Boxing the Compass: A Century and a Half of Discourse About Sailor's Chanties

How do we know what we know about chanties? Beginning with the earliest sources, this book traces the history of writing about chanties -- exploring the layers of discourse that have developed as authors and collectors have relied on, borrowed from, and contradicted those that came before them -- creating an indispensible guide to the primary authors and sources through a century and a half of chanty literature.