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Research in Australia, continued Since the early 1970's, June Factor has been engaged Recently, a new kind of borrowing has appeared, and in the collection, collation, and analysis of Australian it is a combination of both of those mentioned above. children's folklore; and together with her students at the These novels are also High Fantasies. In content and Institute of Early Childhood Development in Melbourne structure, they are very like the novels of Tolkien, and a colleague, Gwenda Davey, she has built up a Alexander, and Chant, but in their composition, they are considerable archive of written, audio, and video material like the novels of Garner, Walton, and Morris. These which is now known as the Australian Children's Folk- novels are High Fantasies based on traditional ballads- lore Collection. In 1978, June Factor, Ian Turner, and Child ballads, in fact. Wendy Lowenstein co-edited a new edition of Cinderella Two examples of this type of fantasy are Dahlov Dressed in Yella. At present, June Factor is preparing a Ipcar's The Queen Of Spells and A Dark Horn Blowing. monograph on children's folklore research in Australia The Queen Of Spells is based on Child #39, "Tam Lin," and a book on Australian children's folklore which will and tells the story from the perspective of Janet, the bring together hitherto unpublished or inaccessible ma- young woman who loves "Tom Linn" and wants to save terial on this subject - including some fascinating early him from the Queen of Spells. Ipcar's A Dark Horn studies of Aboriginal children's play. Blowing is more complex. According to Ipcar's end notes Anyone who is interested in Australian children's to the novel, the inspiration for the story was Child #40, folklore should write to: "The Queen Of Elfan's Nourice." There are also rever- Editors berations of Child #4, "Lady Isabel And The Elf Knight," Australian Children's and other traditional songs. In addition, there are songs Folklore Newsletter of Ipcar's own composition which are patterned after Institute of Early Childhood Development traditional songs. And there is quite a bit of Scandinavian Madden Grove folklore - especially Christmas folklore - in A Dark Kew, Victoria, 31O1 Horn Blowing. If The Queen Of Spells is an expansion of Australia the original material, A Dark Horn Blowing is both an expansion of the original materials as well as an inter- weaving of other materials from many traditional sources FOLKTALES, BALLADS, AND with materials from the author's own imagination. HIGH FANTASY: Another fantasy work, Song of Sorcery, by Elizabeth Scarborough, is loosely based on Child #200, "The Gypsy An Excerpt From Research In Progress Laddie," a song better known in this country as "The Whistling Gypsy." Scarborough's novel uses less of her Tolkien's The Hobbit and The Lord Of The Rings, source material than Ipcar's novels do. Scarborough uses Lloyd Alexander's Chronicles Of Prydain, Joy Chant's the basic situation - the wife who leaves with the gypsy RedMoonAndBlackMountain, Alan Garner's The Owl and the husband who chases after - and explains how Service, Kenneth Morris' Book Of The Three Dragons, the situation arose; but she then leaves the plot of the Evangeline Walton's four books based on the Mabino- Child ballad, content to use it as a part of a larger plot in gion, and many more derive much of their material from which an unscrupulous wizard attempts to gain control traditional sources. The novels of Tolkien, Alexander, of a kingdom. and Chant are patterned after the magic tale or marchen. All of this material - both the recent Ipcar and None is actually a retelling of a specific myth, legend, or Scarborough novels as well as the other works mentioned tale; yet each has the structure of a magic tale. The novels - needs further examination on several levels. For of Garner, Walton, and Morris, on the other hand, are folklore (especially folktale )-in-literature scholars, these actually expansions of mythic materials; each author books need to be examined in terms of their use of expands a few pages of myth or legend into a two- or folktales, ballads, etc. First, these traditional elements three-hundred page novel. continued on page 4 @OO~~[ID[llirn~9~~@~[h)~@[llirnrn~rn~~@@[lliffi~OOW June Factor, "Fragments of Children's Play in Colonial , "Mama Mia Have a Beer," The Educational Australia," in The Colonial Child, Guy Featherstone, Magazine, Vol. 37, No.4 (1980), Victorian Education ed., Royal Historical Society of Victoria, 1981. Department. , "Australian Children's Playground Rhymes," , "A Forgotten Pioneer: Dorothy Howard," The A Track to Unknown Water: Proceedings of the Educational Magazine, Vol. 37, No.6 (1980), Vic- Second Pacific Rim Conference on Children's Litera- torian Education Department. ture, S. Lees, ed., Melbourne State College, 1980. with Gwenda Davey, "Cinderella and Friends: , "While Shepherds Washed Their Socks by Folklore as Discourse," paper, Linguistics Section of Night," The Educational Magazine, Vol. 37, No.3 the Australian and New Zealand Association for the (1980), Victorian Education Department. Advancement of Science, Adelaide, May 1980. 2.