Het grote Pogues topic

quote:

Hell's Ditch
(Shane MacGowan/Jem Finer)

This song is based largely on the life and writings of French author and playwright Jean Génet (1910-1986). Génet spent much of his youth and early adulthood in and out of prisons across Europe. In 1948, following his 10th conviction for theft, he received a life sentence but he was released upon the intevention of Jean-Paul Sartre and other stars in the French intellectual firmament.

"The killer's hands are bound with chains
At six o'clock it starts to rain..."

These lines relate to a scene in Génet's Miracle of the Rose (1946) describing the execution of a murderer.

"He'll never see the dawn again
Our lady of the flowers..."

Our Lady of the Flowers (1944) was Génet's first novel. It is based on his experiences in the French penal system.

"Genet's feeling Ramon's dick
The guy in the bunk above gets sick
In the cell next door the lunatic
Starts screaming for his mother..."
Génet's prison novels contain graphic descriptions and passionate defenses of homosexuality and vivid descriptions of the horrid conditions within the prison walls.

"Black dildo, black hell
As the Spanish cops ridiculed my gel..."
When he was 19, Génet escaped from a youth detention center and joined the French foreign legion. He deserted soon after and drifted around Europe, where he survived by stealing and homosexual prostitution. He was arrested in Spain for his homosexual practices, served his time, returned to France and was arrested repeatedly, culminating in the life sentence mentioned above.