Napoleon and British Song, 1797-1822

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-viii

   PDF

2. Introduction

   • Oskar Cox Jensen

   Pages 1-14

3. ‘A Hacknied Tune’? Song Culture in Napoleonic Britain

   • Oskar Cox Jensen

   Pages 15-39

4. ‘Threats of the Carmagnols’: Contesting the Nation, 1797–1805

   • Oskar Cox Jensen

   Pages 40-73

5. ‘That the War Might Cease’: Awaiting and Making News, 1806–1813

   • Oskar Cox Jensen

   Pages 74-103

6. ‘Now Boney’s Awa”: Triumph, Tragedy, and the Legend Established, 1814–1822

   • Oskar Cox Jensen

   Pages 104-133

7. ‘Canny Newcassel’: A Case Study, 1797–1822

   • Oskar Cox Jensen

   Pages 134-162

8. Coda

   • Oskar Cox Jensen

   Pages 163-164

9. Back Matter

   Pages 165-261

   PDF

This study offers a radical reassessment of a crucial period of political and cultural history. By looking at some 400 songs, many of which are made available to hear, and at their writers, singers, and audiences, it questions both our relationship with song, and ordinary Britons' relationship with Napoleon, the war, and the idea of Britain itself.

• Napoleon
• Napoleonic Wars
• French Revolution
• popular song
• propaganda
• cultural history
• revolution

“Napoleon and British Song, 1797–1822 is an excellent study that brings fresh insights to our understanding of both the political and cultural histories of this period. It demonstrates that a nuanced reading of the era’s popular song is highly rewarding, and its critical approach should serve as a model for scholars working with any ephemera of any kind.” (Erica Buurman, The BARS Review, Issue 48, Autumn, 2016)

"Cox Jensen combines different modes of reading from different disciplines with boldness and great assurance and in the process offers new methodologies for historians and literary scholars alike, opening out to the larger historical questions that absorb all of us working in this period. This is new and fascinating material, and the stories are well told - lively, engaged, and free of jargon." - Mary-Ann Constantine, University of Wales Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies, UK

"This richly detailed and entertaining work is distinguished by its acute sense of the connections between songs about Napoleon and the wider debates about the character of political controversy during his rise to and fall from power. It demonstrates that taking 'ephemera' seriously can transform our understanding of the period." - Mark Philp, University of Warwick, UK

"In a series of richly textured readings, Oskar Cox Jensen shows how central popular songs were to the formation of British identity and opinion during the period of the revolutionary and Napoleonic wars. The critical implications of this brilliant, multi-layered study will resonate with scholars for years to come." - Philip Shaw, University of Leicester, UK

"This is a brilliant book, impressively researched, and argued with great clarity. It uses the evidence of song to challenge some previously unquestioned accounts of the supposed popular hostility towards France and Napoleon, at the same time as it shows that popular song in general was neither loyalist nor radical." - John Barrell, Queen Mary, University of London, UK

• King’s College London, UK

  Oskar Cox Jensen

Oskar Cox Jensen is Research Fellow in the Department of Music, King's College London, UK. He is currently co-editing a volume of essays on the world of Charles Dibdin the Elder and preparing a second monograph on London Ballad Singers.

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