Ten Little Indians
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"Ten Little Indians" is an American children's counting out rhyme. It has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 12976. In 1868, songwriter Septimus Winner adapted it as a song, then called "Ten Little Injuns",<ref name=Winner>Template:Cite document</ref> for a minstrel show.
LyricsEdit
The modern lyrics for the children's rhyme are:
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\addlyrics { One lit -- tle, two lit -- le, three lit -- tle In -- di -- ans Four lit -- tle, five lit -- le, six lit -- tle In -- di -- ans, Se -- ven lit -- tle, eight lit -- le, nine lit -- tle In -- di -- ans, Ten lit -- tle In -- di -- an boys } </score>
Minstrel songEdit
Songwriter Septimus Winner created an elaborated version of the children's song, called "Ten Little Injuns", in 1868 for a minstrel show.<ref name=Winner/>
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Derivative songs and booksEdit
It is generally thought that this song was adapted, possibly by Frank J. Green in 1869, as "Ten Little Niggers", though it is possible that the influence was the other way around, with "Ten Little Niggers" being a close reflection of the text that became "Ten Little Indians".Template:Citation needed Either way, "Ten Little Niggers" became a standard of the blackface minstrel shows.<ref>P. V. Bohlman and O. Holzapfel, The Folk Songs of Ashkenaz (A-R Editions, 2001), p. 34</ref>Template:Sfn It was sung by Christy's Minstrels and became widely known in Europe, where it was used by Agatha Christie in her 1939 novel of the same name, about ten killings on a remote island. The novel was later retitled And Then There Were None for the American edition, although the original title remained in use for the UK publication until 1985, and it remains one of her most famous works. The Spanish and Russian titles of Christie's novel today are still Diez negritos and «Десять негритят», respectively,<ref>A. Light, Forever England: Femininity, Literature, and Conservatism Between the Wars (London: Routledge, 1991), p. 243.</ref> and the German children's song, with a different melody, is called "Zehn kleine Negerlein".<ref>"Zehn kleine Negerlein", text, melody, ingeb.org</ref>
Variants of this song have been published widely as children's books; what the variants have in common is 'that they are about dark-skinned boys who are always children, never learning from experience'.Template:Sfn For example, it had been published in the Netherlands by 1913; in Denmark by 1922 (in Börnenes billedbog); in Iceland in 1922 (as "Negrastrákarnir"); and in Finland in the 1940s (in Kotoa ja kaukaa: valikoima runosatuja lapsille and Hupaisa laskukirja).Template:Sfn The Bengali poem "Haradhon er Dosti Chhele" ("Haradhon's Ten Sons") is also inspired by "Ten Little Indians".
Criticism of racist languageEdit
Because of changing sensibilities over the words used, modern versions for children often use "aeroplanes", "soldier boys" or "teddy bears" as the objects of the rhyme, among others.<ref>R. Riley, P. McAllister, J. Symonsm, B. Cassiday. The Bedside, Bathtub & Armchair Companion to Agatha Christie (Continuum, 2001), pp. 144–145.</ref> Icelandic publisher Skrudda's unaltered republication in 2007 of the 1922 Icelandic version of Ten Little Negroes caused considerable debate in that country, with a strong division between those who saw the book as racist and those who saw it as "a part of funny and silly stories created in the past".Template:Sfn In Kristín Loftsdóttir's assessment of the debate, she states:
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Some of the discussions focusing on the republishing of the Ten Little Negroes can be seen as colonial nostalgia in the sense that they bring images of more simple times when such images were not objected to. As such, these public discourses seek to separate Icelandic identity from past issues of racism and prejudice. Contextualising the publication of the nursery rhyme in 1922 within European and North American contexts shows, however, that the book fitted very well with European discourses of race, and the images show similarity to caricatures of black people in the United States.Template:Sfn{{#if:|{{#if:|}}
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The republishing of the book in Iceland triggered a number of parodies or rewritings: Tíu litlír kenjakrakkar ("Ten little prankster-children") by Sigrún Eldjárn and Þórarinn Eldjárn; 10 litlir sveitastrákar ("Ten little country-boys") by Katrín J. Óskarsdóttir and Guðrún Jónína Magnúsdóttir; and Tíu litlir bankastrákar ("Ten little banker-boys") by Óttar M. Njorðfjörð.<ref>Sigrún Eldjárn and Þórarinn Eldjárn, Tíu litlir kenjakrakkar (Reykjavík: Mál og menning, 2007); Katrín J. Óskarsdóttir and Guðrún Jónína Magnúsdóttir, 10 litlir sveitastrákar ([Hella]: Vildarkjör, [2007]); Óttar M. Norðfjörð, Tíu litlir bankastrákar ([Reykjavík]: Sögur, 2008).</ref>
1945 versionEdit
The following version of the song was included in the first film version of And Then There Were None (1945), which largely took Green's lyrics and replaced the already sensitive word "nigger" with "Indian":
See alsoEdit
CitationsEdit
Cited and general referencesEdit
External linksEdit
Template:And Then There Were None Template:Authority control