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“A dream you dream alone is only a dream; a dream you dream together is reality.” — Yoko Ono
Jul
5
For the Yoko Fans
Filed Under Gratuitous Beatles Blogging, blogging, feminism, fun | Posted by Cara |
Because so many of you have commented before that you are also fans of Yoko Ono, I thought I’d share my discovery from yesterday. Yoko has started a blog called 100 Acorns, which will contain conceptual “instructions,” similar to those found in her wonderful book Grapefruit, for 100 days. They’re great.From the site:
It’s been 44 years since my book of conceptual instructions, GRAPEFRUIT was first published in 1964.
On 15 June 1968, John Lennon & I planted two acorns for peace at Coventry Cathedral. It was the first of our many Peace ‘Events’.
In the summer of 1996, I picked up from where I left off, and wrote 100 ACORNS.
Starting on the 40th anniversary of the Acorn Peace Event on 15 June 2008, I will publish here an acorn every day for 100 days.
After each day of sharing the instructions, you should feel free to question, discuss, and/or report what your mind tells you.
I’m just planting the seeds.
Have fun.
Love, yoko
June 2008Even better, the “acorns” are accompanied by her own drawings. And as always, Yoko is an insightful and funny woman. I remember getting a third to halfway through Grapefruit for the first time before I actually started to “get” it, and John once said that the book made him really angry and frustrated the first time around. So those who are unfamiliar with Yoko’s “instructions” may experience something similar. This is one of my favorite acorns so far. Check it out.
In other Yoko news, I’ve always wanted to see a Yoko Ono art show. Lewisburg is a 4 hour drive from where I live, so my husband and I are making tentative plans to take an overnight trip and go to this show in a couple of months. I mean, a version of Play it by Trust is going to be there! (Play it by Trust the all white chest set, a piece I have always admired and whose title I have always adored. The original chess pieces were all sent to world leaders.)
Oh, and I’m working on a series of posts about the Evil Yoko caricature from a feminist standpoint. It’s fun, so far, and I’m looking forward to completing it.
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“Men, their rights, and nothing more; women, their rights, and nothing less.” — Susan B. Anthony
Thank you for this! I can’t wait to read your Evil Yoko posts. It’s so lazy to blame the beatles’ breakup on her, often in a mixture of misogyny and exoticism (the dragon witch!), which is so transparent it makes me want to gag. Bob Spitz’s Beatles biography is completely discredited for me due to his characterization of Yoko and her “shifting eyes”. Please. Yoko imbued the Beatles with coherent ideology, and until that is understood, nothing about them is. She’s the best thing to ever happen to Lennon.
If you’re interested at all, I made a small multi-media Yoko-love “essay” at She Once Had Me:
http://sheoncehadme.blogspot.com/2008/03/oh-yoko.html
Ah! Spitz is a major part of my analysis! Not only because his biography is otherwise very, very good and that shit does totally ruin it — but also because I think the way he characterizes Yoko is so extremely typical, because he does such a great job of putting all of the attacks in one place and because he inadvertently and accidentally shows that oops, it wasn’t Yoko at all, but actually the Beatles who were to blame.
I also agree that Yoko was the best thing to happen to John, and saved his legacy from being a guy who we would remember as a genius but A MAJOR ASSHOLE to a guy who was a genius but also a giving and admirable person.
And thanks for the link! I’d seen those top two drawings of Yoko, but not the others of them together. Heh. Oh John.
On a Beatles-y note, tomorrow is Ringo’s birthday. Here’s what he wants as a present: “It would be really cool if everyone, everywhere, wherever they are, at noon on July 7 make the peace sign and say ‘Peace & Love.’”
:D
Yup! People are going to be gathering outside of Abbey Road Studios, Strawberry Fields in Central Park (the Lennon memorial) and Capitol Records, which I think is in L.A., among other places.
I’ve always liked Ringo a lot. I can’t say that I’m a fan of his music, exactly, but I’ve always been a fan of him.
I actually squealed at this post. XD
After finally, FINALLY getting my hands on Approximately Infinite Universe, I love her a zillion times more. I look forward to your future Yoko-related postings.
I lived in Liverpool for the first 23 years’ of my life before moving to Manchester. I even grew up very close to Strawberry Fields. I can’t say I have ever cared much for The Beatles myself (and Ringo has really irritated me in the past few months!) but it has always vexed me the way people talk about Yoko. I mean, sometimes people in Liverpool talked about her as if she was the fucking anti-christ. It always came off as typical woman blaming to me and quite stupid.
Yoko is obviously an extremely intelligent and talented woman. It isn’t a surprise that John was into her. Hell, I’d have been into her and I’m of the heterosexual pursuasion. But to hear people talk of her you’d think she was a cackling harpy intent on destroying British music.
I really look forward to reading your analysis of it all!
Thanks for posting this! I adore Yoko.
Can’t wait to read your posts about her.
I’m glad that so many people are excited about the Yoko posts! I was kind of worried that it would just end up turning into a vanity project that no one else would care about. It was slightly on the back-burner for the moment, but you’ve managed to motivate me into getting back to work on it!
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