![]() But she was my imaginary girl that we all have.” So it turned out to be Yoko, though, and I hadn’t met Yoko then. And also the image of this female who would come and save me-this secret love that was going to come one day. It turned out to be Yoko, though I hadn’t met Yoko yet. “There was also the image of the female who would someday come save me-a “girl with kaleidoscope eyes” who would come out of the sky. ![]() While reflecting on each of the songs in his discography, Lennon said this about Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds: Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds was born when Lennon took images from Julian’s picture and combined them with elements of Carroll’s stories and poems.Ī third explanation for the song’s meaning and origin was provided by Lennon many years after it was written, just a few weeks before he was killed. Lennon’s mind had then wandered toward the Lewis Carroll books Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass that he had long admired and recently been re-reading. The oft-repeated story goes that Julian had brought the picture home from school and told his father that it was of his friend, Lucy, who was up in the sky with diamonds. Lennon instead consistently claimed that the song was a response to a picture painted by his almost four-year-old son Julian. Later that summer, the Beatles endorsed the legalization of marijuana by signing their names to a full-page advertisement in the London Times.ĭespite these public proclamations about his drug use, John Lennon steadfastly denied that Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds was about drugs. Soon after, John Lennon, George Harrison, and the Beatles’ manager Brian Epstein also admitted that they had used LSD. McCartney even went on to extol the virtues of LSD, claiming that it had brought him closer to God and would yield world peace if only politicians would try it. Around the time the album was released, Paul McCartney revealed in a Life magazine interview that he had been using marijuana and LSD. Pepper was indeed a piece of hippie propaganda for hallucinogenic partying. The Beatles had no doubt contributed to the perception that Sgt. Some clever listeners even pointed out that the song’s title shares the initials of the hallucinogen LSD (lysergic acid diethylamide). The lyrics of With a Little Help from My Friends, Lovely Rita, and A Day in the Life all referred to marijuana, mentioning getting “high” and taking “some tea,” as well a desire to “turn you on.” And tuned-in listeners easily connected the feelings, sensations, and visions people typically experience while on hallucinogenic drugs to the dreamlike imagery of Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds. The album’s deliriously decorated jacket featured marijuana plants in the garden behind which the Beatles stood. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band in the late spring of 1967, fans and critics alike were quick to find references to drugs throughout the LP. When the Beatles released their album Sgt. In the exclusive excerpt below, Kasser applies the techniques of linguistic analysis to better understand the meaning of the song, as well as the life and mind of John Lennon. ![]() ![]() I n his recent book, Lucy in the Mind of Lennon (Oxford University Press), Psychologist Tim Kasser (Knox College) utilizes the methods of psychological science to explore John Lennon’s life through one of Lennon’s most famous and controversial songs: Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds.
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