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wholalaa t1_j22rv5e wrote

I don't think that's actually true, though. "I Am the Walrus" was written in 1967, a year before Pilcher arrested Lennon. And the same article mentions a more likely connection:

> John Lennon and Paul McCartney began writing a play about a Liverpudlian man who thought he was God titled "Pilchard," but they abandoned the project.

A pilchard is also a type of herring, essentially a sardine. What does "semolina pilchard" mean and what does it have to do with the Eiffel Tower? I don't know, but I don't think we're actually supposed to understand it. I feel like a core part of the song is Lennon taunting the people who loved analyzing Beatles' lyrics by writing a song that was deliberately incomprehensible and layered with in-jokes.

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Generiqueso t1_j23m624 wrote

Thanks, I was scrolling to see if anyone would catch that discrepancy in the timeframe! Hard to have the inspiration for a song take place after the song's release.

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LimehouseJack t1_j23mf48 wrote

Thank you for doing the research. Too often people are desperate to attribute meanings to some of the Beatles songs. Not everything has to have a hidden agenda. Like an Edward Lear poem - sometimes nonsense is fun and evocative on its own.

Anyway - like you say, the dates simply don’t add up. Shame your post isn’t getting more upvotes. I guess the conspiracy and mystery is more important than the truth!

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