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Ophelia (日本語は英語の下期にあります。)
Words and Music: 高橋鮎生 (Ayuo)
Vocals, Harmonica, Percussion Bells: Jadranka
Bouzouki, Vocals: Ayuo
Recorded at Kamada's living room.

Ophelia.
She was one of tens of thousands of the lost souls in Europe at the end of WWII. She had avoided everyone who tried to help her since she got out of the concentration camps in the spring when the war ended. She no longer trusted anyone. She tried to wander outside alone forever. She was 26 years old at the time, but had been eating so poorly for seven years that she did not look feminine at all; she looked like a walking stick.

Everyone thought she was a young gypsy boy under 15 years of age. She collapsed and was carried off by American soldiers. After three weeks in the hospital giving her vitamins, minerals and most importantly love, she was back to being a humorous Viennese intellectual.
The soldier began to speak words of love to her. But she believed that all human beings were evil at their very core. She said that humans are not intelligent enough to create a world that is good according to their ideals, so they can only create meaningless tragedies in the end.
We are like a disease in a corner of the universe. How can you talk about love to someone who thinks it is wrong for human beings to continue having children? He tells her, "But look at the new age we are living in. Look at the new era we are entering. Ten thousand years of madness and lust will end with this war crimes trial. Books will be written, movies will be made. This could be the most important turning point in history."

You sound like an eight-year-old," she says.

You're at the best age for the dawn of a new era," he said.

This optimism came from the American tendency at the time that World War II was the last war, Armageddon, and that a world of miracles would open up from then on.

This song is a love song between a man who believes in the realization of everyone's ideal world (be it democracy or socialism) and a woman who is convinced that the ideal world is nothing more than a fantasy from the point of view of human nature.


Ophelia:

No one ever touches me.
I never touch no one.
Like a bird in flight.
It's so beautiful,


Evil exists within all human beings
For we aren't intelligent enough for all the good we mean.
No one ever touches me.
It's so beautiful,

--------------------

オフィーリア

彼女は、第二次大戦後の何万人ものヨーロッパの頭がおかしくなってしまったオフィーリアの一人だった。彼女は四カ月前の春頃に強制収容所から出てから、彼女を助けようとする全ての人を避けてきた。彼女はもはや誰も信用できなくなっていた。一人で外をいつまでも放浪しようとしていた。彼女は当時26歳だったが、7年間あまりにも食生活が悪かったため女性的な感じはまったくなく、まるで棒のようだった。

誰も私をさわらない
私も誰もさわらない
飛んでいる鳥のように
とても美しい

みんなは15歳の声変わりをする前のジプシーの少年だと思っていた。彼女は倒れ、アメリカの兵士に運ばれた。三週間病院でビタミンやミネラルともっとも大切な愛情を与えると、彼女はユーモラスなウィーンのインテリに戻っていた。
その兵士は彼女のにすぐに愛の言葉を語った。しかし彼女は人間は全て根っこから悪であると信じていた。人間はその理想にみるよい世界を作れるほど知的ではないから、結局意味のない悲劇しか作れないと彼女は言う。
「われわれは宇宙の片隅にできた病気のようなもの。人間が子供を作り続けていくこと事態が間違っていると思っている人間によく愛のことなんか語れるわね」と彼女は言う。彼は彼女に言った。「でもこれからの新しい時代を見てごらんよ、世の中はやっとのこと今までの間違えが分かったんだよ。一万年の狂気や欲望の時代が今回の戦争犯罪の裁判で終わるのだよ。本も書かれるだろうし映画も作られる。歴史の中で最も重要な曲がり角かもしれないよ。」
「あなたはまるで8歳みたいね」と彼女は言う。
「新しい時代の夜明けに一番」いい年齢だよ」と彼は言った。
このオプティミズムは第二次大戦こそが最後の戦争、ハルマゲドンであって、それからは奇跡の世の中が開いていくという当時のアメリカの風潮からきていた。
この曲は誰もが理想とする世界(それが民主主義であろうと社会主義であろうと)の実現を信じて疑わない人間と、理想の世界など人間の本質からすれば絵空事にすぎないと確信する人間の愛の歌だ。

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Ayuo Tokyo, Japan

Ayuo Takahashi (born October 19, 1960) in Tokyo, Japan and raised in New York City) is a Japanese-American composer, poet, lyricist, singer and performer of guitar and bouzouki, From 1984 he has released over a dozen solo albums, collaborating with Peter Hammill, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Danny Thompson, Maddy Prior, Takehisa Kosugi, Carlos Alomar, John Zorn, Clive Deamer, Kazue Sawai and many others. ... more

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