Jump to content

Xanadu: so what exactly happens in this song?


jnoble
 Share

Recommended Posts

Let me explain my interpretation of Xanadu and you guys can comment and correct me if need be.

 

Ok....so an explorer reads about the legend of Xanadu in books and how it will render you immortal and then treks out to the distant snowy mountains of China or some far off Eastern country to look for it. He finds some caves of ice and eventually the 'Xanadu' itself. Which itself is exacly....what? A nicely decorated room or palace tucked inside a mountain, sort of like a 5-star resort in the middle of nowhere?

Anyway, he finds it and eats the honeyhew and drinks the milk of paradise which I suppose were just laying about ready to be served and instantly becomes "immortal" (like magic?)

 

Now comes the part that's always made me wonder.... it appears that the explorer, since now he's become immortal, is permanently trapped inside the Xanadu tucked within the ice caves. Why? Some sort of ironic curse? (this part makes me think of the Covenant opening and melting the Nazis from Indiana Jones)

And so now, the explorer is immortal but can't leave the Xanadu place and is doomed to be there forever.

 

Am I being too literal here? Is this what the rest of you get from this song?

Edited by jnoble
Link to comment
Share on other sites

To me, it's a clear inspiration of Yes' Close to the Edge. And that was about Siddhartha, the founder of Buddhism, and his search for enlightenment, but not before starving himself and allowing himself to be poverty stricken.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

QUOTE (Can-Utility @ Nov 24 2011, 10:54 AM)
It starts, it sucks, it gets mildly interesting, sucks some more and then ends.

We're talking about Rush's song "Xanadu", not Olivia Newton Johns. (Although I like that one too, personally) tongue.gif

Link to comment
Share on other sites

QUOTE (jnoble @ Nov 24 2011, 09:07 AM)
QUOTE (rushgoober @ Nov 24 2011, 10:46 AM)
What I get from the song is that you're seriously overthinking it.  Just let its brilliance wash over you. tongue.gif

The music is great, I'm referring just to the lyrics/story

I am too. Well, both the music and the lyrics are amazing. One of the best songs of all time. Seriously, it's just not a song I feel needs analysis - it's simply one of the best pieces of music ever conceived.

 

QUOTE (Can-Utility @ Nov 24 2011, 08:54 AM)
It starts, it sucks, it gets mildly interesting, sucks some more and then ends.

no.gif

 

facepalm.gif

Link to comment
Share on other sites

QUOTE (Can-Utility @ Nov 24 2011, 10:54 AM)
It starts, it sucks, it gets mildly interesting, sucks some more and then ends.

Does someone need choked out?? LOL

Link to comment
Share on other sites

QUOTE (rushgoober @ Nov 24 2011, 12:37 PM)
How can anyone hate on Xanadu? That's like saying ice cream, pizza, french fries and bacon are yucky tasting.

wacko.gif

I don't hate it. There's just other, better songs. Maybe if they only included about a third of the lyrical part, I would like it better, because the intro is mystical and possibly the best part of AFTK. The singing part just drags.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

the only way I can follow Rush lyrics is by reading them. any time I try to pay attention to the words in a Rush tune I get distracted and taken away by the playing!!

 

seriously, sometimes I'll have to restart the song over ten times if I want to figure out what Neil is trying to tell me... anyone else the same way??

 

what happens in Xanadu?? Geddy plays a doubleneck... done smile.gif

Link to comment
Share on other sites

QUOTE (GeddysMullet @ Nov 24 2011, 05:57 PM)
I think it's a "careful what you wish for" parable.

yes.gif That's what I've always thought.

 

 

wub.gif Xanadu!! Brilliant song!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

QUOTE (jnoble @ Nov 24 2011, 10:44 AM)
Let me explain my interpretation of Xanadu and you guys can comment and correct me if need be.

Ok....so an explorer reads about the legend of Xanadu in books and how it will render you immortal and then treks out to the distant snowy mountains of China or some far off Eastern country to look for it. He finds some caves of ice and eventually the 'Xanadu' itself. Which itself is exacly....what? A nicely decorated room or palace tucked inside a mountain, sort of like a 5-star resort in the middle of nowhere?
Anyway, he finds it and eats the honeyhew and drinks the milk of paradise which I suppose were just laying about ready to be served and instantly becomes "immortal" (like magic?)

Now comes the part that's always made me wonder.... it appears that the explorer, since now he's become immortal, is permanently trapped inside the Xanadu tucked within the ice caves. Why? Some sort of ironic curse? (this part makes me think of the Covenant opening and melting the Nazis from Indiana Jones)
And so now, the explorer is immortal but can't leave the Xanadu place and is doomed to be there forever.

Am I being too literal here? Is this what the rest of you get from this song?

Neil was inspired by the following poem.

 

Kubla Kahn by Samuel Coleridge:

 

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan

A stately pleasure-dome decree:

Where Alph, the sacred river, ran

Through caverns measureless to man

Down to a sunless sea.

 

So twice five miles of fertile ground

With walls and towers were girdled round:

And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,

Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;

And here were forests ancient as the hills,

Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.

