Hi Valerie, welcome to Beatlelinks.
The following segment is from the book "We All Shine On: The Stories Behind Every John Lennon Song 1970-1980" (pg. 41), where the following analysis is presented...
"Paul McCartney's 'Let It Be' and Paul Simon's 'Bridge Over Troubled Water' had, almost simultaneously, struck a pseudo-religious note in the 1970 hit parade. John was openly contemptuous of 'Let It Be', but he was to write the third of these definitive rock hymns himself. 'Imagine' is probably the most widely-revered of all John's songs, including those by the Beatles. Here, at least, he bettered Paul, whose solo work could never surpass a song like 'Yesterday' in popular affections. The restful opening notes of 'Imagine' still strike a deep chord in people of all beliefs. Strangely, not even its explicitly secular message has stopped the song becoming a favourite at modern-minded religious events.
But the currents that run through 'Imagine's lyrics are muddy, as was Lennon's attitude to the Christian faith he was raised in. "I'm a most religious fellow," he told
Playboy in 1980. "I only now understand some of the things Christ was saying in those parables." As a child he attended Sunday School and sang in the choir. Christian hymns would have been his first formal engagement music, just as the Christian God was the first philosophical concept he had to wrestle with. Therefore the church-like tenor of 'Imagine' was quite natural for him, especially as he composed it on the piano rather than the guitar. And the subject it covers - from the existence of God downwards - were themes that nagged him for years.
As the lyrics unfold we are asked to imagine a universe
sans heaven or hell, and a world where people live for the day instead of the afterlife. Religion, like nationhood, is cited as a cause of conflict. Can we imagine ourselves without them, or material possessions, and living in global harmony? He'd ended his previous album [
John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band] by declaring that "the dream is over" [in the song 'God']. He begins this one [the
Imagine album] by announcing a new dream, and inviting us to share it. There was something nearly clairvoyant too in John's critique of national boundaries. The US immigration service would become the bane of his life, and the fight for US citizenship his longest-running battle.
'Imagine' has its origins in Yoko Ono's book of poems,
Grapefruit, published in 1964. In it, Yoko begins each poem with a similar invocation. Thus,
Tunafish Sandwich Piece starts, "Imagine one thousand suns in the sky at the same time...".
Rubber Piece begins, "Imagine your body spreading rapidly all over the world like a thin tissue...", and
Cloud Piece is quoted on the album piece itself: "Imagine the clouds dripping. Dig a hole in your garden to put them in." John would later say that he should have given Yoko a co-writer credit for the song. But, he told
Playboy, "I wasn't man enough... I was still full of wanting my own space after being in a room with the guys all the time, having to share everything."
The second source of inspiration was a prayer book given to John by the US comedian Dick Gregory. Advocating "positive prayer", the book advised that to receive anything from God, we must first imagine it for ourselves. This idea impressed John greatly. The day before he died he was still expounding "projection of our goals". If we wish for a positive future we should exert our mental energy and visualise one. In 1980 he observed how this idea, once considered wacko, was now being adopted by everyone from business organisations to sports stars. If we conceive of the future as something violent, like
Star Wars, then we run the risk of creating precisely that.
Sitting in the spacious white music room of his agreeable English manor, imagining "no possessions", Lennon was soon accused of hypocrisy. But his Utopian dream, with its wistful existentialism, tapped a vast reservoir of feeling in the post-War world. The song has become a standard. John's own opinion was typically perverse. He stood by
John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band, believing it more "real" than anything else he'd done. But the softer tones of 'Imagine' represented compromise, or even sell-out. "Imagine was a sincere statment," he told
NME's Roy Carr in 1972. It was 'Working Class Hero' with chocolate on. I was trying to think of it in terms of children." When Paul McCartney was so incautious as to praise 'Imagine', Lennon quickly fired back: "So you think 'Imagine' ain't political? It's 'Working Class Hero' with sugar on for conservatives like yourself."
That's it, so I hope it may be of use to you and your students in some way.
Perhaps some other members know of a good website you could visit for more (simpler perhaps) analysis of the song.
------------------
Re: Song Title Game Part V
Chess
Backgammon
Candy Tetris
Acno's Energizer
Air Fighting
Paper Shot 2
Babe Jump
Big Bird Hunting
Checkers
Chicken Shoot
Coljump
Camper Strike
Defence The Game
Heptathlon
Desert Rally
Hau den Dax
Horoscope
Mumu
Hockey
Ice Berg
Javelin Throw
Javelin Throw - 6 Shot
Mini Chopper
Mosaic
Rock Face Rescue
ScoobyDoo Foodfight
Penguin Toss
spaceshooter
Square Bear Photo Hunt
Square Bear Trivia Squares
Super Headers
The Flow 2
Tube Loader
Word Search
Albatross Overload (Yeti 4)
welcome to beatlelinks, valerie! 
for no one 
Linear Mode
