Work Text:
To begin with, let’s focus on the plot and the most important things that happen in Morrissey’s novel:
The story is about four (at some point the fifth one joins) runners who train in Boston, led by their coach Mr. Rims. They are on a way to worldwide recognition, victory and fame, but we know from the very first page they are also doomed to fail and there will be no happy ending. Their names are: Ezra, Harri, Justy and Nails (the fifth one is called Dibbs), but the story clearly focuses on Ezra and his girlfriend, Eliza and Harri as the main subjects. One time, they go to a forest, where Ezra kills the spectre who tries to get close to him and hides the body in the woods. It is emphasized that from then on the quartet has to deal with both keeping up with their work while not allowing their secrets to see daylight. Then one of the runners, Harri – kills himself by overdosing on drugs and alcohol after his mother dies. The runners often hang out in a drag bar. On another occasion, Ezra is haunted by the second ghost of a mother whose son, Noah Barbelo was molested and murdered by a dean of the school he went to. She asks Ezra to dig out the son’s body and give him a proper burial. Ezra is already full of guilt because of what had happened earlier in the forest, with the first spectre, so he obliges. At some point, he also confronts Dean Isaac, the rapist and murderer, seeking justice for Noah. They get into a fight which ends with Ezra fleeing the scene. Halfway through, the remaining three (Ezra, Justy and Nails) kill Dibbs. As the story points towards the end, Justy and Nails are also killed by Dean Isaac. Ezra then confesses to his girlfriend, Eliza everything he had done, that he had murdered a spectre and hidden away his body. She decides to forgive him and decides that they will carry this secret together. Next scene, they are driving, but end up in a fatal car crash in which Eliza is killed on the spot and Ezra is taken to a hospital. He is in critical condition and at some point he is dying as well. On his deathbed and supposedly in his afterlife, he reunites not with his girlfriend, but with his fellow runner Harri, whom he kisses and voices hope for the two of them to never be apart.
Now, even given this little info I believe everyone who is familiar with The Smiths’ story can see the connections, but let me explain thoroughly why I think this book is a veiled (in a very Morrissey way – as if he wanted to say everything straightaway, but can’t keep himself from covering and concealing at the same time) truth about Morrissey and Marr’s relationship.
On the back cover, Morrissey explains that his novel is “the reality of what is true, battling against what is permitted to be true”. Let’s keep that in minds.
First and foremost, we have four runners, like four Smiths. The fifth–Dibbs–joins at some point, just like Craig, but has to be removed from the group soon as he isn’t as good as the others (in the story he is killed by the remaining three).
The way Morrissey describes the dynamic within the group and their mutual work immediately brings to mind the dynamics within the band.
Just a few quotes to prove that Morrissey derived the whole idea from his own biography:
“It should be said that they were indeed contracting parties, since their combined aim was to dispose of every other half-mile relay team on any known college campus across the land (…)”
“The wide-eyed girls were many, offering their conscious will as the running boys turned into overloads (…)”
“Their success depends upon the communal goal, the spring in eight legs, the combined methodology of four minds, and the maintained perfection of four physical frames; four wheels of the one machine.”
To draw some parallels to this one, here is how Morrissey describes forming The Smiths, from his Autobio:
“I sing out to the youth of the slums, and Hand in Glove and Still Ill anchor four lives together – four lives unlikely to be anchored for any other reason.”
Few more quotes from LOTL which prove it is very likely that he had The Smiths in mind while writing the whole story:
“All dietary modifications made, it becomes a sign of success when the boys feel too exhausted to sleep (…)”
It is a well known fact that Moz, Johnny, Andy and Mike survived on a diet of crisps, chocolate and Coca-Cola during the Smiths days and were permanently malnourished, exhausted and sleep deprived.
“[all of the boys efforts] on these days seem like nothing yet might have great meaning in years to come.”
The biggest success and popularity peak came for The Smiths after the group disbanded.
“There are days of genuinely poor visibility when your sorry best is the most you can do, whereas a dry and radiant day expects more from you and is ready to catch you victimized by excuses. Well, either you can run or you can’t,”
This refers to and explains Moz not showing up for scheduled videos or gigs. Either you can sing or you can’t.
