{"id":13118,"date":"2025-01-26T14:50:26","date_gmt":"2025-01-26T19:50:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/spinor.info\/weblog\/?p=13118"},"modified":"2025-01-26T14:50:26","modified_gmt":"2025-01-26T19:50:26","slug":"toys-toys","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spinor.info\/weblog\/?p=13118","title":{"rendered":"Toys, toys!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Someone reminded me of Kurt Weill’s poignant 1936 anti-war musical Johnny Johnson<\/em> today. I recalled in particular the last song, Johnny’s song<\/em>, in which the simple-minded protagonist Johnny, never losing his faith in humanity, tries to sell toys to an indifferent public who are rushing over to the next square to listen to another warmongering speaker. “Toys, toys!” cries Johnny but no one listens.<\/p>\n

I did not remember the song’s lyrics. Apparently, there are different versions, but the one I am familiar with includes these lines (emphasis mine):<\/p>\n

At last we’ll find the day<\/em>
\nWhen joy shall be our song<\/em><\/p>\n

I hear them say it’s all baloney<\/em>
\nThe world’s a mighty cruel place<\/em>
\nWith tooth and claw and promise phony<\/em><\/strong>
\nAn old hard guy he wins the race<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

But you and I don’t think so<\/em>
\nWe know there’s something still<\/em>
\nOf good beyond such ill<\/em>
\nWithin our heart and mind<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Ouch. Did Paul Green, who wrote the song’s lyrics, foresee the future?<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Oh well. Here’s a Midjourney cat that I think aptly captures the musical’s atmosphere.<\/p>\n<\/fb:like>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Someone reminded me of Kurt Weill’s poignant 1936 anti-war musical Johnny Johnson today. I recalled in particular the last song, Johnny’s song, in which the simple-minded protagonist Johnny, never losing his faith in humanity, tries to sell toys to an indifferent public who are rushing over to the next square to listen to another warmongering […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13118","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-history","category-music","category-25-id","category-4-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/spinor.info\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13118","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/spinor.info\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/spinor.info\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spinor.info\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spinor.info\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13118"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/spinor.info\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13118\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13124,"href":"https:\/\/spinor.info\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13118\/revisions\/13124"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/spinor.info\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13118"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spinor.info\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13118"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spinor.info\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13118"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}