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THE SONGWRITER AS POET:
IAN MCCULLOCH AND THE PRE-RAPHAELITE TRADITION
Kristin F. Smith
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Chapter 5: Rossetti and McCulloch Confront the Evil Woman
Before we leave the subject of Woman, we should mention that poetical staple, the Evil Woman. Like the dog who did not bark in the night in the Sherlock Holmes story, we note her mostly for her absence in McCulloch's work.
She does come out in force in the Keatsian-flavored Lips Like Sugar [1987]. Graceful as a swan, this mysterious creature haunts the waters of her lake on moonlit nights, summoning unwary men to her side:
"She'll ask and you'll give her
Lips like sugar…." [IM; Lips Like Sugar; ECHO AND THE BUNNYMEN; 1987]
But, like the lady of Keats' poem, her purpose is to ensnare, not delight. The man who falls victim to her charms finds only pain and disillusionment:
"Just when you think she's yours
She's flown to other shores
To laugh at how you break
And melt into her lake...." [IM; Lips Like Sugar; ECHO AND THE BUNNYMEN; 1987]
She is la belle dame sans merci, with a vengeance. But the Poet thinks he can tame her:
"She knows what she knows
I know what she's thinking...." [IM; Lips Like Sugar; ECHO AND THE BUNNYMEN; 1987]
Sexual overtones are rife. The Poet, however, has another sort of particularly close relationship in mind:
"She'll be my mirror
Reflect what I am
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And my Siamese twin
Alone on the river
Mirror kisses...." [IM; Lips Like Sugar; ECHO AND THE BUNNYMEN; 1987]
Perhaps the "mirror kisses" are best left unexplored. McCulloch reveals his Lady of the Lake to be no mere temptress, but a figure of Allegory. She personifies a sought-after quality or goal - something the Poet desires, but which eludes him. The "mirror" and "Siamese twin" images suggest that she embodies as well a part of the Poet's own nature and his longings. Maybe, as he hints ("I know what she's thinking"), the key to escaping her snares lies within himself.
The mysterious woman (if woman she be) of The Killing Moon [IM; OCEAN RAIN; 1984] makes moonlight boat trips with the Lady of the Lake seem downright safe. The Poet encounters her "Under blue moon", an immediate tip-off that we have left the world of ordinary perception. Danger looms:
"So soon you'll take me up in your arms
Too late to beg you…." [IM; The Killing Moon; OCEAN RAIN; 1984]
Two things stand out here: transience ("so soon") and inevitability. She will have him, and there is nothing the Poet can do about it. He foresees this as "the killing time/Unwillingly mine", and yet it will come. There is a strong erotic element here, which McCulloch elaborates in the next lines:
"In star-lit nights I saw you
So cruelly you kissed me
Your lips a magic world
Your sky all hung with jewels" [IM; The Killing Moon; OCEAN RAIN; 1984]
The magnificent setting ("star-lit", "magic", "jewels") evokes a goddess or other elevated being. She stands, beyond all doubt, outside the realm of womankind. McCulloch's Poet never speaks of women kissing "cruelly". The most straightforward reading of the lyrics is as a drug allegory, but the song transcends any such tawdry interpretation. The refrain hints of forces beyond human ken:
"Fate up against your will
Through the thick and thin
He will wait until you give yourself to him...." [IM; The Killing Moon; OCEAN RAIN; 1984]
Patient and inexorable, he waits. The woman may stand for all those things we grasp after - wealth, love, fame, achievement - which so often fail us. The Poet's pronouncement of "the killing time/Unwillingly mine" suggests man's own nature may lead to his downfall. Or, perhaps the woman is Life itself. When we embrace its sweetness, we make ourselves hostages to Fate, for all life is transient.
Like McCulloch's, Rossetti's work does not abound with evil women. But the ones he does present us with are humdingers. An early poem, The Card Dealer [1849], bears striking resemblance to The Killing Moon in both theme and imagery. An entrancingly beautiful woman plays her cards of life and death with the souls of men:
"Could you not drink her gaze like wine?
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Those eyes unravel the coiled night
And know the stars at noon." [DGR; The Card Dealer; 1849]
The lady sits at her table beside the dance floor, the dance itself a symbol of transience. Rather than a "sky all hung with jewels" as in The Killing Moon, her jewels - "Blood-red and purple, green and blue" -- adorn her fingers, reflecting on the polished surfaces of the cards as she lets them slip, one by one onto the table:
"The heart, that doth but crave
More, having fed; the diamond,
Skilled to make base seem brave;
The club, for smiting in the dark;
The spade, to dig a grave." [DGR; The Card Dealer; 1849]
The cards represent aspects of life, and she controls them. Men find her as fatally irresistible as McCulloch's mystical woman of The Killing Moon. She plays, Rossetti tells us:
"…. With thee, who lov'st
Those gems upon her hand;
With me, who search her secret brows;
With all men, bless'd or bann'd." [DGR; The Card Dealer; 1849]
Like the patient but implacable Fate, "she knows/The card that followeth". And, like him, she will ultimately win:
"Her game in thy tongue is called Life,
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When she shall speak, thou'lt learn her tongue
And know she calls it Death." [DGR; The Card Dealer; 1849]
Rossetti's card dealer, though he describes her in painterly detail, remains as firmly confined to her allegorical tethers as McCulloch's danger-wielding females. Generally, however, Rossetti gives his femme fatales free rein to flourish as personalities.
"Lady Lilith", in ballad, sonnet and oils, remains wonderfully bad to the bone, and stands as Rossetti's triumph in the Evil Woman genre. According to ancient mythology, Lilith was the first wife God gave to Adam, created from a snake, not a rib:
"Not a drop of her blood was human,
But she was made like a soft sweet woman." [DGR; Eden Bower; 1869]
She was also the first person cast out of the Garden of Eden, the first woman scorned, and the first to 'fix his wagon' (as we phrase it today). Rossetti, who clearly admires her spunk, gives her story a robust telling in Eden Bower [1869]. This ballad of humanity's first episode of domestic discord defies description or condensation and must be read in its entirety.
The Lilith of Rossetti's sonnet, Lady Lilith (Body's Beauty) [1866], seems almost sedate by comparison, though every bit as hazardous to the male population:
"And still she sits, young while the earth is old,
And, subtly of herself contemplative,
Draws men to watch the bright net she can weave,
Till heart and body and life are in its hold." [DGR; Lady Lilith (Body's Beauty); 1866]
Finally, we should note a remarkable, little-appreciated Rossetti oil, Helen of Troy [1863]. Rossetti's portrait of Sparta's erstwhile queen brilliantly conveys a reckless petulance, a wanton arrogance that is perhaps the essence of evil. We can truly believe she relished having the Trojan War fought over her.
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An Annotated Discography: Works by Echo and the Bunnymen, Ian McCulloch, Will Sergeant, Electrafixion and Glide (off-site link)
Echo and the Bunnymen, Ian McCulloch and Electrafixion: Album Reviews (off-site link)
The Bunnymen Concert Log: A comprehensive, annotated listing of concert dates, venues and set lists for Echo and the Bunnymen, Ian McCulloch and Electrafixion (off-site link)
Bunnymen.info - The (Unofficial) News Source (off-site link, run by Charles Pham)
Aldems' Political Quotations: Apt and Otherwise
BlindFool and Scruffy Dog: Dilettantes-at-Large
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