visions of johanna

[doves]

does anyone understand the lyrics to visions of johanna by bob dylan,especially this line-in the museum infinity goes on trial

[kozmikdave]

Good idea to throw up a copy of the lyrics for people to get to grips with it.

Ain't it just like the night to play tricks when you're tryin' to be so quiet?
We sit here stranded, though we're all doin' our best to deny it
And Louise holds a handful of rain, temptin' you to defy it
Lights flicker from the opposite loft
In this room the heat pipes just cough
The country music station plays soft
But there's nothing, really nothing to turn off
Just Louise and her lover so entwined
And these visions of Johanna that conquer my mind

In the empty lot where the ladies play blindman's bluff with the key chain
And the all-night girls they whisper of escapades out on the "D" train
We can hear the night watchman click his flashlight
Ask himself if it's him or them that's really insane
Louise, she's all right, she's just near
She's delicate and seems like the mirror
But she just makes it all too concise and too clear
That Johanna's not here
The ghost of 'lectricity howls in the bones of her face
Where these visions of Johanna have now taken my place

Now, little boy lost, he takes himself so seriously
He brags of his misery, he likes to live dangerously
And when bringing her name up
He speaks of a farewell kiss to me
He's sure got a lotta gall to be so useless and all
Muttering small talk at the wall while I'm in the hall
How can I explain?
Oh, it's so hard to get on
And these visions of Johanna, they kept me up past the dawn

Inside the museums, Infinity goes up on trial
Voices echo this is what salvation must be like after a while
But Mona Lisa musta had the highway blues
You can tell by the way she smiles
See the primitive wallflower frieze
When the jelly-faced women all sneeze
Hear the one with the mustache say, "Jeeze I can't find my knees"
Oh, jewels and binoculars hang from the head of the mule
But these visions of Johanna, they make it all seem so cruel

The peddler now speaks to the countess who's pretending to care for him
Sayin', "Name me someone that's not a parasite and I'll go out and say a prayer for him"
But like Louise always says
"Ya can't look at much, can ya man?"
As she, herself, prepares for him
And Madonna, she still has not showed
We see this empty cage now corrode
Where her cape of the stage once had flowed
The fiddler, he now steps to the road
He writes ev'rything's been returned which was owed
On the back of the fish truck that loads
While my conscience explodes
The harmonicas play the skeleton keys and the rain
And these visions of Johanna are now all that remain

Better question - what's the song about?

[thoke]

I just got half way through writing a big, long interpretation of the entire song, and then lost it.

what's the song about?

Staying up all night feeling lovesick.

does anyone understand the lyrics to visions of johanna by bob dylan,especially this line-in the museum infinity goes on trial

The museum verse is the most obscure. I think you need to look at it as a whole to understand that first line. My interpretation is that his desperate thoughts of Johanna are making everything else in his life seems pointless and vacuous. Nothing matters except her. By 'infinity' he could mean longevity or posthumous fame, since he's talking about museum art. By 'on trial' he could mean that he questions whether great artistic achievement (such as painting the mona lisa) is really worth it. That kind of salvation becomes a bit of an anti-climax; your masterpiece just sits in a museum for hundreds of years, in the same way that people hang around in purgatory feeling mildly frustrated and dissatisfied; and also in the same way that he is sat in his room listening to the country music station and the heat pipes, unable to sleep or stop thinking about Johanna (who's not there). But he also notices that the thoughts he's having are probably shared with all the great artists of the past. To illustrate this, he describes the subejcts of portraits in the museums as being just as depressed, ill and confused as he is: mona lisa has the blues, the jelly-faced women all sneeze, and the man with the moustache can't find his knees (maybe a reference to Dylan's use of drugs?).

So I don't know whether this is right, but my interpretation of that line is that he no longer thinks that anything matters except Johanna, and this is bringing his role as an artist into question. Why bother going down in history when all you care about is Johanna?

[k-j]

Hey thoke, I like your analysis a lot. This is one of my favourite Dylan songs, from my favourite Dylan album, but I've never bothered to really think about the lyrics, and the "inifinity goes on trial" line in particular I thought was more than a bit pretentious. But you've shone a light on it for me. Cheers.

[David]

I must admit that I always, fairly lazily, thought that Inside the museums, Infinity goes up on trial was about scientific discoveries - dinosaur skeletons and all that - being called in evidence against the existence of God (i.e. infinity), but I'm now more persuaded by your interpretation, Ben.

Great song. The country music station plays soft / But there's nothing, really nothing to turn off - definitely among the best lines ever.

Btw, is it frieze? I always thought it was freeze.

Cheers

David

[dl04]

This recieved a Nobel Prize for literature nomination did it not? It always makes me think of some surpressed love for this woman. It may actually be alegorically about Joan Baez too, who knows?