Английская Википедия:A Spaniard in the Works

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A Spaniard in the Works is a nonsense book by English musician John Lennon, first published on 24 June 1965. The book consists of nonsensical stories and drawings similar to the style of his previous book, 1964's In His Own Write. The name is a pun on the expression "a spanner in the works".

Sales of the book were lower than Lennon's first book, with 100,000 copies bought in the three months following publication.

Background

While some of John Lennon's first book, In His Own Write, had been written years earlier, he mostly wrote A Spaniard in the Works over the course of 1964.Шаблон:Sfn Beatles road manager Neil Aspinall recalled Lennon writing some of the book in Paris in January 1964Шаблон:Sfn – predating the 23 March 1964 publication of In His Own WriteШаблон:Sfn – and bandmate George Harrison recalled Lennon writing while the two holidayed with their partners, Pattie Boyd and Cynthia Lennon, in Tahiti in May 1964. Harrison, Boyd and Cynthia contributed lines, with Lennon sometimes inquiring of them for words that would work better in a particular sentence.Шаблон:Sfn During the same holiday, Lennon occupied himself by reading the books left on their private boat, including a complete set of Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories. Recognising the formula the stories employed, he spent three weeks writing a parody.Шаблон:Sfn

When most of the book was complete, the publisher, Jonathan Cape, requested more material from Lennon. To encourage him, they sent an Italian dictionary, which Lennon read through and found "a howl on its own". Despite further publisher requests that some material be removed or changed, Lennon argued for everything to be kept so as to maintain the work's spontaneity.Шаблон:Sfn

Content

Jonathan Cape published A Spaniard in the Works in the UK on 24 June 1965, retailing for 10s 6d.Шаблон:Sfn Publication in the US followed on 1 July.Шаблон:Sfn Less inhibited than In His Own Write in terms of both writing style and length, some of the book's pieces run for five or six pages,Шаблон:Sfn including the Sherlock Holmes parody "The Singularge Experience of Miss Anne Duffield", which runs nine pages.Шаблон:Sfn The book has 56 pieces,Шаблон:Sfn including twelve prose pieces, six poems and 38 drawings.Шаблон:Sfn A piece titled "The General Erection" satirises the UK's 1964 general election.Шаблон:Sfn

The book includes numerous references to racial minorities, as well as characters with deformities and disabilities.Шаблон:Sfn The title piece, for example, opens: "Jesus El Pifco was a foreigner and he knew itШаблон:Nbsp... a garlic eating, stinking, little yellow greasy fascist bastard catholic Spaniard." In the piece "Our Dad", a father is kicked out of his home by his sons: <poem style="margin-left: 2em;">"You don't want me around," he said, "I'm old and crippled too." We didn't have the heart to say "You're bloody right it's true."</poem> Of the book's drawings, one depicts two street buskers, both wearing signs, one of whose states "I Am Blind" while the other reads "I Can See Quite Clearly". Another drawing depicts a large man with glasses, sitting in a chair looking at a four legged green monster.

Reception

A Spaniard in the Works became an immediate best seller,Шаблон:Sfn going through four printings in its first four months and ultimately selling over 100,000 copies.Шаблон:Sfn Critically, reviewers were generally unenthusiastic, considering the book similar to In His Own Write but without the benefit of being unexpected.Шаблон:Sfn

Describing its parodies as forced, author Jonathan Gould opines that the writing of A Spaniard in the Works was not up to the standard set by In His Own Write. Still, he calls the book's punning inspired, especially that found in "The General Erection".Шаблон:Sfn Critic John Harris describes the book as a "more warped compendium" than its predecessor,Шаблон:Sfn and that the satiric piece "The General Erection" proved that Lennon "had a little more political nous than he let on".Шаблон:Sfn Critic Tim Riley writes that the book was more hastily written than Lennon's first book, yet also more ambitious, with much more wordplay and more genre parodies.Шаблон:Sfn He writes that "[d]etonating conformity was one of the few themes Lennon's pen mastered", though his drawings were more elegant in conveying "emotional mayhem".Шаблон:Sfn

Analysis

Professor of English Ian Marshall describes Lennon's prose as "mad wordplay", noting Lewis Carroll's influence on his writing style and suggesting the book anticipates the lyrics of Lennon's later songs, including "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" and "I Am the Walrus".Шаблон:Sfn In discussing the theme of crowds in Lennon's 1967 songs "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!" and "Good Morning Good Morning", scholar William M. Northcutt suggests that the story "The Wumberlog" pits the crowd against the individual.Шаблон:Sfn In the story, a young boy searches for the "Wumberlog" – a group of people who "Wot lived when they were dead". A "carrot" leads the boy to them, only to find that they are digging his grave. The group throw onto his body while mocking him, with Northcutt suggesting that the crowd's cruel toast of the boy demonstrates Lennon's conflicted feelings regarding crowds.Шаблон:Sfn

In his 1983 book, Literary Lennon: A Comedy of Letters, writer James Sauceda provides a postmodern dissection of both In His Own Write and A Spaniard in the Works.Шаблон:Sfn Everett describes the book as "a thorough but sometimes wrongheaded postmodern Finnegans Wake-inspired parsing".Шаблон:Sfn Riley calls Sauceda's insights "keen", but suggests more can be understood by analyzing the works with reference to Lennon's biography.Шаблон:Sfn For example, Riley suggests that Lennon wrote the poem "Our Dad" after two interactions with his father, Alfred Lennon, writing that both Alfred and the father character in the poem traveled often. The poem is mostly hostile in its tone before the final lines read: "But he'll remain in all ours hearts/—a buddy and a pal." Riley suggests that the poem's "bitingly satiric reversal" serves to satirise the tendency of British odes to always move towards a happy ending.Шаблон:Sfn

Asked in an interview about his "sick" humour, Lennon linked it to his school days, while also saying, "If it makes people sick, they're sick. It doesn't appear sick to me".Шаблон:Sfn Reflecting on the length of his Sherlock Holmes parody, Lennon said "[i]t seemed like a novel to me", and that he "wrote so many characters in it I forgot who they were".Шаблон:Sfn

Legacy

In her study of Beatles historiography, historian Erin Torkelson Weber suggests that it reinforced perceptions of Lennon as "the smart one" of the group, and that the band's first film A Hard Day's Night further emphasised that view.Шаблон:Sfn

A Spaniard in the Works was the last collection of Lennon's writing published in his lifetime.Шаблон:Sfn Lennon began writing a third collection, planned for release in February 1966, but abandoned the project soon after. McCall's published the lone completed poem, "The Toy Boy", in its December 1966 issue.Шаблон:Sfn Harper & Row published a posthumous collection of Lennon writings in 1986.Шаблон:Sfn The collection, Skywriting by Word of Mouth, mostly consists of writings made during Lennon's "house-husband" period during his late 1970s break from recording.Шаблон:Sfn

References

Sources

Books

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Book chapters

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Magazine articles

• Шаблон:Cite magazine

External links

• Шаблон:WorldCat
• [[[:Шаблон:Google Books URL]] A Spaniard in the Works] at Google Books