Keep the Home Fires Burning," another popular song of the First
World War, "It's a Long Way to Tipperary" is not a fight song. As the war wore on, it may have become harder
to sing about martial glory, and easier to sing about home and a nostalgia for
what the soldiers had given up when they joined the war.
Chorus:
It's
a long way to Tipperary,
It's a long, long way to go.
It's a long way to Tipperary
To the sweetest girl I know.
Goodbye Piccadilly,
Farewell Leicester Square,
It's a long, long way to Tipperary,
But my heart lies there.
It's a long, long way to go.
It's a long way to Tipperary
To the sweetest girl I know.
Goodbye Piccadilly,
Farewell Leicester Square,
It's a long, long way to Tipperary,
But my heart lies there.
According
to Imperial War Museum historian Matt Brosnan, the song was catchy enough that
it was sung even by French, Russian, and German troops. William Yorke Stevenson, in his memoir At the Front in a Flivver, describes a
1916 vaudeville show that American ambulance drivers hosted for battle-weary
French troops outside Verdun. He writes,
"They asked—no, really begged, us to sing "Tipperary." Well, we sang it, of course" (149). The
song was everywhere, and so it's not surprising that a poem was written about
it.
Singing 'Tipperary' by William Kersley Holmes
We’ve each our Tipperary, who shout that haunting
song,
And all the more worth reaching because the way is
long;
You’ll hear the hackneyed chorus until it tires your
brain
Unless you feel the thousand hopes disguised in that
refrain.
We’ve each our Tipperary – some hamlet, village,
town,
To which our ghosts would hasten though we laid our
bodies down,
Some spot of little showing our spirits still would
seek,
And strive, unseen, to utter what now we fear to speak.
We’ve each our Tipperary, our labour to inspire,
Some mountain-top or haven, some goal of far desire—
Some old forlorn ambition, or humble, happy hope
That shines beyond the doubting with which our
spirits cope.
We’ve each our Tipperary—near by or wildly far;
For some it means a fireside, for some it means a
star;
For some it’s but a journey by homely roads they
know,
For some a spirit’s venture where none but theirs
may go.
We’ve each our Tipperary, where rest and love and
peace
Mean just a mortal maiden, or Dante’s Beatrice;
We growl a song together, to keep the marching
swing,
But who shall dare interpret the chorus that we
sing?
Holmes'
poem admits that the song has become an earworm that is hackneyed and tires the
brain, but beneath its trite sentimentality and bouncing rhythm lie a "thousand
hopes disguised." For the marching
soldiers, the song provides a way of giving voice to individual dreams that
"now we fear to speak." "Tipperary" has become a stand-in
not only for all the places left behind in the past, but also for the various futures
that men despair of never having an opportunity to reach.
From
mountain top to haven, from fireside to star, the poem asserts the differences
in the men who have been asked to give up not merely the comforts of home, but
their very individual selves. As they
march in step together, it is as a collective noun – a company, a regiment, an
army. Yet the poem invites us to listen beneath
the music to the frustration of individuals who must "shout" and
"growl" a song together.
Mayo Peace Park, Castelbar, Ireland |
In
its closing line, the poem goes one step further and cautions against broad
interpretations of soldiers' individual motivations and dreams. It reminds us that each soldier, whether
serving in the Somme or Normandy or Korea or Vietnam or Afghanistan -- or any other
place or time -- deserves to be remembered with dignity as an
individual, and not as an idealized or homogenized cog in the machinery of
war.
A very fine contrast could be a comparison of this poem with singer-songwriter June Tabor's wistful twin song "It's a Long Way to Tipperary" / "The Making of Tipperary". Especially the latter of these creates a very fine (but quite ominous) time context. Both are to be found on June's CD A Quiet Eye.
ReplyDeleteI'm always grateful for these suggestions and have just ordered a copy!
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