Beatles Biography by Mark Lewisohn (6th edition)- plus Lewisohn news. *

Lewisohn worked for Paul in the past (Club Sandwich etc) and got rattled by the odd put down. That probably affected his view of the man. I don't think he ever worked directly for John, so it's easier for him to retain a fan's perception of him.

I don't mind Lewisohn but some of his methodological remarks about biography really make me wonder how deeply he thinks about the craft.

 

Lennon did not force Thelma to have sex with him against her will. He got frustrated and hit out at her, making contact with her shoulder bone. She left him immediately and ended the relationship. There wasn't a rape.

Lewisohn does not say it was common to hit a girl. He says it was not uncommon in fifties Liverpool. There's a nuance there that you're trying to ignore.

 

Where’s another podcast when we need one?

 

Danny Fields and this:
TOWN & COUNTRY

 

2 visits a year - all photo opportunities!

 

Tripling down on this, eh?

 

Even if this was true (I've seen no claims that it is), it kind of disproves your original claim.

 

Frank said "attempted" rape. I don't think it's clear from her words. She says he got rough and ended up hitting her.
In any case, this explanation that you just gave beats the hell out of saying "they'd been dating for 6 months" s if that means a rape or attempted cannot happen.

A small nuance. He's still trying to justify him, showing a bias no doubt.

 

Can some one send this exact sentiment to Mark Lewisohn in a letter. He really needs to look in the mirror with this.

Also, in what world is John Lennon not a show off? "no one is in my tree, it must be high or low"?

 

Also regarding the comment about McCartney in the grade school picture. It wasn't just Paul. If he'd really paid attention to the picture he would see at least half the class was cutting up. It wasn't just Paul reading the comic book. Some little girls in the front row were laughing their heads off, some other little boys were talking, etc.

It almost like some of the kids got together and did a little planned thing of NOT being perfectly well behaved in the group photo. (Actually it seems like just the sort of plan a kid Paul McCartney would come up with to have fun with his friends at school, something a little rebellious but not really bad where anyone would get into any real trouble for it. I am NOT saying that's what happened, in fact it probably wasn't, but the point is while you might not realized it from Lewisohn's book that actually would be in keeping with young Paul's personality, and why he was popular with other students but still well liked by the teachers, he wasn't a kiss ass but the mischief was mostly good natured)

 

No, Thelma says he got rough and hit her once. There was no "ended up" which suggests this lasted longer than it actually did.

Thelma and John had not only been dating for six months, they'd been having sex whan Mimi was out of the house in John's bedroom.

At this party Thelma knew John wanted sex and she followed him upstairs of her own free will.

John was frustrated and had an instantaneous, understandable but inexcusable reaction.

There was no rape and no attempted rape.

 

He wanted sex, she changed her mind, John got violent because she said no to sex. This is pretty ugly, trying to spin it does you or John no favours in this conversation.

It does not matter if they were dating. I'd stop bringing that up as some kind of justification for John's behaviour in this case.

 

I'm not justifying John's behaviour. But there was no rape and no attempted rape.

Spreading a rumour on internet is easy. Making a cogent legal case based on the facts is another thing altogether.

 

Agreed. I get the temptation to not want to accept that people we admire have flaws, but even John himself has admitted that he used to be violent. He said it was one of the reasons he became so pro-peace; he personally was part of creating a non-peaceful environment for people.

Whether or not that particular episode happened, I don't know, but we know he bashed a washboard on Pete Shotton's head when he said he didn't want to be part of the Quarrymen anymore. That had to have hurt! We know he got into physical fights with people in the early years especially--all the other band members have said so.

John seemed like he was a very damaged person, and understandably so. Add to that the fact that he grew up in a time period where men tended to drink a lot and it was more socially acceptable for men to be violent than it is now (didn't they say something about how when people would ask about a Liverpool party or wedding, the question would be how many people got into fights?), and it isn't that surprising that he wouldn't have known how to express his feelings properly.

