·
“Watching The Wheels”
is interpreted by many as an autobiographical song composed by the ex-Beatle
John Lennon. Lennon was a what he called a "househusband" between 1975 and 1980. He retired from the music industry and
concentrated on raising his son Sean. According to him, people were confused
by his choice
·
The song was written in
1980 and was first released in the US and then in the UK, the same year as a
part of the album Double Fantasy. The genre of the song
is pop rock and it has a length of 3.30 minutes.
·
According to a Lennon
aficionado, this song was written when he was addicted to watching a popular
late-night religious television program called, 'The 700 Club'.
·
When he sings "No
longer riding on the merry-go-round" Lennon seems to be talking about no
longer clinging to his youth. The song is about
crossing from a prolonged youth into adulthood as a
father
o
and self-awareness as a
middle aged human being who has come face to face with his own mortality.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVXR2LYeFBI
People say I'm crazy
Doing what I'm doing
Well, they give me all kinds of warnings
To save me from ruin
When I say that I'm okay, well they look at me kinda strange
"Surely, you're not happy now, you no longer play the game"
1.
From
the very outset of the song Lennon creates a dichotomy: it’s a song about “people
vs. I”. Then,
who is he singing this song for – One gets the idea that this is meant for
like-mined people. The
term ‘People’ can be read as a vague generalization or a direct criticism of
the dominant ideology of the White Anglo- Saxon Protestant West. It
is in that West, sayings such as “idle mind is the devil’s workshop” were
created and novels such as Robinson Crusoe were prescribed as course
material for the shaping of budding manhood.
5.
However,
the person in the song, presumably Lennon himself, is not idle – he is “[d]oing
what he is doing” :
a. Watching shadows on the wall
b. Watching the wheels go round and round
6.
But
none of the things done by the lyrical person meets with the approval of “people”. “People”
are concerned for the well-being of lyrical persona and issues warnings to
“save” him “from ruin”. What
he is doing – retiring and raising a child which is considered as primarily
women’s work – is considered unproductive and slothful. And we know sloth is
one of the seven deadly sins in Christianity.
9.
The
lyrical persona assures “people” that he is “okay” but far from being reassured
by the assurance, they look at the him in a way he terms as “kind of strange”. People
have come to the conclusion that the lyrical persona has become odd, and
oddness is something society frowns upon and is something society is often
determined to change. Hence
we have witch hunts and the burning of heretics.
People say I'm lazy
Dreaming my life away
Well they give me all kinds of advice
Designed to enlighten me
When I tell them that I'm doing fine watching shadows on the wall
"Don't you miss the big time boy, you're no longer on the ball?"
1.
The
second stanza too begin in the same way the first does with the exception of
“crazy” being replaced by “lazy”. This
time the accusation is that the lyrical persona is dreaming his life away. In
the third line, instead of issuing warnings, this time they are offering “all
kinds of advice/ designed to enlighten” the lyrical persona. There
is a wealth of ironic humour in the 3rd and 4th lines of
this stanza. Once
again the lyrical persona tries to reassure the concerned ‘people’ – he tells
them that he is “doing fine watching shadows on the wall”.
6.
In
the title, he was satisfied with watching the wheels go by– if we are to take
the term wheels literally then we might read it as an example of synecdoche –
wheels stand for vehicles; instead of being in them and travelling all over the
world as he used to, the lyrical persona is content to watch other people doing
what he used to. He could very well be seeing what he used to be in them. People
on the other hand seem to think that the lyrical persona is being childish in
his withdrawal from playing the ball as indicated by the use of “boy” to refer
to the lyrical persona.
8.
In
this stanza, instead of watching the “real thing” he is content to watch their
shadows on the wall.
9.