“(…) 25-year-olds who weren’t even born at the time when you were already sick of it all now looked over at you and smiled a nod of compassionate pity.”
He reflects on what it feels like to reach entire generations with your art.
“(…) the future is a time when you will only watch”
Parallels with Autobiography again: "(...) I sit, watching the situation as if behind glass" - about the Smiths' split. It could very well describe Morrissey's feelings during the Joyce's trial.
“Natura (…) embraced the boys as a pictorial love affair began”
That is an interesting choice of words considering he is narrating a story about four friends who prepare for a marathon.
“Nails and Justy are left behind and go their own way; Nails flopped on the bedroom floor with jaggedly soothing music swirling in the background, and Justy pleasing himself in ways that predate religion, and no explanations required.”
Nails and Justy mostly stick together and exist more in the background. That quote also reminds me of Smiths’ first American tour, New Year’s 1983/1984 gigs. Morrissey claims in his Autobio that he was left alone at the hotel while the others went about their wicked ways. It was also when Mike caught chickenpox from some girl he had an ONS with.
“(…) devotional well-wishers, and the girls of the ‘I, unlovely’ division who wrote too openly from afar offering unsought personal details with their this-is-not-me-at-my-best-photographs.”
That is clearly about Morrissey’s relationship with fans - he’s talked many times about receiving very personal letters from people, in which they shared with him the most private details of their lives.
“The tongue, unfortunately, breaks loose on the safety and secrecy of paper whilst suffering in its haste by assuring itself that the sheet shall shield all secrets because, after all, it is only here and now, between you and I, for no one else is reading this.”
He asks himself if he should be revealing so much in his lyrics (as well as in this book probably). While interviewed about his personal life, Morrissey has always claimed that he doesn’t have to discuss it any further, because “The truth is in the songs. So much is in the songs.”
The runners are led by Mr. Rims, who constantly criticizes and minimizes their achievements. In Morrissey’s Autobiography, he devoted many pages to express his disappointment with Geoff Travis from Rough Trade, to whom they signed as a band. Frankly, Mr Shankly was also written about him. Mr. Rims “is homesick for the success that only the boys can bring to him”. In Autobio, Morrissey opines that both Travis and Rough Trade as a label owe their success and recognition purely to The Smiths.
In the novel, the events take place in the city of Boston and the year is 1975, which I don't think has much relevance, although let's just note that 1985 might have been significant to Morrissey and that Boston is the closest US city to London geographically and was also important to Brits historically.
The idea of writing about runners doesn’t seem to be a random choice though, if we look at the fact that Johnny ran the 2010 New York marathon and has been a professional runner for over 10-15 years now. Morrissey was also a promising athlete during his schooldays; from Mozipedia:
“Sport was the only thing I was good at and I used to love it completely. I particularly liked running. But then, I had to be a good runner, for reasons I’ll leave unstated… The 100 metres was my raison d’etre. Yes, I won everything, I was a terrible bore when it came to athletics.”
So it’s another thing Morrissey and Johnny are connected by.
On the very first page, we learn that the story has no happy ending and that our runners will “part this earth in dirt”. In Johnny Rogan's The Severed Alliance, the author mentions that the fact that The Smiths were going to split up at some point was sensed and well understood by everybody involved from the very beginning. The “dirt” part may then refer to the circumstances under which the group ended and the court case.
Now let’s look at the personalities of said runners and other details that bring to mind real people and events.
Ezra stands out the most in this story and almost everything happens as a result of his actions. He is described as the one who “had always won due to his physical and facial features – an amorously fixed gaze”; he is the most physically attractive one. He is full of energy and a natural leader to the group; he also has a younger brother, just like Johnny (who I believe even took part in Moz & Johnny’s interviews with kids – Datarun and Charlie’s Bus, 1984). How Ezra describes himself is particularly intriguing, direct quotes:
“I have erotic curiosities”
“I inspect traffic accidents at the risk of causing another”
“I am the perfect fiasco”
His girlfriend, Eliza is a voice of reason and probably the most likeable character, just like Angie (in Autobio, Morrissey speaks highly of Angie. Other sources, like The Severed Alliance, also claim that Morrissey and Angie got on very well).
