Editing Cecil Sharp (section)

==Political views==

Sharp identified with the political left of his day. He joined the [[Fabian Society]], a Socialist organisation, in 1900, and in later years became a supporter of the Labour Party. In his younger days he was considered a radical and, according to a teaching colleague, liked to "pull the legs off the Tories".<ref name="Karpeles"/> While at Cambridge, Sharp heard the lectures of [[William Morris]], which probably influenced his later self-description as a 'conservative socialist', since his opposition to capitalism went alongside a suspicion of the Industrial Revolution and modernity in general, and a belief in the virtues of rural over urban life.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Bustin |first=Dillon |date=1982 |title="The Morrow's Uprising: William Morris and the English Folk Revival" |url=https://scholarworks.iu.edu/dspace/handle/2022/1763 |journal=Folklore Forum |volume=15 |pages=17–38}}</ref> He wrote of his anger about the 'injustice of class distinctions',<ref name="Karpeles"/> believed in collectivism over private enterprise, and in later life wrote of his sympathy with striking coal miners.<ref name="Whisnant">{{cite book |last=Whisnant |first=David E. |date=1983 |title=All That is Native and Fine |location=Chapel Hill |publisher= University of North Carolina Press |isbn=0807815616}}</ref> He also believed in democracy over totalitarianism, holding that "any form of collectivist government must also be democratic if it is to function properly", and expressing scepticism about the Bolshevik revolution in Russia.<ref name="Karpeles"/><ref name="Harker">{{cite book |last=Harker |first=Dave |date=1985 |title=Fakesong: The Manufacture of British Folk Song, 1700 to the Present Day|location=Milton Keynes, Philadelphia |publisher=Open University Press |isbn=0-335-15066-7}}</ref>

Sharp was an opponent of [[capital punishment]].<ref>Strangways, A. H. Fox. (1933). [https://archive.org/details/CecilSharp/page/n31/mode/2up ''Cecil Sharp'']. Oxford University Press. p. 22</ref> He was not, however, a supporter of the Suffragette movement, although according to his colleague and biographer Maud Karpeles this probably reflected a disapproval of their methods rather than the principle.<ref name="Karpeles"/> Despite this, he maintained a friendly relationship with his sister [[Evelyn Sharp (suffragist)|Evelyn]], an avid suffragist who was imprisoned for her activities; after her release from Holloway she wrote to Sharp stating that she had no wish to quarrel over the matter, and that she did not believe he was a "confirmed 'anti'".<ref>Letter from Evelyn Sharp to Cecil Sharp, 8 Aug 1913, Vaughan Williams Memorial Library, CJS1/12/18/11/2. https://www.vwml.org/record/CJS1/12/18/11/2</ref> Sharp was a nationalist, and believed that exposure to English folk song would engender a spirit of patriotism.