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Glad you all had fun with this quest!

Hartmut wrote:The sentence “I knew it stood for something clear and strong in my own heart.” rings a bell, though.

You just said the chorus

holydove wrote:I'm thinking it might have been a song from The Future album - maybe Anthem? (though the choruses do not seem few & far between in that one. . .)

Your first thought was absolutely correct

Goldin wrote:I'd say there is a remarkable hint on this page!.. (Don't mention it, Rachel)

I thought you might know this because you are the keeper of LC's words

Steven wrote:Caught the hint too.

Good on you

Here are LC's words in full about Anthem:

Interview 1992 ("The Future Press Kit")

It's hard to do a commentary in special for this particular song because it took ten years to write. There’s not a line in it that I couldn't defend. There's not a line in the album that I can't defend, but this song especially. I delayed its birth for so long because it wasn't right or appropriate or true or it was too easy or the ideas were too fast or too fuss, but the way it is now it deserves to be born. I've been playing this song for many years and I knew that I was on the track of a really good song. I knew it stood for something clear and strong in my own heart. And I despaired of ever getting it and I was playing it on Rebecca's synthesizer, and she said "That's perfect just like that" And I said "Really?" She said "Yeah let's go down to the studio now!"


Interview 1992
(from "The Future Radio Special", a special CD released by Sony)
About the meaning of the chorus:

...That is the background of the whole record, I mean if you have to come up with a philosophical ground, that is "Ring the bells that still can ring". It's no excuse...the dismal situation.. and the future is no excuse for an abdication of your own personal responsibilities towards yourself and your job and your love. "Ring the bells that still can ring”: they're few and far between but you can find them. "Forget your perfect offering" that is the hang-up that you're gonna work this thing out. Because we confuse this idea and we've forgotten the central myth of our culture which is the expulsion from the garden of Eden. This situation does not admit of solution of perfection. This is not the place where you make things perfect, neither in your marriage, nor in your work, nor anything, nor your love of God, nor your love of family or country. The thing is imperfect. And worse, there is a crack in everything that you can put together, physical objects, mental objects, constructions of any kind. But that's where the light gets in, and that's where the resurrection is and that's where the return, that's where the repentance is. It is with the confrontation, with the brokenness of things.

Over to you Rachel!

B4real wrote: [Hartmut:] The sentence “I knew it stood for something clear and strong in my own heart.” rings a bell, though.
You just said the chorus

I know it's hard to believe. But when I wrote that, I had not yet figured out which song you were looking for.

Only when Roman and Steven started talking about a 'hint', I realised what I had done. So this was either a very big coincidence - or my subconsciousness at work.

Oh. . .it's the bells that are few & far between, not the choruses. . .

And if Steven & Roman knew what the clue was, then they must have also known the answer!

Well, I'll give the next question anyway. . .& hoping that Bev doesn't mind me copying her very clever cluing mode (good idea, Bev!), here it is:

When asked by an interviewer about the meaning of a particular line in a song, Leonard said that he had showed the lyrics to a friend (before the song was released), & he said that his friend "dared me to leave that line in". Before I give any other clues, can anyone say which line this was?

holydove wrote:her very clever cluing mode (good idea, Bev!)

Indeed!

holydove wrote:Leonard said that he had showed the lyrics to a friend (before the song was released), & he said that his friend "dared me to leave that line in".

This sounds tantalising familiar, but I can't place it. (And I really hope there isn't another unintentional hint hidden in this comment.)

Thanks Hartmut and Rachel about liking my idea of using LC's words as clues - it was a spontaneous thing because I didn't have anything prepared. No problem Rachel, anyone can do it that way and it really does make you think! And talk about things instantly coming to mind, as I'm typing this, I've just though of this answer to the current question -

Right or wrong - "I'm the little Jew who wrote the Bible" from The Future.
I can't remember who the interviewer or friend was at this very moment..... Ah, maybe the friend was Rebecca De Mornay because I think she helped produce the album that song is from "The Future".

Bev, you are right - that is the line, from The Future, & it's from an interview with Paul Zollo, from the chapter on LC in his book "Songwriters on Songwriting". Leonard doesn't say who the friend is. Here is a link to the chapter, which is in the LC files :

http://www.leonardcohenfiles.com/zollo.html

And here is the paragraph with Zollo's question & Leonard's response:

PZ: You mentioned that whole verse about the Jews in "Democracy" that you took out, and in "The Future" there is that line, "I’m the little Jew who wrote the Bible." There are so many great Jewish songwriters, yet it’s so rare that any of them mention being Jewish in a song --

LC: [Laughs] I smiled to myself when that line came. A friend of mine said, "I dare you to leave that line in."

Thanks Rachel, Seems it pays to go with your first impression!

Here’s another song in my top ten......and that knowledge may actually help some people
To my way of thinking it’s a song you feel rather than hear. This song lends itself to many varied interpretations on different levels from physical to spiritual. It could be one of the most difficult LC songs to reach agreement on its true meaning, if such a statement ever was true about any of his songs! To give you more explicit help, it began its life as a poem named after the first line.

Suzanne?

Sorry Roman not that one.

Hi,

Is it "Democracy"? A little borrowing from Longfellow appears in it.

No sorry Steven, not that one either! They are Leonard's own words and poems.
As far as I know there are only 7 songs that qualify and Roman has already said one of those

Hi,

Is it "True Love Leaves No Traces"?

ah Steven, that is another qualifying one but not what I have in mind! In fact, if anyone wants to they could name the remaining 5 songs

I should give you a more concise clue. IMO this song displays LC’s “chop” at its finest. His delivery in 1988 is beyond perfection!

Bev, my guess is you are looking for: Avalanche

(I thought there were just 5 all together that were poems: Avalanche, Queen Victoria, Teachers, Suzanne & Master Song. Can you tell me the other 2?)

Editing: I just remembered - True Love Leaves No Traces & Never Mind would probably be #6 & #7?

If I am right about Avalanche, can someone else please ask the next question?

Avalanche is correct, Rachel Here's that most perfect rendition of it from Barcelona 1988 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxaOcHcrd8k

There are approx 30 poems some identical and some adapted in different ways that are also songs. Included in that are 8 songs where the first line of each is the same as the original title of the poem - I overlooked Queen Victoria having the same first line! Nevermind doesn't and is included in the approx 30 poems.

Here they are:
True Love Leaves No Traces – from ‘As Mist Leaves No Scar’ two verses in Spice-Box Of Earth 1961
Queen Victoria – from ‘Queen Victoria And Me’ in Flowers For Hitler 1964
Suzanne – from ‘Suzanne Takes You Down’ in Parasites Of Heaven 1966
Master Song – from ‘I Believe You Hear Your Master Sing’ in Parasites Of Heaven 1966
Teachers – from ‘I Met A Woman Long Ago’ in Parasites Of Heaven 1966
Avalanche – from ‘I Stepped Into An Avalanche’ in Parasites Of Heaven 1966
I Left A Woman Waiting – from ‘Poem #27’ the first two verses in The Energy Of Slaves 1972
Our Lady of Solitude – from ‘All Summer Long’ longer adaptation with new verses in Death Of A Lady’s Man 1978

And as Rachel has requested, anyone can post a question next.