In List of the Lost, Ezra and Eliza are of similar height and names and are considered to be the perfect match. Angie and Johnny share a birthday (both were born on October 31st) and according to Grant Showbiz were often mistaken to be twins.
Outside influences suggest marriage to Ezra and Eliza:
“Their names were now so tightly super-glued that toastmasters began to joke with some seriousness about marital union (“please, make the same mistake that we did, so that we shan’t feel so patsy-pigeoned”)”
In The Severed Alliance, it is pointed out that it was actually Joe Moss (who worked with Johnny in clothes shops before The Smiths and later became Smiths manager and his mentor) who convinced Johnny that he should marry Angie, revealing that “at some point he tended to go against her”. That also explains why Morrissey wasn’t so fond of Moss and wanted him gone. Grant Showbiz (Smiths producer and sound engineer from ‘83 to ’87) also said about Angie and Johnny’s wedding during American tour in ‘85 that “It didn’t seem like a proper wedding. No relatives were there.”, which again leaves an impression that the whole thing was rushed, for whatever reason.
Harri is the one close to his mother, who is his only friend as he is hers. He takes his own life after her death by overdosing on substances. I think everyone knows at this point that to Morrissey his mother was the most important person as well. At some point, Harri is also called “a forgotten saint” and his separation from the others is perceptible.
Nails has a complicated family situation and a “scrappy social background”, like Andy (thing we know from Johnny’s Autobio and other Smiths biographies. That’s also where his struggle with heroin stems from, where he was introduced to drugs at a very young age and got into them most likely because of family problems). His name is supposed to mean that he is as hard as nails, indestructible, so that also points towards Andy and his addiction.
Justy is the bleakest one, I believe - and we know of which ex-Smith Morrissey isn’t especially fond of. He comes from a big family (Mike has two brothers and two sisters). I also speculate that his name was meant to be a dig at Mike (justice?).
Dibbs joins them when “the far end is closer than it once was” (Craig joined The Smiths in ’86) and he only “runs for beer”. In Autobio, Moz calls out Craig for his laziness and thrashing hotel rooms. The Severed Alliance also mentions Craig’s excessive drinking and particularly that incident of him celebrating his 20th birthday by downing 20 brandies during Smiths’ last American tour in ’86, which didn’t end well for him and his hotel room). Dibbs is also “such a child still” (Craig was born in ’66 and was much younger than others - especially Morrissey - when he joined the group).
The only character I don’t quite get is Tracey, a girl that briefly hooks up with Harri. As far as I know, Moz wasn’t dating any girl around the time of the Smiths (that we know of), apart from Annalisa in 80-82 and it ended quickly after the Smiths began, so I don’t believe it was meant to be her. The only other that comes to mind is Linder, as it is mentioned that “Tracey is a moving photograph (…)” and there are Proust and Chagall mentioned in her description (and Linder is a painter/photographer/artist). While mutual friends don’t think Linder and Moz had a sexual relationship (Severed Alliance), I think it’s possible because of “Wonderful Woman”, “Jeane” and “Driving Your Girlfriend Home” (which are about her according to Mozipedia). That still doesn’t make enough sense, since while The Smiths lasted Linder was living somewhere in Europe and she and Moz drifted apart a bit at that time.
Now the main conclusions that I came to.
The spectre from the forest/Harri/Noah Barbelo were all meant to personify one person – Morrissey. Although there is a lot of him in every single character in this book (he’s not very good at creating characters with diverse personalities, but that’s beside the point), these three characters have the most in common, particularly Morrissey’s life experiences. I am also strongly convinced that if Moz was to portray himself as a supernatural being, he would most likely choose a ghost (because of “I am a ghost and as far as I know I haven’t even died”, “I am the ghost of a Troubled Joe” and generally his strong paranormal beliefs).
The three phantoms engage mainly with Ezra.
They can also represent Morrissey, but at different stages of his life.
Why?
As I’ve mentioned before, Harri is like Moz when it comes to the bond with his mother and suicidal tendencies.
The spectre from the forest wants to be close with Ezra.
