Re: Strange things that authors apologize for

On Fri, 26 Aug 2005 08:32:26 -0700, Kurt Busiek
<kurtbusiek@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

>On 2005-08-26 03:35:13 -0700, "rja.carnegie@xxxxxxxxxx"
><rja.carnegie@xxxxxxxxxx> said:
>
>>
>> K.Schwarz wrote:
>>> William December Starr <wdstarr@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>>> To be fair, "Mack the Knife" wasn't necessarily a celebration of the
>>>> character or the lifestyle,
>>>
>>> Wasn't it? It certainly sounds admiring to me; Mackie's so cool, he
>>> kills everybody and never gets caught. The horns sure sound like
>>> they're having a good time. (I'm not sure which version I'm thinking
>>> of, probably either Bobby Darin or Sinatra.) I vaguely recall
>>> hearing the Brecht version in a German class, which seemed to lean
>>> more towards "Mackie is scary, be afraid."
>>
>> Doesn't the American lyric have lots of women wanting to get to know
>> him? Sells it to /me/.
>
>No -- it lists a bunch of women's names and says "the line forms to the
>right," but the list of names are those of Mack's victims, not women
>who want to get to know him. Well, Mack's victims and Lotte Lenya, the
>wife of the composer, interpolated in by Louie Armstrong.
>
>Macheath is a charming rogue in "The Beggar's Opera," a sinister
>presence in "The Threepenny Opera" and fairly enigmatic in "Mack the
>Knife" -- the song doesn't really commit one way or the other.
>Armstrong's version of it is sinister, Darin's is jazzy and upbeat, but
>whether the song is a celebration of Mack or a warning to others is
>pretty much left to the listener.
>
>> This is the part where in German he's burning down an orphanage or
>> something, which might well be censored.
>
>It's not in the American version, no. Whether it was left out of the
>translation for content or for length, I don't know. But it's not
>there in the Armstrong, either, which comes off as funereal and
>sinister, not approving.

The English version I have, w/lyrics by Eric Bentley, has:

"One old man and seven children
Burnt to cinders in Soho.
In the crowd is Captain Mackie who
Is not asked and does not know."

--
Bill Snyder [This space unintentionally left blank.]
.