| Al Stewart – Roads to Moscow Lyrics | 16 years ago |
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That verse DOES mean something. When Stewart talks of standing in lines, or moving in lines, he's talking about formation. In this case, the narrating Russian soldier is talking about standing in formation with the Red Army, preparing to make the final approach on Berlin. This is done to point out that the narrator had fought for the Red Army for the entirity of the war (the first verse tells us he was there, on the front, when the Germans crossed the border into Russia. This sets up the final injustice that this young man endures -- lifetime (although probably a brief lifetime) imprisonment by the country that he fought so long for. (When he was "taken from the line" to "journey deep into the heart of holy Russia", it was by the Russians, not by the Germans! This is based on facts! Stalin, with his massive paranoia, sent millions of his own soldiers to concentration camps after the war, including those that had been taken prisioner by the Germans! One site suggests that several million Russian soldiers were killed by the Comunists, after the war. I've heard this story from other sources than the internet & do believe it to be true. It fits in perfectly with what I know about Stalin! I think Stewart wrote, not just this verse, but the whole song, as a salute to the Russian soldiers and people who paid such a high price, not just fighting the Germans, but trying to live under the rule of the Communists! I don't have them now, but I've seen figures where, over the course of their leadership, Stalin was responsible for significantly more death than Hitler. Of course, he had many more years to accomplish this. Both were pure evil, in fact, some people like to talk of the political spectrum as a line with liberals on the left & conservatives on the right. At the far right of this line would be facists and at the far left would be communists. I like to think of it as an alomst closed circle instead, where, if you go too far to either the right or left, you come back to the same evil tactics and interpretations as those you claim to be your worst enemy! This CLEARLY describs Hitler and Stalin! |
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