I
don’t know how much of a Classicist Lennon is but this reminds me instantly of
the Allegory of the Cave Plato uses in the Republic to illustrate the
difference between his world of Ideas and the world he lived in. If
this is the case, then there is a deep philosophical implication in the
reference to watching shadows. People
think that they are watching the real thing. However, the lyrical persona knows
what people are seeing is nothing but a shadow “twice removed from reality” as
Plato puts it. The entire world is a world of shadows of the world of Ideas and
Lennon knows it and he looks at what is in front of him with that
understanding. So,
the irony of people who have no idea that they are shadows and what they see
shadows designing to enlighten a person who has reached a much higher state of
self-realization is hinted at here.
I'm just sitting here watching the
wheels go round and round
I really love to watch them roll
No longer riding on the merry-go-round
I just had to let it go
1.
In
the third stanza, the lyricist return to “wheels” and this time they are going
“round and round” indicating the monotonous repetitive nature of life. Caught
in the rat race we are hardly able to breath let alone philosophize the nature
of our existence.
3.
One
has to step outside the grid to see what is happening within the grid – this is
what Ascetic Siddhartha did. It is not my intention to compare John Lennon with
Ascetic Siddhartha, but both had so much and it is in having so much that had
made them appreciate simple life. No
longer caught in the rat race, the lyrical persona is able to appreciate what
he had missed out when he himself was going round and round on/in the wheels
5.
In
using the term merry-go-round the lyricist implies that the time he spent
riding wheels was quite a lot of fun, but it was the kind of fun better suited
to children. On has to grow up sometime and leave childhood behind, so he “had
to let it go. The
use of the term “had to let it go” implies that the decision to step back was
not without pain.
Ah, people asking questions
Lost in confusion
Well, I tell them there's no problem
Only solutions
Well, they shake their heads and they look at me, as if I've lost my mind
I tell them there's no hurry, I'm just sitting here doing time.
1.
Still
people are not ready to take his word so they keep on asking questions to clear
their own confusion. Once
again he assures that his stepping outside of the grid is not a problem but a
solution to a problem. Still
they think they know better and pity him thinking he has lost his mind. He
once again tells them that there is no need to rush about
5.
The
second part of the last line once again hints at deep self-awareness –“Doing
time” is a slang term for serving a prison sentence. He
seems to have understood that life is a sort of imprisonment – we are trapped
within our body and one needs to sit and meditate on how to correct that
situation instead of rushing around like headless chicken.
8.
Once again, there is something Platonic in
this seemingly simple statement. In one of Socratic Dialogues related by Plato,
Aristophanes, the Greek comic playwright states that human babies were beings
from the world of Ideas trapped by the honey of generation into being born in
the same way cheese is used to trap mice in a trap.
9.
According
to Aristophanes this is why babies cry at birth. They resent the imprisonment
within a human body and they want to break free and return to their original
pure energy form – which is a little like how Buddha describes genesis in
Agganga Suuthraya. At
this point Lennon seems to see himself as someone “betrayed by the honey of
generation” and had become trapped and imprisoned within his body.
I'm just sitting here watching the
wheels go round and round
I really love to watch them roll
No longer riding on the merry-go-round
1. In the penultimate section of the
song the third section is repeated verbatim:
I
just had to let it go
I just had to let it go
I just had to let it go
2.
The
last part of the song is a repetition of last tine of the third section of the
song: I had to let go. It is repeated three times. The repetition points to the
pressure of being on the wheel and the deep desire to step off for the sake of
self-preservation. Incidentally, letting go – both literally and metaphorically
- is one of the key aspects of Buddhism in order to realize Nirvana. Here, he is letting go of the blatantly
materialistic aspects of his life in order to find himself. Many of us are struggling
to obtain the things they believe will define and complete them and Lennon who
had it all, while defending his life choice, is trying to tell them what people
think that they needed was nothing but delusion for life itself is a shadow on
the wall.“Help!”, “ Nowhere Man”,
“Working Class Hero” and “Imagine” – some of his other songs along the same
line of thoughts
5.
Interestingly, Lennon
was murdered by Mark David Chapman while Lennon was signing his copy of Double
Fantasy. Later, Chapman was recorded in police
custody reciting the line "People say I'm crazy" from the song
“Watching the wheels”.
.jpg)