| The Decemberists – The Hazards of Love 1 (The Prettiest Whistles Won't Wrestle the Thistles Undone) Lyrics | 16 years ago |
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I read the "prettiest whistles" bit as "No matter how pretty and charming you are, you can still fall in love and get inescapably hooked"- William implying that he's already in love with Margaret, and she'll soon feel the same about him ("You'll learn soon enough"). And as far as the rape interpretation... no, can't see it. They both seem to be stupid in love with each other, but William seems a bit too starry-eyed to actually go around raping people. As a side note: up until the Interlude and the Rake's Song, the whole album seems very reminiscent of the Tam Lin story; after that, of course, there's no "hold me fast, and fear me not" bit, but the wandering into the wilderness, being seduced by a fairy/changeling, falling in love, and returning to him seems very familiar- am I imagining it? |
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| The Decemberists – The Infanta Lyrics | 17 years ago |
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Actually, chaparral is also an evergreen oak (from Spanish chaparro); it seems a bit more likely she's lying on a bed made of chaparral wood. Anyway, it seems like all the complicated "this person is actually that one too" interpretations and the idea that it's a survey of someone's entire life are reading too much into it- the song seems to me like just a description of the coronation of a new infanta. I thought the elephants and camels were a nice touch: they seem unlikely in Spain or Portugal, but... it's a royal parade; who *wouldn't* want to have elephants and camels? Aside from that, they would have had to be imported (probably at great expense) by the royalty for the parade- just another example of the show they were putting on. I thought the word choice in the baroness's section was odd: "Seething spite for this live largesse" Largesse is generosity or benevolence- is she angry about the royal family adopting the infanta? Her barrenness, I thought, was just her literal inability to bear children; the celebration of this child (and the fact of her being a foundling; perhaps she resents the queen for adopting the child instead of her, somehow?) reminds her of that and "stings her". But as I read it, the point of most of the song was the last verse, which immediately dismisses the whole celebration as "folderol" and points out that while everyone is making such a fuss over this child and her crowning, the kid herself is asleep and dreaming about (maybe wanting to go back to?) the quiet river she was pulled out of. Essentially, to the actual infanta, the celebration and praise that all the rest are so worked up over are meaningless- and the narrative voice implies that she's the right one. |
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