Sinister Nursery Rhymes
Imagine you're standing outside a door in dark, wood-panelled corridor. You can hear a child singing a nursery rhyme. Something about the sound of the child's voice sends a shiver down your spine. When you open the door, no one is there.
Which nursery rhyme would be most likely to give you the heebie-jeebies in these circumstances?
(A little bit of market research for my latest book...)
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"One two, Freddy's coming for you...."
Eurghhhhhhhhhh
Any nursery ryhme sung by children in slow way can sound creepy though. Imagine them singing ''Ring a ring of roses". Creep-tastic.
I made you look and I made you stare
I made the barber cut your hair
He cut it long and he cut it short
He cut it with a knife and fork.
Little Polly Flinders sat among the cinders, warming her pretty little toes.
Her mother came and caught her, and whipped her little daughter, for spoiling her nice new clothes.
And I guess this could be creepy in the right circumstances...
Just last night upon the stair
I saw a man who wasn't there
He wasn't there again today
I wish that man would go away!
Thanks for the book reference - sounds like it could be very helpful....
Half-a-pound of tuppeny rice
Half-a-pound of treacle
That's the way the money goes
Pop! goes the weasel
It sounds so innocent, but what does it really mean? Who knows? An the last line could be quite horrific.
Up and down the City Road
In and out The Eagle
That's the way the money goes
Pop! Goes the weasel.
Well, the City Road is in London N1 and The Eagle is a pub that was once a music hall (and is still there). A weasel, I think, is some kind of tradesman's ironmongery used in textiles or something (or possibly rhyming slang for coat - weasel and stoat). Anyway, after going in and out of the pub all night, you had to pawn your tools (or your coat).
It had many verses, so perhaps the rice/treacle is a later verse - or perhaps the children's version?
"Here comes the candle to light you to bed,
And here comes the chopper to chop off your head!
Chop, chop, chop,
The last man's dead!"
Old man stares at the pussy cat's tail
Doesn't hear the children wail
When he does they'll have to run
Or else he'll use his smoking gun
'Course - that won't help if it makes the scene more powerful with a rhyme that we all know...so ignore the suggestion if that's the case!
'It's raining, it's pouring, the old man is snoring,' popped in to my head whilst reading your blog. It's a bit of a sinister one.
If not, there are plenty of ideas above that would also work well so thanks everyone for your contributions. Whisks, I've got the full version of pop goes the weasel in one of our nursery rhyme books and I'm glad you've explained it as I never understood it before. The half a pound verse is about the third verse and there's also one about chasing a monkey around the table or something like that.
Ring a ring of roses - wasn't that about the plague? i.e. a symptom was a ring of red spots on your arm. You get a bit of fever. You die. And everyone sings about it :)
And this is why...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TS_tm2eFT8
Ring-a-ring of roses = plague symptom
A pocket full of posies = a nosegay to ward off evil aromas
Atishoo Atishoo = fever
We all fall down = dead
Thanks for the translation, Whisks. I remembered learning about that particular one at school. Googling 'sinister nursery rhymes' is quite an eye opener for some of the other ones too. There's some rather nasty tales behind the rhymes!
Which they said was about cromwel's soldiers raiding people's homes to arrest people (non-believers) who refused to pray.
Have you heard the song 'Scaretale' by the brilliant Nightwish? It opens with children singing ring a ring o' roses which might help you with the eerie factor.
Here's a link if you want a listen http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BsanIlcGHrA
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