Sonny's Dream: Essays on Newfoundland Folklore and Popular Culture by Peter Narváez (review)

Sonny's Dream: Essays on and By Peter Narvaez. (St. John's: Memorial University of and Language Publica- tions, 2012. Pp. 314, introduction, illustrations, bibliography, index.)This is a posthumously published collection of essays by the folklorist, field-researcher, musi- cian, teacher, and popular culture studies scholar Peter Narvaez, who died in November 2011, shortly before its planned completion. two key people responsible for seeing the book through to publication were Eileen Col- lins and Paul Smith, both of Memorial Univer- sity of Newfoundland's Department of Publications Committee. Most of the 15 essays collected here have been published before, in one form or another, though they were revised and updated by the author for this publication.As the subtitle suggests, all the essays here focus on the folklore and popular culture of Newfoundland-a remote island for most of us, even today, and more so throughout its history. Its early population of indigenous people are not considered in the book. Rather, the focus is on the living past and present that stems from the island's European settlers. was the earliest British colony, pre-dating the Empire. It remained so until as late as 1949, when it became, with Labrador, a Canadian province. Early British and Irish settlers brought with them their work songs and traditions, and these survived in relative isolation into the twentieth century. They continue to offer rich subject matter for folklorists, and Narvaez was particularly alert to the clashes and cross-ferti- lization between local and imported cultural traditions.Peter Narvaez was a United States citizen of partly Mexican parentage, born in Brooklyn, New York, the son of a union organizer. He was in New York during the Revival years, see- ing live performers and becoming a musician himself. After majoring in history, he studied at the Institute at Indiana University, undertook field studies in Puerto Rico and Vir- ginia, became an assistant professor of history and anthropology in Maine, and arrived at Me- morial University in St. John's in 1974. Thus, he plunged into a multi-faceted scrutiny of the folk and popular culture of this unique, tough, enor- mous island with a trained eye and ear, despite being an outsider.This book represents a fair sampling of its author's prolific work across the third of a cen- tury and more in which was his adopted home. list of his Publications, Research and Performances given at the back of the book is extensive enough to suggest that Sonny's Dream is indeed, to use a cliche with real applicability around Newfoundland, the tip of the iceberg.The essays are divided, as Narvaez intended, into four sections: Folk Narrative, Custom, Vernacular Music, and Popular Culture. first section concentrates on the exploration of legend as a narrative form and on the connec- tions between local and international legends, drawing on the author's own fieldwork as is evident throughout his scholarship. essay Newfoundland Berry Pickers 'In the Fairies' first appeared in an earlier form in Lore and Language in 1987. Narvaez also edited the book Good People: New Fairylore Essays (Garland, 1991; and University Press of Kentucky, 1997). same section's other piece, Folklore about Seniors: Media Legends, was published in an earlier form as The of'Old Foolishness': Media Leg- ends, in Canadian Literature 108, 1986. Its opening sentences encapsulate the author's central beliefs, themes, and teachings in folk- lore:The technological media which transmit popu- lar culture have often been viewed by folklorists and other students of culture as destroyers of folklore. …

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