Tell me
'tain't bu'sted--do, honey, en I'll never forgit you."
'Tain't earning now, it's saving does it, you may lay to that.
"'Tain't much use for fools, you may lay to it--that, nor nothing," cried Silver.
Well, pretty soon the whole town was there, squirm- ing and scrouging and pushing and shoving to get at the window and have a look, but people that had the places wouldn't give them up, and folks behind them was saying all the time, "Say, now, you've looked enough, you fellows;
'tain't right and
'tain't fair for you to stay thar all the time, and never give nobody a chance; other folks has their rights as well as you."
"
'Tain't. The stars can't prevent me from shaving."
"Don't want anybody fur to learn the business,
'tain't likely?"
'
'Tain't a wery good 'un to look at,' said Sam, 'but it's an astonishin' 'un to wear; and afore the brim went, it was a wery handsome tile.
'Tain't ev'ry man, Miss Carr, ez hev got the pluck to pledge not only what he's got, but what he reckons to git."
Smith cut her first singles in 1923 (including her first to top the charts, "Downhearted Blues") and her last only a decade later ("Gimme a Pigfoot"), but her enduring recordings of such songs as "
'Tain't Nobody's Bizness if I Do" (1923), "Send Me to the 'Lectric Chair" (1927), "A Good Man Is Hard to Find" (1927), and "Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out" (1929) would influence generations of singers and writers.
She says it's easy ter tell life-long invalids how ter be glad, but
'tain't the same thing when you're the life-long invalid yerself, an' have ter try ter do it" (Porter 178-79).
[...] (Chorus) Look out for club gals, dey're de stuff, Dey're out in eb'ry shade; De Coons take first place,
'tain't no bluff, When dey turns out on parade.
"
'Tain't no tragedy unless you make it one': Imitation of Life, Melodrama, and the Mulatta." ArQ 66.4 (2010): 93-113.