Driftwood 11


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page 58  Giving different possible interpretations doesn't mean that for Syd writing lyrics was just a game of interpretations: that's why in the interview quoted above Syd replied "very important". The importance of lyrics, supported by the shining power offered by the different shades of meaning implied in any word, was even sung by Syd in his song "Matilda Mother":  Wandering and dreaming The words have different meaning Yes they did  So it's good to have at least one coherent interpretation to fully enjoy a song, but since it's not an easy task when a song is as complex as Opel, even the most outrageously bizarre interpretations should be taken into account. If anything, statistics should be used to prevent interpretation.

By the way, the word "gem" is used 22 times in Bigney's "twice far distant shore" book, while in the more "gem-specific" Prichard's The Black Opal, "gem" is used only 8 times. Though the first is a book of poems and the second is a novel, a comparison with the 490 pages of the 1944 book of poems A Comprehensive Anthology Of American Poetry shows there are only 3 occurrences of "gem". We will return to the importance of Bigney's book in the next chapter, but we have to admit that these statistics do not prove that Syd read that book. On the other hand, the scrapbook where, in 2000, Syd pasted newspaper photos of the Millennium Star diamond * proves he was keen on gems.

 * The scrapbook was found among other things in Syd's house after his death, as reported in Palacios' biography on page 431. The news was probably related to the 1999/2000 exhibitions of the diamond: see Wikipedia, which also links to http://famousdiamonds.tripod.com/millenniumstardiamond.html.