Fancy Analysis
Misty
Jennifer
English 1101 126
10 March 2014
The American Dream is different
to all of us. In the song that I chose to analyze, Reba McIntyre’s rendition of
Fancy, originally sung by Bobbie Gentry, her path starts from poverty, and ends
in an elegant New York Townhouse Flat. How she got there is not the path that
many of us would choose. Fancy did not even choose the path; it was thrust upon
her.
In the opening of the song Reba
talks about the situation that she came from. It was the summer she turned 18,
and she lived in a rundown shack with her family. Her father had abandoned the
family, the mother was soon to die, and the baby was going to starve to death. Somehow,
she had to make her way in the world.
Her mother spent all of the
money that the family had to buy Fancy a ‘dancin’ dress’. To me this is equated
to how some families go into debt to pay for their children’s education. The
idea behind both paths is the same. The parents give all that they can,
sometimes more to give their children the best that they can give them.
Her mother dolled Fancy up, so
that when Fancy looked into the mirror, she saw a woman, where a half-grown kid
had stood. Her mother transformed her into a woman with the lipstick and hair
curlers. This can be equated to how some children are forced to grow up to
fast. Fancy is forced to grow up right there in that moment so that she starts
her journey.
The chorus chimes in at this point:
She said "Here's your one chance Fancy, don't let me down.
Here's your one chance Fancy, don't let me down."
She said "Here's your one chance Fancy, don't let me down.
Here's your one chance Fancy, don't let me down."
Her mother is giving her the
only chance that she feels that she can give her, and she is telling her “This
is all that I can give you kid, go make the best of it.”
Before she leaves Fancy asks her mother what she is
supposed to do with this new self. Her mother gives her a locket that said, “To
thine own self be true,” and tells her to “just be nice to the gentlemen and
they’ll be nice to you.” It did not take her long to know what her mother
meant, and by then the ball was rolling, and she was on that path and there was
no turning back. This is what she now recognizes a path to The American Dream.
She did not turn back once she
started her journey toward The American Dream. Now that she is on this path,
she has no choice but to follow through. She quickly learns what her new life
role involves, and what she must to do survive.
She promises herself that she
will make something out of her life. She knew that what she was doing was not
the normal path. She also knows that society looks down on her, but she would
not spend the rest of her life with her head hung down in shame. She might have
been born plane white trash, but Fancy was her name. She knows that what she is
going is beneath her, but she must live through it to get through it. Her
mother’s words are in her ears again. "Here's your one chance Fancy, don't
let me down."
She then meets a good man that
takes her in off the streets. She works for him in a capacity that the lyrics
do not really go into other than that one-week later she is “pouring his tea in
a five room hotel suite.” Soon after she is charming powerful men, again, the
lyrics do not tell what she is doing for these gentlemen, but I doubt it is
pouring tea. So much is left to your imagination as the listener. I wonder if
the benevolent man that takes her in is getting a cut of her profits the way
that a pimp might get a cut of her earnings.
She uses her earnings to get a “Georgia mansion and an elegant New York Townhouse flat, and she ain’t done bad.” I would point out that she must have saved much of her earnings and invested well, etc. Many call girls do not end up in this place in the world. Fancy mentions not wanting to spend her life with her head hung down in shame. Many call girls start doing drugs as a way to escape the shame that they feel because of what they are doing. In what turns out to be a terrible vicious cycle, they turn to the drugs, become addicted, and then ‘work’ to pay for the drugs that help them hide from the shame that they need the drugs for. A dizzying cause and effect cause a downward spiral for these women.
Addiction as a Risk Factor for
Prostitution
At the street level pimps often use drugs to exert control over
prostitutes…Once a girl is addicted, she is likely to show up looking for drugs
and will be willing to do whatever it takes to get them. At this point the pimp
will inform the girl that he can’t keep financing a free ride, and the time has
come for her to start pulling her weight. In her addicted state she is
experiencing overwhelming cravings for the drug and will do what she has to do
to satisfy them. She has impaired judgment and is susceptible to control by a
domineering personality. Drug addiction helps pimps keep prostitutes virtually
enslaved. (1)
Fancy goes on to talk about how people judge her for the
life choices that she made, and judge her mother for ‘turning her out no matter
how little we had’. She says these people are self-righteous hypocrites. This
speaks to the old saying “people in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones”, but
again, the lyrics do not going into details about how it is that these people
are self-righteous hypocrites. No one can say for sure how they would have
reacted if they were in Fancy’s shoes, or those of her mother.
The song ends with Fancy telling us that she can still hear
the desperation in her mother’s voice when her mother told her "Here's
your one chance Fancy, don't let me down." Even with all of her riches,
that still haunts her. I think that this might be an apprehension that many
people have as they chase The American Dream. We all might be faced with a
choice about the things that we might compromise to get ahead in the world.
I realize it is supposed to be ironic that
her name is Fancy, when what she was forced to do for a living is so far from
Fancy. I also find it ironic that in the end she did live up to her name. The
song does not explicitly say that she is not a call girl anymore, but I would
like to believe that she is not.
This song is about The American
Dream in that Fancy came from poverty and ended up in the Georgia mansion. What
did she have to do to get there: whatever it took. I think that many people
feel this way, even if they do not have to go to the lengths that Fancy did.
She did what she had to, and she knew it was beneath her. She knew that her
mother felt bad for putting her on that path, but she did what she had to.
Citations:
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