Examine John Lennon's Imagine Using Critical Thinking

Running head: IMAGINE1
Imagine As Narrative
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Imagine As Narrative
The idealistic, mythologized and iconized appreciation and acclaim of “great songs” is common. In music, songs rise and fall in a few days and, in an age of social media, within a few minutes or perhaps seconds. The passage of years, coupled by growing distance from “original facts,” changes, moreover, songs – and, for that matter, artists – into a state of fabled eternity. Imagine, an album written exclusively by John Lennon except for one song by his partner Yoko Ono, “Oh My Love,” (“Imagine,” n.d.) is a case in point. Topping charts and, mythologized by Lennon's iconic figure, Imagine, particularly album's title track, continues to echo as a global anthem for peace and a prescient prediction of current state of affairs. The reality of Imagine, as is for each and every mythologized and iconized work of art, is, however, much more nuanced, if not dismaying to fans, contemporary and present. (The album's cover showing Lennon's head in clouds is, in fact, informed by much unflattering, if not damaging, of Lennon and, for that matter, a whole legacy still unquestioned as proper.) The earlier background of, musical arrangements for and subsequent critical and mass reception of Imagine offer, however, much subtler understandings. The parallels often (yet mistakenly) established between works of art and real life find fertile ground for discussion of, yet also for much confusion about, what a work or art is actually about. To put matters into perspective, a close examination is required of Imagine. Far from a close reading of songs, musical worth or actual historic happenings, current essay aims to examine Imagine as a living document of Lennon's personal history, musical career and experiences in a wider context of artist's struggles for professional and personal freedom.
The iconic status Imagine still enjoys is undisputed. In part attributed to Lennon's iconic status as a former Beatles (lead) singer, partly to album's release at a critical juncture of singer's
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music career and partly to wider contemporary political and social conditions, Imagine is clouded by – and, as a consequence, clouds – subtler critiques. Coming second, as Lennon's solo album following John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band in 1970, Imagine is, in a sense, Lennon's actual debut into music market as a solo artist in a post-Beatles period (Radio X, 2020). The breakup of Beatles in 1969, followed by bitter legal and public banters between Lennon and Paul McCartney over contractual rights (Radio X), offers a subtler yet much muted background to Imagine. Indeed, viewed partly as a phase in a healing process Lennon underwent following one of world's most successful (and mythologized) bands, The Beatles; partly as a critical juncture in Lennon's evolution as an artist; and partly as an actual (mass) market appraisal of Lennon as a successful, commercial artist (“Imagine;” Radio X; Rogers, 2020) – Imagine, framed as such, can no longer, in a more critical and alternative reading, be understood merely as an eternal s...