GOO GOO GOO JOOB: Julia Kristeva and John Lennon

"I Am the Walrus”
By John Lennon (officially by Lennon/McCartney)

I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together.
See how they run like pigs from a gun see how they fly.
I’m crying.
Sitting on a cornflake – waiting for the van to come.
Corporation teashirt, stupid bloody tuesday man you been a naughty boy
you let your face grow long.
I am the eggman, they are the eggmen – I am the walrus GOO GOO GOO JOOB.
City policeman sitting pretty little policeman in a row,
see how they fly like Lucy in the sky – see how they run
I’m crying – I’m crying I’m crying
Yellow matter custard dripping from a dead dog’s eye.
Crabalocker fishwife pornographic priestess boy you been a naughty girl,
you let your knickers down.
I am the eggman, they are the eggmen – I am the walrus GOO GOO GOO JOOB
Sitting in an English garden waiting for the sun,
if the sun don’t come, you get a tan from standing in the English rain.
I am the eggman, they are the eggmen – I am the walrus GOO GOO GOO JOOB
Expert texpert choking smokers don’t you think the joker laughs at you? Ha ha ha!
See how they smile, like pigs in a sty, see how they snide.
I’m crying.
Semolina pilchard climbing up the Eiffel Tower.
Elementry penguin singing Hare Krishna man you should have seen them kicking
Edgar Allen POE
I am the eggman, they are the eggmen – I am the walrus GOO GOO GOO JOOB
GOO GOO GOO JOOB GOO GOOGOOOOOOOOOOOJOOOOOB

In the excerpt from Revolution in Poetic Language, Julia Kristeva theorizes that we are full of energies that become arranged in the course of human development based on the constraints imposed upon them by family and social structures. Kristeva labels this energy “chora,” defining it as “a nonexpressive totality formed by the drives and their stases in a motility that is as full of movement as it is regulated” (2170). This chora is prevalent in the semiotic state, which is the state of being prior to the acquisition of language, but still exists in the symbolic state one enters after learning language. Kristeva illustrates this in her discussion of the genotext, the part of speech dominated by the semiotic chora, and the phenotext, the part of speech dominated by the symbolic—the “grammar” or “literalness” of speech. In discussing the genotext, Kristeva writes: “Designating the genotext in a text requires pointing out the transfers of drive energy that can be detected in phonematic devices (such as the accumulation and repetition of phonemes or rhyme) and melodic devices (such as intonation or rhythm), in the way semantic and categorical fields are set out in syntactic and logical features, or in the economy of mimesis (fantasy, the deferment of detonation, narrative, etc.)” (2177). This can be seen in the “poetic” devices of speech. Kristeva uses the examples of Mallarmé and Joyce as being authors in touch with their chora. Having thumbed through Finnegans Wake, I can only assume that the bulk of the novel IS genotext.

Although Kristeva uses highly reputed authors to illustrate her theory, I would like to apply the theory to popular culture using “I Am the Walrus,” the great Beatles song from the album and film Magical Mystery Tour. The song consists of literal language and grammatical structures, which make up the phenotext, but, unlike other Beatles songs (at least the early ones), the song’s nonsensical quality and clever wordplay display a strong genotext. Rhythm, alliteration, and assonance dominate several lines, which create a singsong quality of language seen in the semiotic utterances of a pre-linguistic state (“I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together” and “City policeman sitting pretty little policeman in a row” for example). The surrealistic imagery also illustrate the dominance of the genotext over the phenotext in the song. The lines “Yellow matter custard dripping from a dead dog’s eye” and “Semolina pilchard climbing up the Eiffel Tower” are surreal images that, although disgusting, sound aurally pleasant to the ear. The lines “Crabalocker fishwife pornographic priestess boy you been a naughty girl, / you let your knickers down” display the interaction of the phenotext with the genotext. The genotext, and therefore the semiotic chora, dominates the lines, but the speaker’s labeling of the pornographic priestess as a “naughty girl” for letting her knickers down illustrates the laws of the symbolic and its subjugation of the semiotic. Although family authority is also referenced in the song (“man you been a naughty boy / you let your face grow long”), the semiotic chora dominates the song. This can be seen in the several affronts to logic—“you can get a tan from standing in the English rain” and “Sitting on a cornflake – waiting for the van to come,” for example. The speaker’s reference to himself as the eggman combines the symbol of the earliest state of human development with that of a grown man, which illustrates his desire to return to the semiotic state of human development—the phrase “GOO GOO GOO JOOB” acting as the pre-linguistic gibberish uttered by humans in this stage. Furthermore, the speaker’s crying throughout the song refers to the utterances of babies, whose cries are one of the few methods of communication—cries signify unhappiness, hunger, a dirty diaper, for example. It should be noted that Lennon is rumored to have written the song on LSD, which perhaps could explain its bizarre nature. (Another aside: Lennon is rumored to have purposely written baffling lines upon hearing that students at his old school studied his songs in class.) Perhaps the taking of drugs suspends the symbolic and gets people more in touch with their semiotic chora. I wonder what Timothy Leary would have to say about the subject? Hell, Freud loved cocaine and was one of its biggest supporters in his day. Maybe that would explain some of his theories.

Note: the above text of “I Am the Walrus” is transcribed from a picture of the lyrics printed on the foldout of the British LP Magical Mystery Tour released in 1976. The words in the audio recording are slightly different—most notably being the lyric “Mister city policeman sitting pretty little policeman in a row.”

Second Note: The author of this blog does not condone the use of drugs with one notable exception: Rock n’ Rollers, whose wonderful experiments with hallucinogenics ushered in the psychedelic rock music of the late 1960s. Thank you all!