While telling to the boys the story of his life, he admits that he had a bad first time at the age of 13, with a girl who laughed at him:
“A girl laughed at me when we were both thirteen years old, and that widening mouth of laughter, as dumb and sterile as it was, the vicious disdain because I couldn’t measure up… but it was the way she laughed… the way she laughed… with all that hair like something pulled out of a microwave… like something you’d twirl on a stick… it stayed with me forever, and it triggered my dislike of all women, or, my embarrassment at women.”
As Morrissey himself admitted to the part of having a bad first time at 13, I have every reason to believe that the girl and the laughing part are also true. This would explain the lyrics to Miserable Lie and Pretty Girls Make Graves or Morrissey’s supposed “misogyny” (as well as confusion when it comes to sex in general) - which, knowing he had such a scarring for a young man experience, I'm not sure is entirely the case.
What is more, the spectre says that he “had no education, no proper job, and being on state aid was just a blatant way of doing nothing” – just like Morrissey’s life before Johnny knocked on his door.
The spectre is also characterized as “a man pushed past his limit and now ready to feud with his own grave”. In one of the interviews, Morrissey said about himself that “People like me prove that you can survive without romance, even though you end up a bit unbalanced and you tend to argue with your own reflection.”
The spectre states that: “there is no safety and nobody cares about you”, while in Autobiography Morrissey writes about his childhood: “There is only a sense of change and of slipping away, but never a sense of security or stability.”
“The wretch, too, was a man, but had positioned himself so far away from obedient society that no one who mattered was close to him, or even knew him.”
That one makes me think of Morrissey’s favorite poet, A.E. Housman, about whom he wrote in his Autobiography (and conciously or unconciously about himself as well): “(…) Housman, who was said to be a complete mystery even to those who knew him. (…) A stern custodian of art and life, he shunned the world and he lived a solitary existence of monastic pain, unconnected to others. The unresolved heart worked against him in life, but it connected him to the world of poetry, where he allowed (in)complete strangers under his skin. In younger years, he had suffered from the unrequited love of Moses Jackson, the pain of which was so severe that it doomed Housman for the rest of time. All of his work would be governed by this loss, as if life could only ever offer one chance of happiness (and perhaps, for every shade and persuasion, it does?)”
Noah Barbelo is another character whose only friend is his mother. He was molested and murdered by a dean of the school he went to. In his Autobiography, Morrissey reveals being molested by his P.E. teacher. In LOTL, he talks of “haunted locker rooms”, which is where the assault took place I believe. Also, Noah’s mother’s name is Elizabeth.
While describing Noah’s abuser–Dean Isaac–Morrissey in fact portrays no one other than himself:
“Always fighting himself, this was where he found the light that his heart always yearned for, and where he could forget his disturbing associations, no matter how capriciously the mind dragged the fat body along. He could look suffering directly in the eye as long as that suffering was not his own, yet he was now in a terrible rush, for he had never heard of sexual presumptions in either heaven or paradise, and there were now fewer years to cram more of it in – at least as far as his capacities would allow… as a chronicler of horror, for even at twenty years old his timing had been all wrong, and life’s general rites of passage were never his. The right response from the right loved one never came, and as the middle age ambushed him, Isaac still struggled to construct lost youth (...), throughout years and years of sexual silence. Now, in slipping maturity, he was a sorry image of the overripe drifting into life’s final chapters as if they were a sandy whirlwind of death (…)”
This quote is also very similar to the Housman one from Autobiography.
At some point in the story, Ezra confronts Dean Isaac and they get into a fight. That could be interpreted as Johnny fighting with Morrissey’s demons (and Morrissey himself), his pre-Smiths past - when it comes to physical intimacy too; knowing what happened to him during his early teens, that’s how I understand “I’m a twenty digit combination to unlock with a past where to be touched meant to be mental” from the last song Morrissey and Marr wrote together and it is widely believed to be very direct and personal ("I think 'I Keep Mine Hidden' was extraordinary. He was going somewhere with that, somewhere really confessional. There are very few songs where Morrissey says: "This is me", but I think that was a very personal song. A very direct song from Morrissey to Johnny." - Grant Showbiz). That ‘touch’ can obviously have more than one meaning.
Morrissey described Johnny as his savior on multiple occasions, even stating at one point that Johnny literally saved his life.
