anonymous
2007-07-17 16:00:59
Death and time lay men and nations low, but life, though short, can have brief meaning, through drugs and intense human relationships, including of a sexual nature. Such is this writer's subjective interpretation of “A Day In the Life,” based on the following line-by-line analysis.
''I read the news today, oh, boy.'' An anonymous narrator seeks information about the world outside his own life. He reads a newspaper, a chronicle of the undifferentiated, relentless march of human events. “Oh, boy” is a euphemism for “Oh, God” — an exclamation of surprise, fear, powerlessness in the face of reality. In the vein of the bromide that declares that mediocre minds discuss people, average minds discuss events, and great minds discuss ideas, the narrator is seeking information through the media beyond that which is available in the course of ordinary, narcissistic personal experience.
''About a lucky man who made the grade.'' Our narrator overlays irony over this line. The individual has been blessed by fortune, in the sense that he has “made the grade” — achieved material or worldly success. On a deeper level, one who dies because of inattention in a traffic accident is the opposite of “lucky.” He is in fact cursed, doomed — a victim of the fate that claims us all in the end. This sarcasm expresses uneasiness about the transitory nature of temporal human ambitions.
''And though the news was rather sad, well I just had to laugh; I saw the photograph. He blew his mind out in a car; he didn’t notice that the lights had changed.'' The narrator, while acknowledging the tragedy of the accident, reflexively, automatically (“had to”) employs sarcasm as a defense mechanism against the awful reality: death is a fate that spares no-one. “Blow your brains out”: to commit suicide with a firearm. “Blew his mind out” substitutes “mind” for “brain,” indicating fatal head injury in an accident that is suicidal in the sense that the driver caused his own demise, if not with intent then certainly with the same outcome. “Blow your mind”: to be amazed, to be stunned by new awareness or insight by information coming from outside the boundaries of familiar experience. And death is certainly the ultimate alien experience — the one true “alienation” experienced universally. All of which is suggestive of the fact that we live in utter ignorance of the nature of death, the ultimate truth which defines our lives by virtue of being the opposite of life. Not noticing that the traffic signal had changed describes one running a stoplight and dying in a collision: a mundane, relatively meaningless demise suffered by many. Meaningless, because death results from so small an action as being distracted for a moment while behind the wheel.
''A crowd of people stood and stared; they’d seen his face before. Nobody was really sure if he was from the House of Lords.'' The anonymous crowd is gripped by impolite, morbid curiosity; the vicarious thrill derived from viewing death first-hand — from the knowledge that someone has died, but not me: I am still alive. Of course, death is the most important fact, and ultimately the defining reality, of human experience. However, the nature of that experience cannot be accessed second-hand. The anonymous, gaping street crowd degrades the significance of this event, reducing what should be a moment of solemnity to an opportunity to access cheap thrills. This member of the House of Lords — a British political institution of long tradition — has political power and inherited wealth. Such an individual might be known to average people through glimpses in the media, but these people would have no occasion to be personally acquainted with him: to the mass of people on the street, he is no more recognizable than a face on a television screen or in a newspaper photograph — an abstraction, representing a distant, governing elite. This individual is separated — alienated — from the rest of us by his power and privilege. However, the commonness of his death proves that his privileged status is an illusion.
''I saw a film today, Oh, boy. The English Army had just won the war. A crowd of people turned away. But I just had to look, having read the book.'' The anonymous narrator, continuing to seek information about the wider world, is again struck by his insignificance, as signified by his invocation of the euphemism for the religious exclamation “Oh, God.” Again discarding the oblique mechanisms of symbolic allusion, the narrator references a historical event in which the armed forces of a named country — the United Kingdom — is victorious in an unnamed war. The unspecified triumph of British arms in war symbolizes Britain’s temporal greatness or significance. But in the same way that individual achievement fades into the past, the greatness of the English nation has become a matter of history — whether fictional or documentarized, we are not told, and it does not matter: this is merely a “film.” The point being made is that this unspecified British victory is an irrelevancy from which the anonymous audience of moviegoers literally turns away. Standing in contrast (more likely, sitting) is our protagonist, whose desire to acquire knowledge finds special expression in the act of viewing a film regarding a subject in which he is interested enough to have not only read a book about it, but to have then sought additional information on this specific topic. However, the majority does not share the narrator’s interest. By implication, the meaningless death of one man in a car accident today is more interesting to society than a monumental achievement of the storied, historic English army. What this describes is a society severed from any connection to its past.
