"all stove up"-- "I feel so break-up"

[Wilson Gray]

On Jun 3, 2004, at 9:14 PM, Laurence Horn wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: "all stove up"-- "I feel so break-up"
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>> On Jun 1, 2004, at 9:33 AM, Dale Coye wrote:
>>
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>>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>> Poster:       Dale Coye <Dalecoye at AOL.COM>
>>> Subject:      Re: "all stove up"-- "I feel so break-up"
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>>> This reminds me of the Weavers' song-- not sure of the title but the
>>> first
>>> line is "We sailed on the ship John D."  --they sing "I feel so
>>> break-up, I
>>> wanna go home"   When I heard the Beach Boys version not so long ago
>>> they changed
>>> it to "I feel so broke up" which makes more sense to me-- almost in
>>> the sense
>>> we're talking about in "stove up"-- can anyone enlighten me on "feel
>>> so
>>> break-up?"  why break and not broke?
>>>
>>> DF Coye
>>> The College of NJ
>>
>> "The Ship 'John B.'" is a folksong of Caribbean origin - Jamaican, I
>> think, but maybe not - and uses some form of Caribbean English. Is it
>> true that the Beach Boys sing "broke up"? I've always heard it as
>> "break up." My mistake, I guess.
>>
>> -Wilson Gray
>
> It's actually "The Sloop John B." rather than "The Ship".  I was
> pretty sure that the standard Beach Boys' recording of the song,
> presumably adapted by Brian Wilson, did indeed have it "I feel so
> break up", not "broke up", but a google search confirms Dale's
> memory, not Wilson's and mine.  I'm puzzled, but resigned.   Maybe
> they actually sang and recorded it both ways on different occasions?
>
> Larry
>

Re: "sloop" vs. "ship." Quite so. It is indeed "sloop" and I knew that.
I should have proofread the post before I sent it. My bad. Re: "break
up" vs. "broke up."
"Break up" is my story and I'm sticking to it.

-Wilson Gray