Monday's Child
‘Monday's Child’ is one of many fortune-telling songs, popular as nursery rhymes for children. It is supposed to tell a child's character or future based on the day they were born and help young children remember the days of the week. As with all nursery rhymes, there are many versions. It has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 19526.
Lyrics
Common modern versions include:
- Monday's child is fair of face
- Tuesday's child is full of grace,
- Wednesday's child is full of woe,
- Thursday's child has far to go,
- Friday's child is loving and giving,
- Saturday's child works hard for a living,
- But the child who is born on the Sabbath Day
- Is bonny and blithe and good and gay.[1]
Origins
This rhyme was first recorded in A. E. Bray's Traditions of Devonshire (Volume II, pp.287-288)[2] in 1838 and was collected by James Orchard Halliwell in the mid-nineteenth century.[1] The tradition of fortune telling by days of birth is much older. Thomas Nashe recalled stories told to "yong folks" in Suffolk in the 1570s which included "tell[ing] what luck eurie one should have by the day of the weeke he was borne on". Nashe thus provides evidence for fortune telling rhymes of this type circulating in Suffolk in the 1570s.[3]
There was considerable variation and debate about the exact attributes of each day and even over the days. Halliwell had 'Christmas Day' instead of the Sabbath.[1] Despite modern versions in which "Wednesday's child is full of woe," an early incarnation of this rhyme appeared in a multi-part fictional story in a chapter appearing in Harper's Weekly on September 17, 1887, in which "Friday's child is full of woe", perhaps reflecting traditional superstitions associated with bad luck on Friday - as liturgical Christians associated Friday with the Crucifixion. In addition to Wednesday's and Friday's children's role reversal, the fates of Thursday's and Saturday's children was also exchanged and Sunday's child is "happy and wise" instead of "blithe and good".[4]
Cultural references
In literature:
- Monday's Child (2004) and Tuesday's Child (2005) are novels written by Louise Bagshawe
- Wednesday's Child (1956) is the title of a short story by William Tenn (pen name of Philip Klass) published in Fantastic Universe in 1956.
- Wednesday's Child (1960) is a novel by Margaret Arbore Berg
- Wednesday's Child (2011) is a short story by Ken Bruen, nominated for the 2011 CWA Short Story Dagger
- Wednesday Addams of The Addams Family is said to have been named after the phrase, "Wednesday's child is full of woe." Her middle name, Friday, corresponds to the 1887 version.
- Thursday's Child (1956) is one of Eartha Kitt's three autobiographies.
- Thursday's Child (1970) is a novel by Noel Streatfeild.
- Thursday's Child (2000) is the title of a novel by Sonya Hartnett.
- Friday's Child (1944) is a novel by Georgette Heyer.
- "Old Mama Saturday ('Saturday's Child Must Work for a Living')" (1995) by Marie Ponsot, featured in the 1995 volume of the annual Best American Poetry, vol. 8 (New York: Collier Books, 1995), refers to the rhyme in its title.
- Prior Walter refers to the poem in Tony Kushner's play Angels in America (1985-86) (Act III Scene 1)
In T.V.:
- Wednesday's Child is the title of a play in the umbrella series Kraft Television Theatre (season 1, episode 15), broadcast on January 21, 1954.[5]
- "Friday's Child" (1967) is the title of an episode of the original Star Trek television series.
- "Thursday's Child" is the title of an episode in the fifth season of the series Road to Avonlea, in which Great Aunt Eliza recites part of this poem in relation to Cecily.[6]
- "Thursday's Child" is the title of an episode of Murder, She Wrote in season 7.
- "Wednesday's Child" is the title of an episode in season 1 of the US version of Prime Suspect.
In popular music:
Sunday's Child was the name of a 1970s trio of African-American female singers, which featured singer-actress Ren Woods.
Notes
- ^ a b c I. Opie and P. Opie, The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1951, 2nd edn., 1997), pp. 309-10.
- ^ http://books.google.com/books?id=qw82psYn-eoC&lr&pg=PR2#v=onepage&q&f=false
- ^ A. Fox, Oral and Literate Culture in England, 1500-1700 (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2000), p. 182.
- ^ 'Children's charms and Oracles' New York folklore quarterly (1952), p. 46.
- ^ Kraft Television Theatre: Wednesday's Child on the Internet Movie Database.
- ^ [1] Episode 61 (Season 5, Episode 9), originally aired on CBC: February 27, 1994
- ^ http://www.thechameleons.com/lyrics/index.php?song=8
External links