It is finished, by Ernest Dowson

Post mortem of a young girl lying on a blanket
Post mortem of a young girl lying on a blanket – from user oakenroad on Flickr

Dowson wrote several poems about the death of a child. The best known one is probably “The Dead Child “in the volume Decorations published in 1899. In it, the poet wishes to be dead, to share the child’s rest.

The following poem comes from his collection Poésie Schublade (“Drawer Poetry”), which was published only posthumously. It was probably written in the middle 1880’s. CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…

Kids have gifts—when one trusts them

Russian TV - Bella Devyatkina
Russian TV – Bella Devyatkina

All too often, adults think that children by their nature should do childish things and be left in their childish world, rather than imitating adults and their activities; this is the motto “let kids be kids.” Thus they are left in ignorance of what one considers as “beyond their age,” and if they show too much interest in such “beyond” things and inquire too much about them, they will be answered “don’t touch,” “stay away,” “this is not of your age,” “you are too young for that” or “anyway you can’t understand.” This makes future adults who will be ignorant, backward, immature and dependent on authority. CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…

Daddies and their little girls

Terry Zwigoff – Robert Crumb and his daughter Sophie, in Crumb
Terry Zwigoff – Robert Crumb and his daughter Sophie, in Crumb (1994) – from IMDB

In my post Thank Heaven For Little Girls, I presented several renderings of the song and ended with its use to accompany a stage dance between mature men and little girls. I stressed the symbolic nature of this reinterpretation of a song that lauded little girls for growing up into delightful young women: men love little girls as they are now, not only for their future beauty after puberty.

Now I found another video of a stage dance of adult men with little girls, but this one is much more romantic, the men lift the girls up, take them in their arms, and kiss them several times (at 1’05”, 3’00” and 3’29”): CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…

Childhood nostalgia in Ernest Dowson’s Praeterita

Jules-Alexis Muenier - La ronde des enfants
Jules-Alexis Muenier – La ronde des enfants (1902) – from Tutt’Art

Ernest Dowson kept in a drawer a booklet of poems written in his youth, which was published posthumously under the title Poésie Schublade (‘drawer poetry’ in a mix of French and German). These poems are not widely available on the web. However, they shine with freshness and evoke nostalgia for childhood, two qualities partially lost in the more polished verse of his maturity. CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…

Catholic School Girls Rule, by Red Hot Chili Peppers

Cover of the LP Freaky Styley by Red Hot Chili Peppers
Cover of the LP Freaky Styley by Red Hot Chili Peppers – from Amazon

The American rock band Red Hot Chili Peppers released their second studio album Freaky Styley in August 1985. Its 11th track, the song “Catholic School Girls Rule,” is inspired by an event in the life of the band’s singer Anthony Kiedis, which he told in his 2004 autobiography Scar Tissue (written with Larry Sloman, and published by Hyperion). A 14 years old girl who attended a local Catholic school met Kiedis backstage, and he slept with her while on tour before and after discovering her age. Genius quotes the book about their first meeting: CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…

Unhappy Girl, by The Doors

Dorothea Lange - Resettled farm child from Taos Junction to Bosque Farms project
Dorothea Lange – Resettled farm child from Taos Junction to Bosque Farms project, New Mexico. Photograph for the Farm Security Administration (December 1935) – from Wikimedia Commons

I have recently presented “You’re Lost Little Girl,” the second track of the album Strange Days by The Doors, and I said that this song probably refers to William Blake’s poem “A Little Girl Lost” in Songs of Experience (1794). Commenting the repeated line “You’re lost little girl” in the song’s lyrics, Genius says about Blake’s poem “A Little Girl Lost:” CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…

You’re Lost Little Girl, by The Doors

Paul Stewart - Tracy Stratford in The Twilight Zone, Episode 91: Little Girl Lost (1962)
Paul Stewart – Tracy Stratford in The Twilight Zone, Episode 91: Little Girl Lost (1962)

The Doors released their second album Strange Days in September 1967. Many fans consider it as the band’s most original and creative album. Its second track is a song called “You’re Lost Little Girl,” about a little girl who is lost, but knows what to do. For this song, the singer Jim Morrison was requested to relax, not to shout, so that his voice would sound like that of Frank Sinatra. CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…