Meet Me on My Vast Veranda

From the speech-in-character to the song-in-character. When I opened this blog I thought about naming it My Vast Veranda to echo a line which was echoing in my head anyway - "Meet me on my vast veranda / my sweet untouched Miranda". One's own blog is always an appropriate place to point out a favourite song, I guess, but luckily (accidentally...?) We Both Go Down Together from the album above is even written in the first person singular, so here I go with no time to lose.

The following remarks are clipped from the Radio Paradise chatroom:

The lyrics make me giggle like a fool...i don't think I've ever heard mention of a veranda in a song before, much less a VAST veranda. Also: "cliffs so high you can't see over." Damn, now that is high.

Arrrgh, I was reading King Lear for class today, and every time they mention Dover, I would hear this nasal "cliffs so high you can't see over" in my head, and then, inevitably, the vast veranda/Miranda bit.

"you wept, but your soul was willing" does that creep anyone else out a bit?

Yeah, it creeps me out too. But then a lot of the Decemberists' lyrics creep me out. I imagine their stuff is what the Addams Family listens to.

Creepy it is. The song is a monologue by a rapist who is deceiving himself - but not the attentive listener, of course - by putting an epic and romantic spin on his crime. The rape part in itself might count as a good reason not to name your blog after it - the obscurity of the reference might count as another - but as hippiechick in the chatroom remarks

I hope they are being very ironic in pointing out violence and sickness. I think this is why i am drawn to their songs, plus I really dig the music.