Analysis of the song “imagine”

The objective of the present work is to discuss and analyse the song “imagine” by Jhon Lennon.

Just considering the title, made up of only one word, imagine, that’s an imperative, the reader expects the poem to be an invite of the author directed to the reader to imagine what he is going to tell in the stanzas of the song. Just reading the title the reader is curious to find out if the verb “imagine” would be the key word of the song.

The main topic of the song is to imagine an ideal world in which all the people live to live every day, not for a second future purpose, in which all people are in peace and share the world as brothers. For this reason, the goal of the present analysis is to find out the message of the song.

The song is organized in five stanzas and it has a regular pattern, indeed two stanzas make up the refrain and, for this reason, have the same number of line and the other three stanzas have seven lines each. Also the lines’ length is regular. The regularity of the layout of the song may bring the message that, for the realization of the author’s ideal world, all conditions are important at the same way and for this reason no element shall be highlighted.

In the economy of the test all the stanzas have the same function, to treat and extend the main topic. In the first stanza the speaking voice introduce the first condition for the creation of the ideal world: the absence of the belief in the heaven and the hell. This is a synecdoche, the substitution of all objectives that push people to live their life for future goal with a religious one. As a consequence of the absence of this objectives people would live carefree day by day, free from the fear caused by the unknown of the future.

In the second stanza, instead, the speaking voice introduces the second condition for the creation of the ideal world: the absence of countries and religions. The lack of these two kinds of separation of humans would have as a consequence the disappearance of all kind of wars, people would become part of a big, unique group, the mankind.

In the third stanza, that is the refrain, the speaking voice reports the reaction of the listeners he imagines after listening the song. The author thinks the listeners may consider the world he is describing a utopia, something impossible to create and he a dreamer. In opposition to that the author reports that he isn’t the only one to believe in this dream and that he hope, one day, also the people today doesn’t agree with what he is saying would join them, because only in this way this imaginary world can be created.

In the fourth stanza the speaking voice reports the third and last condition for the creation of the ideal world: the absence of possessions. As a consequence of this lack all the world would be of all the people, two emotions that are the ruin of the mankind and that are often the causes of wars and misfortunes, greed and hunger, would cease to exist.

In the first, the second and the third stanzas there’s the repetition, in each two times, of the verb imagine. With these stanzas the speaking voice invite us to imagine the world with the absence of the heaven, the hell, the religion, the countries and the possessions, therefore to imagine the world he is describing. In the second line of the first and the second one the speaking voice says it isn’t difficult to imagine the world without these elements. Probably with these sentences the author would say that, if isn’t hard to imagine the world without these elements, it isn’t impossible abandon them. In the second line of the fourth stanza, instead, the speaking voice wonders if the listener can imagine the world without possessions. This sentence could actually mean that for the author the possessions, the material objects, are the most difficult element to abandon, given that modern society is closely linked to money, wealth and in it is deeply rooted consumerism.

In conclusion, the listener understands that the message of the song is of peace. This originate, according to the author, by man’s abandonment of greed, hunger and living with the objective of seeking power or wealth that precisely lead to the conflict between men and the war.