Rabbie’s ode to a red, red rose
QUESTION What was the poem recited by Timothy West on TV’s Great Canal Journeys after travelling through the Crinan Canal in Argyll and Bute?
IT WAS Scotland’s most famous love poem, A Red, Red Rose. Originally considered to be a song, rather than a poem, it is usually credited to Scotland’s national poet, Robert Burns: O my Luve’s like a red, red rose, That’s newly sprung in June: O my Luve’s like the melodie, That’s sweetly play’d in tune. As fair art thou, my bonnie lass, So deep in luve am I: And I will luve thee still, my dear, Till a’ the seas gang dry. Till a’ the seas gang dry, my dear, And the rocks melt wi’ the sun; I will luve thee still, my dear, While the sands o’ life shall run. And fare thee weel, my only Luve, And fare thee weel, a while! And I will come again, my Luve, Tho’ it were ten thousand mile.
This was probably a folk song adapted by Burns. In the final seven years of his life, he collected more than 300 traditional Scottish songs, the most famous being Auld Lang Syne and A Red, Red Rose.
Burns gave the latter to the composer Pietro Urbani to publish because he was too embarrassed to approach his usual publisher, George Thomson, fearing that the song would be regarded as ‘ludicrous’ and ‘absurd’.
The song first appeared in Urbani’s Scots Songs (1794) with the explanation: ‘. . . the words of A Red, Red Rose were obligingly given to him by a celebrated Scots poet, who was so struck with them when sung by a country girl that he wrote them down, and, not being pleased with the air, begged the author to set them to music in the style of a Scots tune, which he has done accordingly.’
Burns considered A Red, Red Rose a song and set it to the melody Major Graham’s Strathspey by the fiddler Niel Gow. However, since 1821, it has been sung to the tune Low Down In The Broom. When you hear Timothy West recite it so beautifully, it can equally be considered to be a poem.
The song proved hugely influential. Bob Dylan cited it as having had the greatest effect on his music.
As you can see from its final line, it may also have inspired Scotland’s alternative national anthem, The Proclaimers song I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles).
Gary Muir, Ayr.
QUESTION Are shopping centres designed to disorientate customers?
THE phenomenon of walking into a shopping centre, becoming enamoured by the displays and wandering out with an unintended purchase is known as Gruen transfer.
Victor Gruen was an Austrian architect who conceived the modern shopping mall in the Fifties. In his early designs of storefronts on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, he created some of the first window shopping experiences, reducing the threshold between the products and passers-by — and converting them into shoppers.
His plan had been to give the suburbs a sense of community, but it backfired when managers began to use Gruen transfer as a tactic to manipulate consumers into buying more stuff.
The Swedish furniture giant Ikea has mastered this art. Store designers nudge you through a maze of products along a path that is the least direct route to the cash register. By the time you get there, your trolley is probably full of things you never considered buying on the way in.
Ella Stewart, Basingstoke, Hants.
QUESTION Is it true that, until recently, Hawaii was mosquito-free?
MOSqUITOES were first recorded in Hawaii in 1826. These southern house mosquitoes ( Culex quinquefasciatus) likely arrived on a trading ship unloading on the docks at Lahaina Harbour, Maui.
Four more species, Aedes albopictus (Asian tiger mosquito), Aedes aegypti (yellow fever mosquito), Aedes japonicus (Asian bush mosquito) and Wyeomyia
mitchellii (bromeliad mosquito), were accidentally introduced to Hawaii over the next 150 years.
The very large elephant mosquito ( Toxorhynchites spp) was deliberately introduced between 1929 and 1953, because its offspring preys on the larvae of other mosquitoes.
The arrival of mosquitoes coincided with an outbreak of avian pox on the island. This was probably imported by non-native birds and was spread to local birds by the mosquitoes. They hadn’t encountered mosquito-borne diseases, so had no immunity.
The disease accelerated a sharp decline in the lowland native bird population. In 1900, several native species went extinct following an outbreak of avian malaria ( Plasmodium relictum). Dr Ken Warren, Glasgow.
QUESTION Did Chuck Berry write the Beach Boys’ hit Surfin’ USA?
AS THE original answer pointed out, Surfin’ USA was inspired by Berry’s Sweet Little Sixteen — acknowledged on later releases of the song.
However, the melody of Berry’s first hit, Maybellene, was cribbed from the old country song Ida Red. There’s nothing new in the music business!
The assertion that the U. S. had countered the British invasion with the Beach Boys is wide of the mark.
Thanks to Surfin’ Safari in 1962 and Surfin’ USA/Shut Down in 1963, the Beach Boys were well-established before The Beatles had their first U.S. hit, I Want To Hold Your Hand, in early 1964.
The Beach Boys were never clones of The Beatles. There was a rivalry of sorts and, when the Beach Boys’ album Pet Sounds came out in 1966, it had a great effect on The Beatles. Paul McCartney still describes God Only Knows as one of the best songs/recordings of all time.
Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band was his own counter to Pet Sounds — and what a response that was!
T. A. Cox, Malvern, Worcs.
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