BOOK REVIEW: Imagine by John Lennon

Shane | 30 August 2018 | Reply

BOOK REVIEW: Imagine by John Lennon

Frances Lincoln Publishers
April 2018
Hardcover, $12.99
Reviewed by Shane Pinnegar

Picture book / Music

10/10

There are few songs as iconic, generation-spanning and pure as John Lennon’s wonderful Imagine.

Often criticised as a childish, over-simplified call for an unrealistic and unattainable global peace, its appeal is exactly for those reasons: why can’t we wat peace in our time? Why do we have to allow the governments and powerbrokers and liars of the world constantly lead us into conflicts for their own greedy and amoral reasons? Why must peace be a childish aspiration?

The endurance of the song proves that most people do want peace and happiness and equality. The beauty of the song lies in its ability to instantly centre our morality – have you ever heard anyone argue about the message here? On a local or global level it is something worth striving for.

“We can all help make the world a better place in our own way,” writes Lennon’s widow Yoko Ono in a touching foreword, which references Jean Julien’s wonderfully simple illustrations of a pigeon uniting birds of all breeds and hues.

Now THERE is a message to instil in our kids from the moment they are born – and then, even if it is after we are long gone, perhaps one day the world truly will live as one.