Oh the Woes of Writing a Paper.

I’ve been doing research for my paper, and now I feel like I have hit a wall. I’ve been able to find a great deal of information on Ethel Smyth, her early years, some of her better known compositions, how she learned to compose, who she studied with, etc… She is an extremely fascinating woman and a woman way ahead of her time. She was outspoken, independent, she worked, had affairs with other women; things no proper lady of the Victorian era should do.

However, my paper is going to discuss Ethel Smyth’s development, very general information just to give some background and set up who Ethel Smyth was. But the main focus is going to be on her part in the Women’s Suffrage movement and her Suffrage music. I have been able to find a lot of background information and a fair amount of information on her role in the Suffrage Movement, but I haven’t been able to find as much information as I would like to on her Suffrage music. I was hoping to find more, the woman devoted two years of her life to this movement and I find it hard to believe that she only composed a handful of pieces for this cause.

I have found one song, “The March of the Women,” which is great, it actually became something of a theme song for the movement, but I have had trouble finding scores, lyrics, analysis of any of her other suffrage pieces. I would like very much to be able to interweave her life before her involvement in this movement and her life during this movement, with her suffrage music. Why was each piece specifically written, the words/message of the piece, how/why was it performed, what was its reception like? It is the answers to these questions that I am struggling to find.

I am continuing to do research through the databases and journal holdings through the rider web site and finding a lot of useful information, it’s just not exactly what I had hoped for. Unfortunately it seems as though on Monday I may have to make an emergency meeting with one of the reference librarians. However I have to say that although the annotated bibliography is not my favorite assignment, it is forcing me to make sure I have useable sources for this paper before it’s too late, so I appreciate that.