[american pie] Lenin/Lennon read a book on Marx/Marx

So which was it?

[image=http://www.amath.washington.edu/~slemons/imagesdir/lenin.jpg] -> [image=http://livinginstereo.com/wp-content/uploads/2006/07/Karl%20Marx.jpg] ?

[image=http://www.lennon-chapman.com/images/john-lennon.jpg] ->[image=http://livinginstereo.com/wp-content/uploads/2006/07/Karl%20Marx.jpg] ?

Or...

[image=http://www.lennon-chapman.com/images/john-lennon.jpg] -> [image=http://www.mainstage-mgmt.com/images/groucho/groucho_cigar2.jpg] ?

 

The first option. You're silly.

 

None of the above:

[image=http://www.amath.washington.edu/~slemons/imagesdir/lenin.jpg] -> [image=http://www.mainstage-mgmt.com/images/groucho/groucho_cigar2.jpg]

 

Well that last ones are the great ones of the bunch.

 

Ah, but V. Lenin and K. Marx have no personal bearing on American rock and roll. One could argue Cold War, but why not throw Stalin and/or Kruschev in there to hammer the point home?

So I'd be more inclined to say Lennon. After all, McLean keeps referring to "Sergeants" playing a "Marching tune", which is obviously Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, the "Jester" Bob Dylan, and the "King" Elvis Presley".

 

It has a double meaning. Its main focus is obviously Lennon's being influenced by Communist ideology. However, it's obvious that the pun of Lenin/Lennon was intended.

 

Touche.

 

Or it could have been an allusion to government jumping at shadows.
Marx is never identified as being Karl.

"Lennon/Lenin" and "Marx", one automatically assumes Communism.
But...

 

But why did Madonna kill American Pie?
Well it's tragic but this classic has been hung out to dry,
She might as well have poked a sharp stick in his eye,
She's makin' all the neighbor dogs cry, makin' all the neighbor dogs cry.

So Bye, Bye, to American Pie,
When Madonna killed this classic I just wanted to cry,
If Puffy ever takes a shot at Vincent I'll die,
I'll pop a cap in his ass in a drive-by, pop a cap in his ass in a drive-by.

 

I totally agree.

 

But alas, there is hope in a comedian with a crazy 'do.

And the Jedi I admire most
Met up with Darth Maul
And now he's toast.
I'm still here, and he's a ghost.
I guess...I'll train...this boy....

 

AND WE WERE SINGIN'
MY MY, THIS HERE ANAKIN GUY
MAY BE VADER SOMEDAY LATER NOW HE'S JUST A SMALL FRY

//has flashbacks to C4 podparty

 

LeeKenobi is spot on. If you pay attention to the lyrics throughout the song and what they mean, they tell the story of the development of Rock and Roll, interspersed with the story of the 60s in America in general. For example, "The Day the Music Died" refers to the day in February 1959 when Buddy Holly, Richie Valens, and the Big Bopper died in a plane crash. Obviously they weren't the only big stars at the time, but within a year or two of that event, Elvis went into the Army, Chuck Berry was arrested for having sex with an underaged prostitute, and Little Richard went gospel. So there was a bit of a slump, that in some sense started with that plane crash. In any case, VI Lenin, ne Ustinov, is therefore more or less irrelevant, though Don McLean may have, as was suggested, liked the pun of Lenin/Lennon and Marx (Karl)/Marx (Groucho or whichever one was your favorite). My sources suggest that this particular line refers to the Beatles in general, and John Lennon in particular, reading radical and/or socialist/communist thinkers, and bringing radical politics into their music, though not to the extent that some at first believed, and as LeeKenobi suggests, this may have been exaggerated by the government, especially Hoover's circle of paranoiacs at the FBI. While some of the lines in the song are capable of multiple interpretations, and McLean himself refuses to confirm or deny anything about what the song means, any alternative interpretation would have to be contemporary with not only the other events referenced in the song, but more specifically those referred to in neighboring lines, given that it's "While Lennon read a book on Marx, the quartet practiced in the Park, and we sang dirges in in the dark."

 

Or maybe

[image=http://www.lennon-chapman.com/images/john-lennon.jpg] -> [image=http://www.katfm.com/images/80s_Popstars/Richard_Marx.jpg] ?

 

I do like his beard.

He was also quite handsome when he was young.

[image=http://www.unc.edu/~cshowden/mx1839.gif]

 

frederick douglass was totally the black karl marx.

[image=http://www.mrthomasclasses.com/Frederick%2520Douglas.jpg]

in appearance at least.

 

I met a girl who sang the blues
And I asked her for some happy news
But she smiled and walked away

That part is so about Janis Joplin.

 

Suffice to say, the Beatles releasing "Back to U.S.S.R." in August 1968 (= the invasion of Czechoslovakia by the Soviet armies) was very bad timing...