 

John's account

"And that was the first national stuff we got. And that was terrible. And I was so bad the next day, they had a BBC appointment, and they all went down the train, and I wouldn’t come. And Brian came into me house in Mendips, and was pleading with me to go down there, and I was so afraid of – of the outcome of nearly killing him, because I nearly killed him. Because I think he’d said something about, he’d insinuated that me and Brian had had an affair in Spain.

I remember it, vaguely. I was out of me mind with drink – when you get down to the point where you drink all the empty glasses, that drunk. And he was saying, “Well, come on, John, tell us,” something like that, “Tell me about you and Brian, we all know,” like that. And obviously, I must have been un– uh, f– frightened of the fag in me to get so angry at that. You know, when you’re twenty-one, you want to be a man, and all that. And for the first time I thought, “I could kill this guy.” I just saw it, like on a screen, that if I hit him once more, I – that’s gonna be it.

And that’s when I gave up violence. Because all me life had been like that, and that’s when I really got a shock. Apart from occasionally hitting my dear wife, in the early days, [laughs; nervous] when I was a bit – when I was a bit, you know. Crazy."

 

==
“I told John I was uneasy about doing it in a place like that, especially with other people there, and he wasn’t happy with my attitude. When I insisted on going, and got up to leave, he became rough and whacked me one—his fist connected somewhere between my shoulder and my head, around my neck.”
==
Who mentioned bringing a legal case about it?

I don't know what your background or experience is, but coercive / intimidating behavior toward someone you are dating to convince them to have sex when they clearly don't want to, along with with the looming threat of physical force (whether or not you follow through with the physical force, which he did), is pretty clearly attempted date-rape.

Had she not left and instead gone along with it after the punching, then it is no longer attempted. But because she didn't, it's attempted.

I'm sorry that people have trouble squaring this with their feelings about Lennon. That's not my fault, it's his.

Just say "He atoned, he changed, he became a better person." That's all fine. He probably did ("couldn't get much worse"). But don't try to minimize it or justify it, because it's not a minimal thing, and it's unjustifiable.

The point here was never whether it happened, the point was Lewisohn's waving it off. But I guess that's a more common blind spot among Lennon fans like him than I imagined it could be.

 

It doesn't matter whether or not it happened?

And you're asking Lewisohn to accuse Lennon of attempting to rape one of his girlfriends even if you're not sure it happened?

I'm not idolising Lennon or his violent behaviour, but your accusation is way out of line.

 

I didn't say it doesn't matter whether it happened. That it did is a given. I said my point in bringing it up here in the context of Lewisohn's bias was to show that even his worst behavior was minimized in the book.

We are discussing a book here.

Shall we discuss urinating on nuns instead?

 

another of your guesses huh?

 

==
This was also, of course, the way it was in many other relationships, and had been for a long time and would be in the future, especially in the north of England. It wasn’t excusable but nor was it unusual...
==
Well, esteemed historian Mark Lewisohn tells me this type of behavior was not uncommon in your area at that time or "into the future," so I attribute your acceptance of this as a cultural difference. But in general, I'm left to guess about why other people do.

 

So you're now definitely saying Lennon attempted to rape one of his girlfriends. Yes or no?

And if so and if you were Lewisohn, you would have written that in the book? Yes or no?

 

This thread needs to be retitled.

 

Keep struggling.

 

In his own words describing his mindset at that time, "The he-man was supposed to smack a girl across the face, make her succumb in tears and then make love. Most of the guys I knew in Liverpool thought that’s how you do it."

I've said this was an attempted date rape since I first read the passage. There is no other accurate way to describe what happened.

She said no. He kept up trying to coerce / cajole / intimidate her into it. When she tried to flee the situation, he struck her. Given his self-described attitude at the time, what do you think he was attempting to do by hitting her? If someone attempts to murder me and I get away and they give up trying to murder me, they still attempted to murder me.

Then, afterward, he publicly shamed and humiliated her for it.

If you have some insights into why people who enjoy someone's music are so quick to absolve them of their bad behavior, I'd be happy to learn from them. As it is, I'm only seeing defensive, sarcastic asides.