“Limerick is Beautiful (Colleen Bawn)”

Description

The city of "Limerick is beautiful ... The girl I love ... lives in Garryowen, And is called the Colleen Bawn." If I were "Emperor of Russia ... Or Julius Caesar, or the Lord Lieutenant" I'd give up everything to have her be my bride.

Notes

Given how often most of the characters the singer envies were assassinated, I might be tempted to give up the job too. - RBW

Fowke notes that the song was included in Boucicault's play, and that he is therefore sometimes credited with authorship. A more literary version was penned by the Irish poet Michael Scanlan. - PJS

The song is from Dion Boucicault's play "The Colleen Bawn" which opened September 10, 1860 at the Adelphi Theatre, London [sources: Templeman Library University of Kent site "Richard Fawkes Dion Boucicault Collection" (gives attribution for "composer" as "Levey, R. M., Mr"; "The Adelphi Theatre 1806-1900" at Eastern Michigan University site for English Language and Literature).]

Broadside LOCSinging sb20290b includes the statement "Sung by Dan Bryant in the great Irish drama, the Colleen Bawn, at Wallack's Theatre, New-York."

"Garryowen (Garrai Eoin, 'the garden of Eoin') on the edge of the old city of Limerick Eoin is the older Irish form of the name John" (source: _Odds and Ends_ from May 26, 2001 online edition issue Limerick Leader site)

Broadside LOCSinging sb20290b: H. De Marsan dating per _Studying Nineteenth-Century Popular Song_ by Paul Charosh in American Music, Winter 1997, Vol 15.4, Table 1, available at FindArticles site. - BS

Same tune

• Limerick is Beautiful (Rebel Version ) (DT, LIMBEAUT)

Cross references

• cf. "The Wreck of the Varty" (tune)

Broadsides

• Bodleian, Harding B 26(100), "Limerick is Beautiful", P Brereton (Dublin), c.1867; 2806 b.11(40), "Limerick is Beautiful"; also Harding B 26(101), "Colleen Bawn" ("Limerick is beautiful as every body knows")
• LOCSinging, sb20290b, "Limerick is Beautiful!", H. De Marsan (New York), 1861-1864

Recordings

• O. J. Abbott, "The Colleen Bawn (Limerick Is Beautiful)" (on Abbott1)

References

1. O'Conor, p. 12, "Limerick is Beautiful" (1 text)
2. OLochlainn 72, "Limerick is Beautiful" (1 text, 1 tune)
3. Dean, pp. 23-24, "Coleen Bawn" (1 text)
4. Roud #3002
5. BI, OCon012