The Rhetorical Analysis Of John Lennon's 'The Beatles Revolution'

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The lyrics to Revolution can be analysed at length, for the assumption of the simplicity of the the song is soon rejected beyond the first listen. In order to understand, it is important to take into account the hints that the Beatles provide to help us get over the initial material meaning.

Their revolution, as we have stated before, would be to inspire us to think for ourselves, to open our minds to any new possibility and concept. With this objective, the band incorporates an open space into the song, of which they are very much aware: their aim is to create an abstraction from the physical world. The lyrics may seem politically positioning, but a closer analysis enables us to witness that there is not one clear politically-positioned statement …show more content…

This apparent correction is in reality the band’s boldest conflicted statement in the song: it is representative of a whole counterculture generation that had promoted peace and love and felt disgusted by the mere thought of engaging in violence (count me out). However, the unstable political situation of the time had caused many demonstrations; riots flooded the streets both in America and Europe, and the naive pacifism of the Flower Power was being challenged in a call for direct action. The young people who, a year later, would see their hippie ideals culminate in the form of a gathering named Woodstock suddenly found themselves in an incredibly confusing position, unclear about the violence limits they were willing to reach. Many of them partly desired to participate in the social revolution, but still believed in the peace and love values. The Beatles were not there to tell them which way to go: they simply offered two choices. You can be out or in, not even Lennon claims to know the right answer. This provides a duality on the meaning of the