"While My Guitar Gently Weeps" is a song written by George Harrison of The Beatles for their double album The Beatles (also known as The White Album).
The song was ranked #135 on Rolling Stone's list of the 500 greatest songs of all time, #7 on their list of the 100 greatest guitar songs of all time, and #10 on their list of The Beatles 100 Greatest Songs.
Inspiration for the song came to Harrison when reading the I Ching, which, as he put it, "seemed to me to be based on the Eastern concept that everything is relative to everything else...opposed to the Western view that things are merely coincidental." Taking this idea of relativism to his parents’ home in northern England, Harrison committed to write a song based on the first words he saw upon opening a random book. Those words were “gently weeps”, and he immediately began the song. As he said:
"I wrote "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" at my mother's house in Warrington. I was thinking about the Chinese I Ching, the Book of Changes... The Eastern concept is that whatever happens is all meant to be, and that there's no such thing as coincidence - every little item that's going down has a purpose.
"While My Guitar Gently Weeps" was a simple study based on that theory. I decided to write a song based on the first thing I saw upon opening any book - as it would be a relative to that moment, at that time. I picked up a book at random, opened it, saw 'gently weeps', then laid the book down again and started the song.