Fighting Dean Isaac, Ezra eventually flees the scene, since at some point he has had enough. After that, he cries to Eliza: “It’s all too much (…) Everything here… the boy… Isaac… the non-tournament…” (Johnny has been put under enormous pressure during last Smiths years, coping with managerial issues, organizing tours and basically keeping everyone and everything together), to which she replies: “It’s already unwon. It’s gone, and… haven’t you noticed? More important things have replaced it.” (Smiths is dead and Morrissey considers his solo career to be much more important).
Nails and Justy are later killed by Isaac, which I think represents their falling out with Moz.
The amount of violence in this book also shows how Morrissey feels about the group’s demise and how deeply he was affected by everything that happened around it.
Second way of interpreting this, the trio’s presence could also be metaphorical rather than literal. They might represent the worst experiences of Morrissey’s life. The fact that they all appear as some kind of phantoms throughout the story brings to mind the author’s own demons, traumas and struggles he is haunted by:
Noah: violence experienced at school (probably the most touching part of Autobiography)
The spectre from the forest: his relationship with Johnny or rather the end of it (probably also other failed romances/unrequited loves and especially that first girl who laughed at him, but I am safe to assume it’s mostly Johnny, because I think he loved (loves) him the most – and he had previously put together these two in I Know Very Well How I Got My Name)
Harri: the death of his mother. That one is tricky, because when Moz wrote the book his mom was still alive and well, but as the mother figure appears more than once in this book (both Harri and Noah are tightly linked to their mothers) and the fact that they were so close makes me think that he was always terrified by the prospect of losing her - after all the death of one’s parents is almost inevitable. To back this up, in one of the Morrissey-Central interviews, right after his mother had passed, Moz described the death of one’s parents as a critical moment in everyone’s life, after which there is only our own death that awaits us. He also described 2020 as “the worst year of his life”.
If it’s not about the mother, then my second guess is that the part of Harri taking his own life can be also linked to Moz attempting suicide at some point in his life (most likely after Johnny had left – such rumor was floating around on Tumblr years ago and backed up by songs like Late Night, Maudlin Street and Angel, Angel Down We Go Together as well as Grant Showbiz and Stephen Street voicing their concerns about Moz’s psychological state after the breakup, there might be some truth in it).
Now probably the most important thing.
This is probably not a big revelation, but this novel strongly accentuates how much Morrissey associates intimate relationships with some form of violence or death (“I entered nothing and nothing entered me till you came with the key and you did your best but you have killed me”; dying by a loved one’s side as the highest form of romance and I could go on, literally every love song he wrote is also about death), most likely because of his failed and scarring first experiences (assault and being laughed at). It also proves the obsession with death he claims he’s always had.
Therefore, I can’t help but wonder what he wanted to say by making fictional Ezra (Johnny) a murderer. Was it meant to symbolize that other thing he so strongly links to violence which happened between them in real life?
So many details prove that this book was meant to reflect real events and it’s obvious that Johnny hasn’t killed anyone literally (see also the part when Ezra confesses to murder I mention later).
When the second ghost haunts Ezra and asks him to dig up her son’s body and give him a proper burial (the son that shares Morrissey’s childhood traumas) to help her find peace again may mean that Morrissey – despite claiming that “Our truth will die with me” – deep down is still waiting for some kind of closure from Johnny:
"Your actions will forever live in my heart, as you will forever be nearest the heart. I take my first hour of slumber, for you have removed the knife from my back. Without your help my despair would see no chance of hope. (...) I have sought compassionate listeners for many years. You must please forgive my unrestrained sentiment. My only prayer is that he may lie beneath a stone bearing his name... Was he not worth that, at least, instead of the evil and delerict design that befell him - discarded as a worthless waste?"
This motif also returns later, at the end of the story.
He would like Johnny to “dig him up and give him a proper burial” as well.
