Lindsay Moon" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> she and all her siblings are named with "J" names and then their parents
> had one more child and named her Bernadette. All the children rebelled
> because it broke the pattern of "J's" and the parents renamed the child
> with a "J" name. So I believe it is kind of a song relating to that lost
> little Bernadette soul as well as the Joan of Arc theme.
>
> Sighing again at the huge amount of ridiculous trivia that resides in my
> head, but smiling because people like you actually find things like this as
> interesting as I do.
I'm smiling too, Lindsay - I'm always fascinated to learn the
story behind the song - and what the authors have to say.
Looks like the title and first verse were inspired by Franz Werfel's
book 'Song of Bernadette' about Bernadette Soubirous of Lourdes.
Here's what Leonard Cohen said about the song in a 1988
interview: see http://www.leonardcohenfiles.com/rte.html
Leonard Cohen : "Jennifer was brought up as a Catholic girl and
we were on tour together and she was talking about Bernadette all
the time and I always was fascinated by the figure too, and she
said I really want you to write me a song about Bernadette, here's
like a couple of lines of a tune, here's my idea. So the song came
out it was a real collaboration we really worked together on the thing."
John McKenna : "Song of Bernadette works on several levels. There's
the young visionary of February and March 1858 with that apparition
in her soul. A vision no-one believed. And, there are the rest of us with
our own visions and dreams, which no-one, least of all ourselves, can
believe in. Once we realise that visions don't last - they disappear -
and we end up running and falling, rather than flying. There's Bernadette,
true to her belief and finally rewarded with the knowledge that there is
mercy in the world. There's Leonard Cohen, acknowledging that each
of us is torn by what we've done and can't undo."
Leonard Cohen : "I think that we mostly do fail in these things, but the
thing that makes these failures supportable are these moments like
the one I tried to talk about in Hallelujah or the one I tried to talk about
in Bernadette - it's those are the moments when the thing is resolved -
the thing is reconciled - not actually by moving pieces around - it's not
a chess game. As I say in my new version of Hallelujah, 'I've seen
your flag on the marble arch, but love is not a victory march, it's a
cold and it's a broken Hallelujah.' Nobody's going to win this, not the
men, not the women, not the socialists, not the conservatives. Nobody's
going to win this deal. The only time we win is that moment when we
drop the battle and we affirm the whole situation with this embrace."
John McKenna : "Ultimately the song of Bernadette is a plea for love.
A celebration of the joy of faith. A statement of belief that we can get
through to something clearer. It's one of Cohen's fiercest and most
powerful lyrics."
Leonard Cohen: "But I never sang the song alone; I've only sung it with
Jennifer. It's a beautiful song I think."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
PaulC
np: I Am A Man of Constant Sorrow ( love them Soggy Bottom Boys!)
