leonardcohenforum.com

Greetings to all you beautiful losers!

I have been listening to Leonard since the Eighties, when a friend gave me some cassette tapes (remember them) of him.

One of these tapes was Live Songs. The last song was called Queen Victoria, which has always intrigued me with it's desolate beauty.

Thanks to the interweb, it has shocked me that I had apparently misunderstood a line from the song as:

love you too in all your forms, the slim and lovely virgin floating among German beards,

Which makes sense, because German Beards were royal high fashion, and the young Victoria dancing amongst many of these German beards makes for a rather wonderful picture.

To my consternation the interweb lists the lyric as:

love you too in all your forms, the slim and lovely virgin floating among German beer,

This strikes me as a problematic lyric, because

1. Royals of the era wouldn't drink beer, German or otherwise, and
2. Why would a slim and lovely virgin float among German beer?

Not only is the lyric very poor English, one would float IN or ON German beer, not among it.

So to get to my question, is the internet correct?

Thanks in advance.

Chris Spray wrote:So to get to my question, is the internet correct?

Thanks in advance.

No, it's beards.

Welcome to the forum Chris.
Forum member Maarten has a great site with all lyrics (and chords).
http://www.maartenmassa.be/CohenChords/songs.htm

That's the answer I wanted.

But can you supply a reference?

All of the internet says it's beers, which is frankly asinine.

Thanks.

Chris Spray wrote:That's the answer I wanted.
But can you supply a reference?
All of the internet says it's beers, which is frankly asinine.
Thanks.

"All of the internet"? I have no idea where you searched, but the only place you need to look is the link at the top of this page, the "Leonardcohenfiles," and then find the "song index" in the left column, click on it, then scroll down and click on Queen Victoria/Live Songs, and you will find the lyrics. It is an official website, and the information is accurate!

It also appears, that the said beard floater isn't quite that lovely after all.

I love you too in all your forms,
the slim unlovely virgin floating among German beards

Reference as instructed above.

I like this word you used: "consternation". I'm going to use it quite often. Thanks.

I never noticed the "and lovely" lyric. Always heard it as "unlovely".

Would like to know why the "beer" lyric is so ubiquitous.

You're welcome Seadove!

Chris Spray wrote: Would like to know why the "beer" lyric is so ubiquitous.

A lot of alcoholics surf the web?

LisaLCFan wrote:

Chris Spray wrote: Would like to know why the "beer" lyric is so ubiquitous.

A lot of alcoholics surf the web?

Perhaps just a lot of ancient egyptians.
The British Empire may have something to do with German beards - but the pyramids were built on beer for the artisans.