If Morrissey isn’t still hoping that they can be together one day, then at least he wants Johnny to acknowledge his feelings (maybe even publicly?), be true to himself and accept everything that had happened between them (“Don’t leave us in the dark”), instead of badmouthing him in his interviews. After all, Morrissey has always been quite open about his feelings for Johnny (it is a huge statement to make that you love someone more than life, while life is the highest value and the most precious thing in all cultures) and while I believe most fans would agree there was more than friendship on his side, you have to dig a bit deeper into songs, books and interviews to find out it wasn’t necessarily one sided. Johnny’s side of the story is more hidden (and it’s understandable considering he was already involved with someone else when they met).
The fictional Ezra has a secret: he killed the spectre and disposed of the body.
Noah’s been murdered and laid to rest in an unmarked grave.
Morrissey has been forced to keep the truth about their relationship from the world to protect Johnny. The entire thing isn’t finished and he can’t move on.
He is being asked if he was in love with Johnny to this very day, while no one asks Johnny the same question (except from one time maybe).
I’ve been thinking for a long time why would Morrissey even write such a revealing story and realized once again that this is another proof of how heavily the whole thing still weighs on him.
While pleading for justice for his son, Elizabeth Barbelo also asks Ezra: “Is it within your heart to help me be at rest with the one and only thing I have ever loved?”, which could be a direct plea to Johnny ("I love you more than life").
Morrissey mentioned many times that The Smiths were the first real pleasure in his life and gave him a reason to live.
The maternal figure deeply involved in her son's affairs also makes me think of how Morrissey's mother took up the role of his manager after she had retired.
Now let’s look at the part where Ezra confesses to ‘murder’ (knowing this word has a double-meaning in Moz’s mind) to Eliza and the end of the book:
“I ache in every muscle when I think of that night (…) The question wasn’t… answerable… I’d been shoved past my limits… I know that. Do you think I haven’t cried every single night?”
“(…) I’ve killed a man and hidden his body in the woods… and then I dig up the body of a young boy murdered twenty years ago, and I’m unable to manage the truth to anyone… walking around in a hypnotic state… hearing Harri’s voice wherever I go (…) And in the midst of it all I was meant to lead a relay team to national… televised victory!”
“Yet I have no understanding of why what happened took place. There’s no answer. Yet it had to be done. There’s a point at which you do what you must to protect yourself, and there isn’t time to consider implications or tolerance or holy scriptures or nineteenth-century laws… it’s all there in the pit of the stomach, and you articulate whatever it is you’re feeling, whether it be with words or actions, and to hell with the Pope – who, in any case, isn’t there, isn’t facing whatever it is you face, and we must make the best of what we feel.”
I wonder what “nineteenth-century laws” were supposed to mean because “You shall not kill” is definitely much older than that. Could this be a reference to Wilde's trials and England's penalization of homosexuality in the 19th century?
“Ezra knelt before her. “Your emotional permanence is all that keeps me level. I only learned to love you because you showed me that I could. Nothing else in life is enough. I will give you no trouble for the rest of our lives. I beg you to take me as I am, with the knowledge of all that’s happened. The agony will only be sharper if we separate. Unless I am with you I shall never be where I belong. Together we can recover, and we can live a happy life. There is no one but you for whom I feel this love. I’d endure any pain in order to spare you from it. Your love is beyond price. I am so heartily sorry for all that has taken place, but I am spared further self-hatred if I can turn around and there you are.”
“Yes, there I am… co-conspirator,” she is now calming her anger.”
Given the highlighted choice of words, am I the only one who thinks such sentences could apply to confessing infidelity as well? (again, knowing how love equals death in Moz’s vocabulary)
After that, Eliza wishes to spend the night at her parents’ house, so Ezra drives her back, but they end up in a fatal car crash, in which she is killed.
This brings to mind Johnny’s very similar accident from the late 1986.
From The Severed Alliance: “The car went completely out of control, then bounced off a couple of walls and ended up in the middle of the road. I jumped out and saw that the car was completely squashed. I couldn’t believe that I was alive.” (Johnny also talks about the crash in his autobiography, Set the Boy Free)
And more importantly:
“After receiving hospital treatment, he [Johnny] was fitted with a neck brace and splints and ordered to rest. The Anti-Apartheid date was postponed and Rough Trade issued a press statement subtly covering up Marr’s illegal driving by suggesting that Angie had been a passenger. Johnny knew all too well that, had his wife been in the car at the moment of impact, he would have become a widower after barely more than a year of marriage.”
