Skip to main content

On Broadway

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3rAiwP8IBg 

Yip Harburg was a champion of racial and gender equality. Also, he wrote "Somewhere Over the Rainbow." That's enough for one life. But on top of that, he wrote "Down With Love."


This is an "I Want" song--but the wish is a wish to commit violence. To murder and stuff a dove. It's an "I Want" song for someone like Sweeney Todd.

Down with love--with flowers and rice and shoes.
Down with love--the root of all midnight blues.
Down with things that give you that well-known pain...
Take that moon, wrap it in cellophane.

Standard writing advice says, "Use the white space. Pay attention to what a character omits. This matters as much as what a character chooses to advertise." In a catalogue of romantic cliches, Harburg's speaker lets us know exactly what her last six months have been like. Without telling the story, she nevertheless "tells the story."

Down with songs that moan about night and day.
Down with love--yes, take it away, away.

Take it away. Take it away.
Give it back to the birds and the bees and the Viennese.....

There's an interesting shift. First, the speaker says, "Take it AWAY, away." Then, moving into the bridge, she changes her emphasis. "TAKE it away. TAKE it away." She becomes committed to action. "TAKE it. GIVE it back to the birds. Brother, let's STUFF that dove. Down with love."

This song seems effortless, but it's graceful and repeatedly surprising. It builds from general peevishness to galvanizing fury. It's a gem.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How to Host a Baby

-You have assumed responsibility for a mewling, puking ball of life, a yellow-lab pup. He will spit his half-digested kibble all over your shoes, all over your hard-cover edition of Jennifer Haigh's novel  Faith . He will eat your tables, your chairs, your "I {Heart] Montessori" magnet, placed too low on the fridge. When you try to watch Bette Davis in  Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte , on your TV, your dog will bark through the murder-prologue, for no apparent reason. He will whimper through Lena Dunham's  Girls , such that you have to rewind several times to catch every nuance of Andrew Rannells's ad-libbing--and, still, you'll have a nagging suspicion you've missed something. Your dog will poop on the kitchen floor, in the hallway, between the tiny bars of his crate. He'll announce his wakefulness at 5 AM, 2 AM, or while you and another human are mid-coitus. All this, and you get outside, and it's: "Don't let him pee on my tulips!" When...
3 comments
Read more

The Death of Bergoglio

  It's frustrating for me to hear Bergoglio described as "the less awful pope"--because awful is still awful. I think I get fixated on ideas of purity, which can be juvenile, but putting that aside, here are some things that Bergoglio could have done and did not. (I'm quoting from a survivor of sexual abuse at the hands of the Church.) He could levy the harshest penalty, excommunication, against a dozen or more of the most egregious abuse enabling church officials. (He's done this to no enablers, or predators for that matter.) He could insist that every diocese and religious order turn over every record they have about suspected and known abusers to law enforcement. Francis could order every prelate on the planet to post on his diocesan website the names of every proven, admitted and credibly accused child molesting cleric. (Imagine how much safer children would be if police, prosecutors, parents and the public knew the identities of these potentially dangerous me...
1 comment
Read more

Raymond Carver: "What's in Alaska?"

Outside, Mary held Jack's arm and walked with her head down. They moved slowly on the sidewalk. He listened to the scuffing sounds her shoes made. He heard the sharp and separate sound of a dog barking and above that a murmuring of very distant traffic.  She raised her head. "When we get home, Jack, I want to be fucked, talked to, diverted. Divert me, Jack. I need to be diverted tonight." She tightened her hold on his arm. He could feel the dampness in that shoe. He unlocked the door and flipped the light. "Come to bed," she said. "I'm coming," he said. He went to the kitchen and drank two glasses of water. He turned off the living-room light and felt his way along the wall into the bedroom. "Jack!" she yelled. "Jack!" "Jesus Christ, it's me!" he said. "I'm trying to get the light on." He found the lamp, and she sat up in bed. Her eyes were bright. He pulled the stem on the alarm and b...
1 comment
Read more