''I’d love to turn you on.'' “To turn on” is of course a double entendre, meaning either “to excite sexually” or “to provide access to drugs or to a drug experience.” In the face of these events, the narrator is declaring that access to a deeper, more-meaningful level of existence — or even mere diversion from these melancholic facts — is available by means of intense, shared interpersonal experiences, including sexual relationships, mind-altering drugs, or both.
''Woke up, fell out of bed, dragged a comb across my head.''
Waking up is the first action any individual must make in a given day — an action that is in a sense involuntary and paradoxical, in that the act of waking up is automatic, requiring no free will. The need to rise from sleep is inevitable, a rigid fact of existence, like the cycles of nature, and therefore inescapable. In a way, it is its own negation of free will — or birth by another name. Falling out of bed evokes the experience of falling, of being an object of gravity, a prisoner of the natural laws and forces that govern all existence. It is one of the first things we learn after being born: you can fall down. Combing one’s hair symbolizes all that is cosmetic in the putting on of our public face, in choosing how to present ourselves to society. Thus is a kind of pilgrim’s progress described: We are born. We learn how the world works. We decide what we want others to know about us.
''Found my way downstairs and drank a cup. And looking up, I noticed I was late.'' Moving through life, we “find our way” by trial and error; we acquire sad knowledge of the baser requisites to be fulfilled in the construction of our foundation. We grow sadder and wiser — a process which that seems to satisfy a human need no less elemental than that of thirst slaked by the raising of a drink to the lips. The universality of such an experience drives a further sense of inevitability, of being captive to the larger forces of gravity, the need for food and water, the inexorability of time.
''Found my coat and grabbed my hat, made the bus in seconds flat.'' We further refine our public posture in our choice of defensive garments. And we do so in haste, with the sense of urgency derived from our knowledge that we are running against time.
''Made my way upstairs and had a smoke. And somebody spoke and I went into a dream.'' We have arrived at a destination. Though our trip on the bus is over, we’re still on a trip, in the sense that we’re not at home. And though anywhere other than home is at least to some degree, and by definition, alien — alienated — at least we are familiar with the terrain: we can go upstairs. And though we may still be isolated, we are at least no longer alone. We know this, because we hear the voice of an anonymous party. Thus is the possibility for the transcendence of isolation made available, by means of communication with another human being. However, we decline this opportunity in favor of the ultimate introverted act: retreat into the internal, dreamlike, surreal, irrational, non-linear mental state made created by drugs. Thus, although we have opted out of an opportunity for interpersonal contact, we have shifted our consciousness away from the strictures of reality and toward the freedom of a dreamlike, drug-induced state.
