Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 1996. [Vol. 3.] Eger Journal of American Studies. (Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 23)

STUDIES - Gabriella Varró: The Theme of Comic Love in Blackface Minstrelsy: The Anatomy of the Grotesque

of these objects to generate comic, surprising and alienating effects, and all this through the exploitation of and fascination with the black male as the butt of jokes as well as the object of desire. The bizarre, the highly exaggerated, the ambivalently attractive and repellent, yet always somehow perversely distorted was everywhere in the grotesque props appearing on sheet music covers, in minstrel lyrics and directly on the stage. 4. GROTESQUE MINSTREL SCENARIOS OF COMIC LOVE The theme of love has always presented itself as a popular topic for the stage, whether writers dramatized its tragic or comic aspects. As expected, of all the themes that circulated widely on minstrel stages, it was undoubtedly the theme of love that proved most durable. In due course, like in established drama, the American popular minstrel stage also developed its own stereotypes and cliches for the love theme in its sentimental, melodramatic (the tragic mulatto formula) and comic modes. Therefore it is in the theme of comic love that we find the most fertile ground to examine variations on grotesque minstrel scenarios. The very first burnt-cork song of comic love, "Coal Black Rose,"

11 is seen by many critics as also marking the beginning of the minstrel theater as such (Boskin 74). According to the Brown University notes for the song, George Washington Dixon was singing it as early as 1827, "while playing with a circus" (Wittke 18). Dixon was author of a number of early minstrel songs, and was widely known as one of the earliest blackface delineators. The Starr Collection version of the song cites Mr. W. Kelly as one of the many performers of the song, who got "unbounded applause" for his presentation, if we can believe the note on the sheet music cover. 1

1 "Coal Black Rose" Brown University, Harris Collection, no. 13. In Starr. M1.S8, AfroAmericans before 1863. The Starr Collection edition was written by White Snyder; although Dennison cites a John Clemens as another possible author of the song. 103