I had a professor of English (Male, black) who said that the lyrics to “Paper Moon” were conceited and sexist.
It’s only a paper moon, hanging over a cardboard sea.
But it wouldn’t be make-believe if you believe in me…
It’s a melody played in a penny arcade…
It’s a Barnum and Bailey world, just as phony as it can be.
But it wouldn’t be make-believe if you believe in me.
Personally, I’ve never associated anything with the lyrics except a lovesick entreaty; not someone with ulterior motives as this professor seems to imply.
Who’s right?
Just what did this professor say the lyrics were about?
Near as I can remember, he said they were about a man imploring a woman to become emotionally subservient to him. (One story he had us read was “Yellow Wallpaper,” whose symbolism, he claimed, was prepared by the author to illustrate this notion.
I don’t know the whole song, but that interpretation is a touch…whack. (Keep in mind I’m the only one I know who hates the ending of the Breakfast Club because of the fact that Ali Sheedy’s character needed a makeover before she was noticed.)
‘It wouldn’t be make believe if you believed in me’ taken out of context could seem conceited, but the whole thing sounds more like a typical ‘the world doesn’t mean anything without you.’
Touché, Tengu. 
I drove a verbal wedge into this professor’s comments about Thomas Jefferson by commenting that such castigation of him occurred suspiciously during a Republican Presidential administration (Reagan’s). Whether I can get him to retract his assertion about “Paper Moon”, five years after the fact, is another matter.
I always heard “Paper Moon” as a Sufi metaphysical love song (there are lots of them in the Islamic world, for example the songs of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan). In Sufi songs the woman you’re in love with represents God. The lover is saying to the divine Beloved: Only your love makes existence real. Only You are Real. This was a way of infusing Sufi metaphysical philosophy through popular song. “Paper Moon” may not have been intended that way by its writer, but its lyrics made a great deal of sense viewed in the light of this tradition.
Apart from it being a very old song, it was also a movie and a TV series. The worst undertone I can think of is that Ryan and Tatum O’Neill couldn’t act together THEN, either.
BTW, it’s one of the many songs of that era I really love (but I also love “High Hopes”, so don’t take too much notice of me).
For those interested in trivia, Billy Rose also wrote a lot of Fanny Brice songs.
Those lyrics could be sung by a woman and be equally as convincing. It seems gender neutral to me.
He demanded (and got) credit, but didn’t actually write them. Arlen and Harberg didn’t need help.
Wishing that someone ‘believed’ in you is hardly trying to make someone emotionally subservient to you. After all, it doesn’t exclude the possibility of you believing in them in return. Plus, as Sugaree said, those lyrics could equally well be sung by a woman - would your Professor then say the lyrics were sexist because it made a woman’s existence dependence on the love/belief of a man? That idea makes false assumptions too: if a man’s singing, he’s not necessarily directing his wishes to a woman.
I love this song, as I love most songs of this era. They often have deeper meanings than a first listening would suggest. But this particular song is not in the slightest bit sexist.
There’s an episode of ST:DS9 where Nog becomes overly-dependent on the holosuite, where the lounge singer there (whose name slips my mind) is aware that he’s a hologram, and is thus semi-sentient (if there is such a state). At the end the singer sings this song, ‘it wouldn’t be make-believe if you believed in me,’ and it’s incredibly touching. That’s the best application for this song - in movies and books and TV shows, as a metatextual lament - though I’m sure that’s not what the writer intended at all.
I guess I would have to have read “Yellow Wallpaper” with this professor’s viewpoint–finding what I want to find–to come to his interpretation of “Paper Moon.”
If you believe in me, I can make it all real. Otherwise your life is just fake. Pretty sick.
Vic Fontaine, played by the wonderful James Darren. Now that I’ve found this site, I have to see if I can purchase a copy of the CD.
BTW, The Yellow Wallpaper was recently discussed in the Kate Chopin thread. In any case, I think that the original context of Paper Moon referred to a stage set. It was a song that could literally be sung under a paper moon, in front of a cardboard sea. In this sense it always worked metatextually.
Ella Fitzgerald and Natalie Cole seemed to have no problem with it. And what her Devine Ella-ness sees no harm in, neither do I. In fact, I was belting the words along with Ella driving home from work today. I’ve always loved that song, I see it as saying “I have a fantasy world, where you love me. If you believe in who I am, the fantasy world will come true.”
You can read into almost any love song. By definition, love is about making yourself a little bit submissive, be you male or female. Saying that all love songs are bad because they glorify vulnerability and submissiveness is kinda a no-brainer. I have a better idea: let’s all remain detached, aloof, and independant. :rolleyes:
On the other hand, the professor isn’t here to defend his/her arguments, so maybe he/she has a stronger argument we haven’t heard it.
I always disliked the make-over aspect of Breakfast Club, too, Tenga. She’s still a loonie, she’s just a loonie with mascara on.