Collected in the field from 1915 through 1955, these tales and songs were considered by the publisher at the time to be too salacious for inclusion in Vance Randolph’s Ozark Folksongs. Randolph came to doubt that they would ever appear in print, and they did not in his lifetime.
Roll Me in Your Arms, Volume I of “Unprintable” Ozark Folksongs and Folklore, includes 180 unexpurgated songs collected by Randolph with tunes transcribed from the original singers. Volume II, Blow the Candle Out, contains rhymes and songs without music as well as other unexpurgated Ozark folk materials, including children’s lore, elements in speech, graffiti, riddles, dance calls, and beliefs.
G. Legman’s painstaking and patient editing, annotating, and crossreferencing richly complement the Randolph collection. The result is a look into a previously neglected area in the study of folksong and folklore in the Ozarks and further evidence of Randolph’s preeminence in the field.
The late Vance Randolph lived in the Ozark Mountains from 1920 until his death in 1980. Although he taught folklore at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville, he is best remembered for his many years of field research resulting in the national bestseller Pissing in the Snow & Other Ozark Folktales and more than a dozen other books on American folklore.
