Talk:The Lives of John Lennon

message: The notations about Lennon's alleged homosexuality and Ono's alleged prostitution are merely sensationalist soundbytes that miss the essential character of the book, which was to destroy the carefully constructed narrative that John had selflessly sacrificed five years of his superstar career to raise his son, Sean, and that now he was somewhat self-sufficient, Lennon and Ono were free to re-enter the recording and touring industry and lifestyle. As I've enumerated in my additions, Goldman sought to pose an alternative narrative. The truth of that narrative maybe debated, but the character of the book is exactly that, and the bulk of it is supposed facts and testimony supporting Goldman's assertions. It seems to anger some moderators to see these assertions in print. Many people have rebutted them, and rebuttals could be posted, but they are not really germane to an article about the book, It should not be for Wikipedia to prove or disprove Goldman. It should be for the wiki to accurately report what the book was about. I believe I have added a great deal to that reporting, and have done so from the text itself.
I can quote more text verbatim if anyone doubts the veracity of this fact.  The sensationalist stuff misses the point entirely.71.100.13.236 (talk) 00:46, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Wrong focus

message: I removed the word "teen" from the prostitution claim on Yoko Ono. She was at least 20 by the time she is alleged to have been a prostitute. 12.96.162.45 17:27, 7 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  the teen prostitute claim 

message: I have removed this unsourced edit by IP70.188.142.63. See .
See also this biased contribution by the same IP. Onefortyone (talk) 00:48, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Unsourced claim

message: According to the Blender music magazine article, Rock's 25 Most Dastardly Villains (published September 15, 2002), Goldman himself claimed he "didn't much like Lives, either; he complained that his editors cut 81,000 words of his more balanced manuscript." The same magazine quotes Yoko Ono as saying "I'm not aware that there were 81,000 words of positive material removed from the book at the editing stage. That's like saying [Lennon's killer Mark David] Chapman had some very positive things to say about John which weren't reported." WikiPro1981X (talk) 10:08, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  81000 Words Removed from Book 

message: I’m cleaning up some inaccuracies in the article that reading Goldman’s book cleared up. First, Goldman did not charge that Lennon was “instrumental in the murder of a sailor.” The quote on page 107 reads “One attack lay heavy on his conscience because he had gone mad and beaten the sailor so badly that John feared he had left the man for dead … John could never be sure that his victim had died … study of the Hamburg press reveals no record of such an event.” According to Goldman, Lennon felt guilty about this incident and supposedly thought he himself would die a violent death. There is no allegation that he murdered a sailor. Same is true of Sutcliffe’s death – look at pages 118 and 119. According to a story Lennon supposedly told, he once got in a fight with Stu and beat him up. John felt guilty about Stu’s death several months later. Once again, there is no direct allegation that Lennon was responsible, just that he felt guilty. In the previous paragraph, Goldman discusses a story of a beating Stu allegedly received from a gang of thugs at Litherland Town Hall. Goldman presents these events, and does not allege either were directly responsible for Sutcliffe’s death.
Also, according to the book, the "kick to the belly" was while she was pregnant with Sean, not in 1968. (Page 554) On page 319, Ono is claimed to have told her assistant that her first miscarriage in 1968 was "triggered by a beating she received from John." So the end result is the same, but details are jumbled.
The statement that Goldman largely dismisses Lennon’s work is also inaccurate. He does criticize the song “Imagine,” and a few of his solo works are given a lukewarm appraisal, but he’s generally positive regarding Lennon’s artistic output. I didn’t see any part of the book where Goldman claimed Lennon’s best songs were a product of mental illness or drug abuse. As for melodies being “stolen,” there was the legal action regarding “Come Together” which is detailed in the text. Other than that, Goldman put forth the following observation - “If John Lennon was the music game’s slickest pickpocket, he was also a thief with a hole in his own pocket because he always left more at the scene of the crime than he took.” (p. 137) This roughly translates to the idea that Lennon was an expert at borrowing just the right amount from earlier material in creating his own original songs. This is not a putdown – Goldman appears to be making the case that this brand of “synthesis” is a rare skill. It’s a major stretch to claim Goldman is stating that Lennon did this for every song he wrote, but even if he did, it’s not a putdown.
In time, I might balance the text with some other sources that show Goldman had much admiration for Lennon's talent, but not so much admiration for him as a man. Tidewater 2014 (talk) 15:11, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cleaning up