''I read the news today, oh, boy. Four thousand holes in Blackburn, Lancashire. And though the holes were rather small, they had to count them all. Now they know how many holes it takes to fill the Albert Hall. I’d love to turn you on.'' The theme of individual powerlessness and insignificance against the backdrop of the relentlessly and endlessly unfolding human drama is repeated. Initially, the relevance of the quantity of holes is unkown to us, because the context is known only to the protagonist. But if you can’t know what the holes are, you can know that they were counted in a specific place whose importance the narrator signals by naming the city and county. The holes could be anything: a symbolic stand-in for the march of ephemeral concerns that constitute the bulk of human existence in every locality. More likely, their meaning is literal, for holes are indeed empty, devoid of meaning. The identity of the unnamed “they” whose duty it was to count the holes is a matter of speculation. Call them census-takers, tax collectors, assessors. Whatever the moniker, their role is the same — that of faceless, anonymous “experts.” Anointed by the Establishment, these experts enumerate those facets of reality deemed by that same Establishment to be relevant to the society. Only after this act of counting — literally, of determining “what counts” — can come the dictation of the societal priorities flowing therefrom. The anonymity of those doing the counting symbolizes the essentially alien nature of the means by which government rules. This reinforces our narrator’s concern with the theme of alienation — the alienation of the successful politician from the fundamental truth of his mortality; the alienation of the street crowd from the governing elite; the alienation of the moviegoers from their nation’s history; and the alienation of so-called experts from the daily concerns of laypeople. The experts announce an absurd finding: 4,000 holes will fit in the Albert Hall. This result underscores the distinction between meaningless information, which is everywhere but of no use to anybody, and meaningful knowledge, which is elusive. The reference to the Albert Hall is an English place-name familiar to very few outside England. The idea here is that if you recognize the reference to the Albert Hall, you will experience the minor thrill of recognition — and the fleeting satisfaction that comes from feeling that you can construct meaning within the context of random and terrifying events by means of language: the power to superimpose order onto chaos simply by giving things a name. Even if you don’t recognize the reference to the Albert Hall, you still recognize the absurdity of counting the holes in Blackburn. Significantly, the Albert Hall is a place where famous performers ply their craft. An allusion, we may conclude, to the meaninglessness of fame — the emptiness in the soul modern celebrity. It was a void the Beatles themselves spoke of after they had reached their peak. And the narrator sends, for the second time, the dually desirous proposition to provide the anonymous “you” with an opportunity to replace mental alienation and emotional emptiness — to fill these twin voids at the center of the modern soul — with the twin towers of a mind-altering drug experience and an interpersonal relationship, the latter being sexual in its intensity if not in its expression.
It’s one song, but there are crucial difference between the two narrators. Narrator No. 1 seeks to understand reality; he wants to know about the news, he’s interested in history; he ponders the nature of societal forces; alludes to the absurdities that underlie conventional wisdom; clothes his comments in ironic sarcasm. Whereas No. 2 accepts his immediate reality without a second thought; makes no comment about the world beyond the boundaries of his narcissistic concerns about grooming, hairstyle, clothes. He knows time outruns us all, but doesn’t seem to care a whit about that fact. In another key contrast, No. 2 rejects human contact in favor of drug-induced inner space, while No. 1 invites the anonymous “you” to experience, along with him, a chemical- or sex-induced alteration of consciousness. In essence, No. 1 stands outside society. He analyzes, judges, constructs an edifice of emotional self-defense. And yet, despite his isolation, it is he who seeks alliance with another person. Indeed, his most meaningful action is to invite someone to share with him in the pursuit of transcendence through drugs and intense relationships. Whereas No. 2 accepts reality implicitly, tailors for himself a stylish suit of armor, and rejects a relationship in favor of introversion.
What is the takeaway here? First, that we modern men and women are alienated: from each other, from the Establishment, even from our own history. This latter fact is one of the things that makes us modern. And that which we value most — fame, success, power and money — are but fleeting unrealities trumped by death and the passage of time. Our humor may provide defense against the terror arising from these melancholic facts. But solace can be achieved, if only temporarily, by raising our consciousness to different levels, whether through intense relationships or chemical substances.
A final word about authorial intent: Many of you know that Lennon based the lyrics for this piece on a several newspaper articles, including one about potholes. Many of you will no doubt set me straight by quoting the relevant scholarship. No doubt I will be cautioned against the sins of reading too much into the text. My response is the following: All art gets its start in the mundane, ephemeral facts of human experience. Small-minded insistence upon restricting to the terms of that ephemera any effort to interpret a text, painting or other work is a denial of art's power to transcend the quotidian realities above which all artistic minds strive to reach.
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