John Lennon Said The Beatles’ ‘I Am the Walrus’ Could’ve Been About a Pudding Basin Instead

TL;DR:

• John Lennon said The Beatles’ “I Am the Walrus” could’ve been about a pudding basin.
• He discussed the tone of the song.
• John discussed another Beatles song where he mentioned a walrus.

John Lennon said The Beatles‘ “I Am the Walrus” could have been about a “pudding basin” instead. In addition, he discussed the tone of the song. John said his attitude toward lyrics changed when he was writing one of his post-Beatles albums.

John Lennon said The Beatles’ ‘I Am the Walrus’ and ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’ included his avant-garde material that was ‘usable’

The book Lennon on Lennon: Conversations with John Lennon includes an interview from 1980. In it, Yoko Ono said John produced some avant-garde material at his home. 

“I would take the sort of most usable [material] and add it to The Beatles, or to my tracks of The Beatles, like ‘I Am the Walrus’ or ‘Strawberry Fields [Forever],’ whatever,” he said. “Fiddled around a bit, or put loops or something funny. But at home I was really far out.”

John Lennon said ‘I Am the Walrus’ was tongue in cheek but he later started to write straightforward lyrics

During another 1980 interview, John discussed his approach to lyrics. “I’ve had tongue in cheek all along,” he said. “‘I Am the Walrus,’ all of them had tongue in cheek. Just because other people see depths of whatever in it. 

“What does it really mean, ‘I am the eggman?'” he added. “It could have been a pudding basin for all I care. It’s just tongue in cheek.” For context, a pudding basin is a bowl used the steam puddings.

John said his attitude toward lyrics changed. “It [interpretation of the lyrics] gets to be stupid,” he said. “That’s why I started, from the ‘Mother‘ album onwards, trying to shave off all imagery, pretentions of poetry, illusions of grandeur, à la Dylan, Dylanesque. I didn’t want any of that.” 

For context, “Mother” appeared on the album John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band. John said he wanted the songs from that album to be written in simple English with a rhyme scheme.

The ‘Imagine’ said another Beatles lyric could have been about something totally different and it wouldn’t matter

Famously, John also mentioned a walrus in The Beatles’ “Glass Onion.” The song is littered with references to Beatles tracks like “Lady Madonna” and “The Fool on the Hill,” ending on the line “The walrus was Paul,” a subversion of “I Am the Walrus.”

During a 1980 interview from the book All We Are Saying: The Last Major Interview with John Lennon and Yoko Ono, John was asked about that line. He said the walrus in the lyric was incidental. He said he might as well have said Paul was a fox terrier. John just threw in the reference to the walrus, calling it a bit of poetry.

John said the lyrics of “I Am the Walrus” were tongue in cheek but fans will likely be trying to understand the song for years to come.