 

But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted

Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!

A savage place! as holy and enchanted

As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted

By woman wailing for her demon-lover!

And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,

As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,

A mighty fountain momently was forced:

Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst

Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,

Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail:

And 'mid these dancing rocks at once and ever

It flung up momently the sacred river.

Five miles meandering with a mazy motion

Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,

Then reached the caverns measureless to man,

And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean:

And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far

Ancestral voices prophesying war!

 

The shadow of the dome of pleasure

Floated midway on the waves;

Where was heard the mingled measure

From the fountain and the caves.

It was a miracle of rare device,

A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!

 

A damsel with a dulcimer

In a vision once I saw:

It was an Abyssinian maid,

And on her dulcimer she played,

Singing of Mount Abora.

Could I revive within me

Her symphony and song,

To such a deep delight 'twould win me

That with music loud and long

I would build that dome in air,

That sunny dome! those caves of ice!

And all who heard should see them there,

And all should cry, Beware! Beware!

His flashing eyes, his floating hair!

Weave a circle round him thrice,

And close your eyes with holy dread,

For he on honey-dew hath fed

And drunk the milk of Paradise.

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

QUOTE (jnoble @ Nov 24 2011, 03:44 PM)
Let me explain my interpretation of Xanadu and you guys can comment and correct me if need be.

Ok....so an explorer reads about the legend of Xanadu in books and how it will render you immortal and then treks out to the distant snowy mountains of China or some far off Eastern country to look for it. He finds some caves of ice and eventually the 'Xanadu' itself. Which itself is exacly....what? A nicely decorated room or palace tucked inside a mountain, sort of like a 5-star resort in the middle of nowhere?
Anyway, he finds it and eats the honeyhew and drinks the milk of paradise which I suppose were just laying about ready to be served and instantly becomes "immortal" (like magic?)

Now comes the part that's always made me wonder.... it appears that the explorer, since now he's become immortal, is permanently trapped inside the Xanadu tucked within the ice caves. Why? Some sort of ironic curse? (this part makes me think of the Covenant opening and melting the Nazis from Indiana Jones)
And so now, the explorer is immortal but can't leave the Xanadu place and is doomed to be there forever.

Am I being too literal here? Is this what the rest of you get from this song?

It's based on the poem "Kubla Khan" by Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

QUOTE (Digital Man @ Nov 24 2011, 10:03 PM)
QUOTE (jnoble @ Nov 24 2011, 10:44 AM)
Let me explain my interpretation of Xanadu and you guys can comment and correct me if need be.

Ok....so an explorer reads about the legend of Xanadu in books and how it will render you immortal and then treks out to the distant snowy mountains of China or some far off Eastern country to look for it.  He finds some caves of ice and eventually the 'Xanadu' itself. Which itself is exacly....what? A nicely decorated room or palace tucked inside a mountain, sort of like a 5-star resort in the middle of nowhere?
Anyway, he finds it and eats the honeyhew and drinks the milk of paradise which I suppose were just laying about ready to be served and instantly becomes "immortal" (like magic?)

Now comes the part that's always made me wonder.... it appears that the explorer, since now he's become immortal, is permanently trapped inside the Xanadu tucked within the ice caves. Why? Some sort of ironic curse? (this part makes me think of the Covenant opening and melting the Nazis from Indiana Jones) 
And so now, the explorer is immortal but can't leave the Xanadu place and is doomed to be there forever.

Am I being too literal here? Is this what the rest of you get from this song?

Neil was inspired by the following poem.

 

Kubla Kahn by Samuel Coleridge:

 

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan

A stately pleasure-dome decree:

Where Alph, the sacred river, ran

Through caverns measureless to man

Down to a sunless sea.

 

So twice five miles of fertile ground

With walls and towers were girdled round:

And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,

Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;

And here were forests ancient as the hills,

Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.

 

But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted

Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!

A savage place! as holy and enchanted

As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted

By woman wailing for her demon-lover!

And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,

As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,

A mighty fountain momently was forced:

Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst

Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,

Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail:

And 'mid these dancing rocks at once and ever

It flung up momently the sacred river.

Five miles meandering with a mazy motion

Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,

Then reached the caverns measureless to man,

And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean:

And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far

Ancestral voices prophesying war!

 

The shadow of the dome of pleasure

Floated midway on the waves;

Where was heard the mingled measure

From the fountain and the caves.

It was a miracle of rare device,

A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!

 

A damsel with a dulcimer

In a vision once I saw:

It was an Abyssinian maid,

And on her dulcimer she played,

Singing of Mount Abora.

Could I revive within me

Her symphony and song,

To such a deep delight 'twould win me

That with music loud and long

I would build that dome in air,

That sunny dome! those caves of ice!

And all who heard should see them there,

And all should cry, Beware! Beware!

His flashing eyes, his floating hair!

Weave a circle round him thrice,

And close your eyes with holy dread,

For he on honey-dew hath fed

And drunk the milk of Paradise.

This.

 

Thought it was common knowledge.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...