ACTIVITY 1: Make your own perspective base on the song

Imagine

The song is written by John Lennon and encourages listeners or readers to imagine a world without
religion, hunger, divisions, and many other issues plaguing our world. He is arguing that if we all come
together, then we can make strides towards solving our problems. It is a feel-good song that transports
listeners to a world where no problems exist and everyone can live as one.

In the first stanza, the poet asks the readers and the audience to Imagine that there is no heaven and no
hell and it’s easy if you try according to him. The idea of heaven and hell is in almost all the major
religions in the world like Christianity, Islam, Judaism, etc.

This idea is however different in all the religions and also the cause of a number of wars, crusades,
enmity among the people and even the countries. Thus, for Lennon, Heaven and Hell, or in other words
life after death has no reality or proof.

In the third line, he asks us to Imagine that all the people living for today and above us are nothing but
the only sky. The poet is asking the people to leave aside what has been prescribed and advised in their
religions and beliefs and rather consider the world as the ultimate reality and live for today.

In the second stanza, the poet again asks us to imagine there’s no countries and no religion too and thus
nothing to kill or die for. According to the poet, it isn’t hard to do i.e. there is no big deal in imagining it.

The countries and the religions divide the people and also lead them to fight and kill each other. The
poet thus wants us to imagine what if these two dividing forces were not here on the earth, then no
person would die or kill others. And thus, all the people living life in peace.

The third stanza is a kind of chorus. The poet says that the people may think that he is a dreamer.
However, according to him, he is not the only one to think like this.

There are many others as well and someday we will also join him and that day the world will be one.
There will be unity among the people, and peace and prosperity will prevail.

In the fourth stanza, the poet asks us to imagine that there would be no possessions and no need for
greed or hunger and thus a brotherhood of man would exist where all the people will be sharing all the
world.

In this stanza, the poet talks about material possessions. Materialistic desires lead to greed and thus
capitalism, which again divides the society into classes i.e. rich and poor class. This desire is, again a
cause of problems faced by the people in the world.

The poet thus asks us to think and imagine if we would give up the desire to possess the material things,
there will be no fight, no class, no greed and thus no problem. Universal brotherhood will prevail in the
world and it will be shared by all the people equally.

The fifth and the final stanza is again a chorus repeated by the poet. He says that though he is a
dreamer, he will too join him someday and thus the world will be one.
The song or the poem reflects the dream of a poet who wants to see the world problem-free. For him,
religion, afterlife, countries, possessions, etc are the things that divide the people and make them fight
with each other.

As a dreamer, he asks the readers and the audience to imagine like him and see the world as he does.
Though it is difficult to imagine so, yet we will someday find it to be the ultimate solution and will accept
it and then we will be one.

This song is considered one of, if not the most, meaningful songs ever written. It came out in 1971 in a
time where there was war, hatred and bigotry spreading like wildfire. This song encouraged many
people to go fix something. It can still apply heavily to the issues we have today since not much has
really changed with intercontinental and domestic relations.