A Tale of Two Samuels
"The Song of Hiawatha" vs. "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner"
Have you heard of the Mandela Effect? It's a phenomenon whereby you - and a great many other people - misremember something in the exact same way, despite being doubtlessly certain of your shared narrative.
For instance, lots of folks seem to “remember" that Nelson Mandela died in prison back in the 1980s. That did not actually happen: the South African politician and social-justice icon was released from prison the following decade and lived until 2013. Still, thousands of people would have sworn sincerely that it happened the other way.
Same deal with the Fruit of the Loom logo (cornucopia or no cornucopia?) and, oddly, Froot Loops, the cereal ("OO” or "UI” in "Froot?”). But the Mandela Effect does strike in non-fruit-related areas, too, and when it does, it's unsettling.
At least, that's what I'd heard. I had never actually been struck by this weird, reality-warping effect until last week, when I happened to be reading about the 1900 First Pan-African Conference in London, and a certain name jumped out at me.
"… It was here that W.E.B. DuBois was first introduced to a young Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, a connection that would later prove fruitful in the following …” I read, squinting at the screen.
Samuel Coleridge-Taylor?
The “Rime of the Ancient Mariner" guy? “Kublai Khan?"
God, I thought, embarrassed. I sure thought he lived a whole lot earlier than 1900!
My mother, an English teacher, would be horrified, I knew. I practically shivered at the thought. Goodness! It was lucky I happened to catch that, I thought with relief. That way, I wouldn't embarrass myself in some conversation with a literature person.
But something about it still seemed off to me.
Later that evening, as my partner, the Writer, and I were settled in on the couch for a rousing three or four episodes of “Holiday Baking Championship," contestants were asked to build a dome cake: a cake that would have a rounded, rising center constructed with the help of some internal scaffolding such as mousse or meringue or a sugar shell. (I’ve seen four seasons of this show, so I'm pretty much a baking expert.)
Dome cakes, I thought. Dome …
"‘In Xanadu did Kublai Khan a stately pleasure dome decree,’” I intoned significantly.
Startled at this outburst, the Writer glanced at me and nodded politely, wanting to focus instead on Javier's failing isomalt structure.
Suddenly I knew why it had stuck in my mind. “Hey! Pause that a second,” I cried. "Did you know that poet’s name was actually Samuel Coleridge-Taylor?"
The Writer looked at me and blinked a couple of times.
“Oh, you know!" I exclaimed. “‘In Xanadu did Kublai Khan a stately pleasure dome decree!’"
"Oh, yeah," he said. “His name was what?"
"Samuel Coleridge-Taylor. I would have sworn that was the other way around: Taylor Coleridge!” I insisted. "And I didn't think it had a hyphen, but apparently it does.” I threw my up my one functional arm. "It’s Bizarro World Romantics! Everything's all loosey-goosey!"
The Writer's brow furrowed. "That does sound wrong,” he said.
"I know, right?” I said, trying to work up a bit. "It must be some Mandela Effect thing …" I trailed off, trying to find the joke.
He picked up the remote, but turned to me again before pressing “play." “Are you sure, Sally?" he asked, serious now, as if I were suggesting that using my curling iron while lying in the bathtub would be an efficient use of time. "I mean, I was an English major, and I don’t -"
I cut him off. "Absolutely,” I said, perfectly assured of my correctness. “I just read about it today!" A defensive note crept into my voice. "He met W.E.B. DuBois at the 1900 Pan-African Conference in London! It was a connection that would later prove fruitful in the following …”
I trailed off, seeing the Writer slowly cock his head and gaze at me with a mix of amusement and concern.
“Sally, that really doesn't sound right," he said.
"I swear! It's Samuel Coleridge-Taylor!”
He raised his eyebrows, thinking. Apparently he was prepared to take my word for it. “Well, that really is very strange," he concluded after a moment.
"I know,” I said with self-satisfaction as he resumed Holiday Baking Championship. I was pleased to have contributed a Fun Fact to the evening’s discourse.
We watched for a few minutes as six bakers zoomed around the Food Network kitchen making their dome cakes as host-extraordinaire Jesse Palmer alternately called out dad jokes and coaxed the despairing contestants along as time dwindled.
Suddenly the Writer looked over at me.
“Unless they're two different people," he said.
For a moment, I could only stare. How in the world could they be two different people?!
"It's not like the name is Benjamin Thomas!” I shrieked, rattled. “It's not like it's … Robert Adam, or something incredibly generic! It's a pretty distinctive name, right?”
“Okay," the Writer said, turning back to the TV. "Coleridge-Taylor it is.”
As judging of the dome cakes commenced, I was filled with more than schadenfreude for Justine, my least-favorite contestant, whose effort looked a little wonky. My face began to redden. I thought about the inherent idiocy of growing up the child of two English majors, let alone being engaged to one now, and never realizing that it was Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, not Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
Well, that was it. I had to check.
As the Writer watched Carla Hall bite into a dubious-looking cream puff the size of a Big Mac, I picked up my phone surreptitiously. Two different people! Was it possible? I wondered as I typed the name into Wikipedia.
Staring back at me was a photograph of a rather handsome mixed-race man of clear partial African heritage.
Well, this was too much.
“Whaaat?!" I shrieked. “He was Black, too?! And I didn't even know that?!"
Luckily, my father was already dead. But my mother could never know, I thought, crazed with humiliation.
“Are you sure?" the Writer asked, pausing Holiday Baking once again.
I scrolled to the top of the entry. "Yes!” I exclaimed. “It says that …” But then something else caught my eye, and I stopped in my tracks.
The very top of the page read:
This article is about the composer. For the poet, see Samuel Taylor Coleridge. For other uses, see Coleridge-Taylor (disambiguation).
I could only stare for a moment, totally entranced by what I was seeing. Somehow, it was true; against all odds.
“Holy shit," I breathed. I fortified myself with a deep breath, then bellowed, “They are two separate people!"
The Writer burst out laughing. “Seriously?"
Seriously! As we had both suspected, Romantic poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge did, indeed, live from 1772 to 1834 - and he definitely did not have African ancestry.
But I wasn't entirely wrong, either. Samuel Coleridge-Taylor - amazingly, no relation - lived from 1875 to 1912 and did, indeed, meet W.E.B. DuBois at the First Pan-African Conference in London. I'm sure it was a connection that would prove fruitful later on, when …something! He was an acclaimed composer, achieving worldwide fame for his three cantatas that make up "The Song of Hiawatha,” his most lasting work.
It seems that the composer's mother, upon learning that her son's last name would be Taylor, decided to honor the poet by naming her son in this super-confusing way.
Now - and stay with me here - I thought it would have been awfully neat little now on things if Samuel Taylor Coleridge had written the original poem, "The Song of Hiawatha,” which Coleridge-Taylor later adapted to such great effect.
But he didn't. That was Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (not to be confused with Henry Longfellow-Wadsworth). Who belonged to an entirely different literary tradition altogether - something my parents would also certainly expect me to have on immediate recall, though I’m pretty sure I will from now on.
So yeah: I was spectacularly wrong about this. However, I think we can all take heart in the reminder that there may be an unfortunately-named Henry Longfellow-Wadsworth out there whose brilliant work is just waiting to be discovered.
Think of the possibilities: an Edgar Poe-Allen! A Henry Thoreau-David! Perhaps even - dare we hope - a Ralph Emerson-Waldo we should really all have heard of.
And hey, you never know! Because a completely shitbonkers-bananapants coincidence like this is apparently a thing that can happen.
Anyway, I'm sure glad I cleared that up before I embarrassed myself in conversation with a literature person!