Although Morrissey never voiced any ill feelings towards Angie (directly, maybe apart from "Girlfriend in a Coma" and “I Won’t Share You”) I think they creep out in this part against his will. Obviously, I wouldn’t go that far as to think he could ever wish such horrible fate on her, but it’s hard to believe he never saw her as an obstacle.
Finally, the scene of Ezra dying in the hospital.
“(…) who is it that keeps forcing me back? Figuratively he had indeed already died – our great stylist of the track leaned into a rolling and groaning Harri trembling with exhaustion after a lengthy run and now lying flat on his back on the sun-soaked track, and Ezra kissed him softly on the head and Harri looked up with eyes that shed a gentle melancholy at an affection so unexpected and one that moves different people in different ways. The body at unguarded moments is fully alive to accept more readily, and will not be guided by jealous advice.”
Again, am I the only one who thinks there’s a double entendre here? (which both Morrissey and Johnny constantly used while talking about their professional relationship)
“May we never be apart,” Ezra sensitively murmured to Harri, knowing that love could never be experienced without risk, or without a voice with a certain sound. There were days when… all we needed to do was accept, irresponsible acts meaning not very much at all, a disassembled life with a head full of music and a heart full of hope.”
I feel like even Morrissey himself gives up on the whole runners narration at this point as he pops up with “head full of music”.
Ezra also has other visions at this stage as he reevaluates his life in the hour of his death. In one of them, he recalls Eliza explaining to him:
“Once you finally know someone intimately… they no longer have any defense against you… and you suddenly have power over them… the power to hurt them quite viciously…”
In Autobiography, while mentioning that one time in 1992 when he and Johnny drove to Saddleworth Moor to talk, Morrissey shared a very similar thought:
“People who have been close do not need to say very much in order to wound each other.”
Knowing that he becomes really attached to people he’s been intimate with, that clicks with a bit disproportionate sense of betrayal (for a purely platonic friendship) the court case left him with and why he was so affected by Johnny’s departure. After the court case, he felt so hurt to the point that he had to move out of England. Right after Johnny left the band, he ended up suicidal (to quote Mozipedia: “Morrissey’s respondent anguish became so worrying that Showbiz spent a night at the singer’s Chelsea flat to monitor his depression. ‘I’d never seen him so upset’ says Showbiz. ‘Morrissey wasn’t so much crying as physically swooning.’”).
Few last sentences of the book, the narrator seems to be speaking directly to ‘Ezra’:
“Destiny, now, has nothing to do with you, Ezra – all responsibility shredded and shed.”
Slipping further into unconsciousness, Ezra sees the spectre he had killed in the forest. Here, both my theory about the spectre/Harri/Noah representing one person (Moz) and the notion that Moz may still be looking for recognition especially make the very last sentence of the novel truly poignant:
“Yet here he was again – at the foot of his bed, like a barking dog… like a smiling and shadowy disembodied seething mess, watching Ezra slide away (…). Ezra applied final will to fully recognize the spectral sheet, as maddening midnight church bells provided their harmonized soothing dullness, asking only that we remember with kindness.”
Honestly, this story fits so well with all the events and other things it would take hours to list; songs or the whole it was Johnny who was afraid to take it further narration, I feel it doesn’t even need my comments anymore.
It’s a bit much to brush it off as just Morrissey’s wishful thinking or fantasy. Yes, when in love we often delude ourselves immensely and it is still possible that Johnny really didn’t love Morrissey as much as Morrissey wants to believe, we probably won’t know that. But to me this story makes a 99% valid proof that there has been something more complicated between these two than just one-sided infatuation. I just can’t see it any other way.
A few other quotes that also caught my attention:
“Yet, if I feel it, so must you, for it is you who made me feel so. Otherwise what is it that is ‘there’ for either of us to catch? Electrons from me need electrons from you in order to become electrons. Yet, there they are, and you still say nothing whilst always knowing. Look at the blue of the sky and tell me why you held back. Did you think there would one day be a bluer sky and a better hour? What did you think before you were aware?”
