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12 |
PREFACE |
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enough help to carry them into a new realm of most delightful fun.
In many different places I have seen groups of beginners trying to do these old dances. Without an experienced caller, without authentic calls, without much of an idea of the form of the old dances, they try to make up for their lack with a boundless enthusiasm. They need help. The time seems ripe for a revival. Seeing these old dances take hold so contagiously makes me hope that they may spread to hundreds of groups all over the country who are eager for good, wholesome, social fun.
But besides the dancers and the young of heart who wish to "shake a wicked hoof" around a square, I have found an increasing number of people who are interested in the old dances for their historic and literary significance. They are a living bit of the colorful days of the Old West. Beaten out by hand in the crude forge room of necessity, they are an authentic witness of the life of our fathers. Perforce the work of amateurs, of pioneer spirits, they were fashioned from old fragments of dances that had been carried by ox team from many lands. Each phrase of their apparently meaningless chatter appears to have a significance and a history that makes it fascinating to the student of words or of peoples.
I have had letters from many writers and students about the dances, and a book might be written for them alone. But it would lose its flavor. The dances would be like dead ants preserved in the amber of the past. We want them stingingly alive and danceable. We want them as real as the varmints the cowboys sang about—
"The sand burrs prevail And so do the ants And those who sit down Need half-soles on their pants."
"Unless you are half-souled, don't sit down with them in your study chair. Get a group of friends together and dance them. Then their literary significance and their full flavor will be yours. |
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Coombe-Corrie January, 1939 |
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