That quote (and the whole book) makes me think of the interview with Morrissey from I-D, 2004 when he was asked once again if he was in love with Johnny, to which he replied: “Well, why doesn’t anyone ever assume Johnny Marr was in love with me? That perhaps Johnny Marr was in fact madly in love with me but didn’t feel he could act on that. Or that he didn’t have the courage to ever take it any further (...) Why assume that I must have loved him and not the other way around?”
“Natura means mother nature, and here she is all around you, as you stand shyly abandoned, denying that what was said was ever intended.”
Throughout the book, Morrissey also elaborates on everything he despises about society and the way this world works. He talks about monarchy, politics and meat industry, but mostly about heterosexist standards that force people into boxes and obligations and punish those who don’t fit into them by excluding them. Homophobic society presents the only right way of living, pushing people into hasty marriages and having children. I can only assume which events reinforced his beliefs.
I also think that the infamous sex scene between Eliza and Ezra (which I presume everyone is familiar with even if you haven’t read the book) could have been intentional. Moz is simply too complex for us to think he just can’t write a good sex scene (ok, knowing his confusion on the subject, it may be partly true), but knowing the context of the story I think it’s him once again ridiculing straight relationships as the only pure way of fulfillment (as perceived by society).
“Whilst the boys had agreed amongst themselves that the incident had not actually taken place, they would also not mention the night’s events even when quietly amongst themselves. What’s done in the dark remains in the dark.”
This refers to Ezra’s killing of the spectre from the woods and it instantly made me think of Billy Budd (“Don’t leave us in the dark”) and the song that inspired Billy Budd (according to Mozipedia) - “Turn Out The Light” by Joan Armatrading.
It's yet another thing which convinces me that the whole murder is just symbolic and has a hidden subtext. What ‘incident’ could have taken place in the dark in real life I believe is pretty obvious.
References to Forgive Someone also can be found throughout the book, particularly to the “track and field” scenery. What is worth mentioning is that the song and the novel were written around the same time.
“Nervous vitality would scour each of all emotional involvement or responsibility; that moment had gone, and they would now exercise an innocence with a talent as impressive as anything shown on track and field.”
After Harri’s death and funeral, the remaining three get drunk and end up reminiscing their lost friend. At some point, one of them says:
“He’d walk across the field… towards me… with that strong stride and stupid with smiles, and I’d be happy just to hear whatever the hell would stream out of him on that day, on any day… that open face, that knowing grin… that grin I’d known all of my life… before we even met. I grew up on tales of his exploits, I knew his body like I knew my own.” and although it is not clarified at this point which one of them says it (for a reason I believe and because they are all drunk and their voices blend into one), it has to be Ezra (unless someone wants to believe that Moz had something going on with Andy or Mike).
It is also worth reminding here that Johnny had known and heard things about Morrissey from mutual friends even years before they finally properly met, since Moz was known in Manchester as this weird New York Dolls enthusiast and unfulfilled music journalist, thus “I grew up on tales of his exploits”.
What is more, in one of the interviews Morrissey recalled how some time before Johnny showed up on his doorstep he had had this strange premonition that something special was going to happen in his life: "I had a slight tremulous feeling a long time before then, that something very unusual would happen to me and I interpreted it as fame of some magnitude."
“For since no one can love you as much as I do, therefore no one can likewise exceed my venom. Accept the enslavement of my undying love, or bear my viciously unpleasant cruelty, for dearly I love you more than any other could.”
This one is my favorite, Morrissey is a word genius.
Explains so well the whole open letter thing, all of their never ending dramas and arguments, shows exactly what unresolved love turns into. Definitely works both ways with these two.
“Feelings must carry into deeds, otherwise what’s the point of those feelings in the first place… we don’t have feelings in order to do nothing with them.”
Again, apart from the plot this book is mostly a discourse on repressed sexuality, nature battling denial, heterosexism and internalized homophobia. Along with the main plot and the interview quote I mentioned earlier, I believe Moz isn’t discussing all of it in regards of his own state of mind.
Another thing I find intriguing is that “Ezra, Nails and Justy felt a love for each other that prospered without the sexual, or found prosperity precisely because the sexual did not make propositions.” (supposedly Johnny, Andy and Mike)
Somehow Harri (Moz) is missing in this context.