What's The Name of That Song? Books With Titles You Could Put On A Playlist
Music feeds on literature and literature feeds on music. These are some books that inspired musicians to write songs and the songs they wrote.
Leonard Nimoy, the original Mr. Spock of "Star Trek" fame, wrote and recorded "The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins" after the main character in this fantasy classic.
On the deluxe edition of her album 1989, Taylor Swift drew inspiration from this classic for her song "Wonderland."
This novella by Edith Wharton gave its name to a song by The Magnetic Fields. The song is literally about the story, which tells of an unhappy marriage, an attempted suicide, and about the singers love for the book.
The band Twenty-One Pilots take their name from this play by Arthur Miller about the cost of choosing money over morality. Tyler Joseph has gone on record saying that when he and Josh Dunn, his bandmate are at risk of not giving their songcraft their all, they call back to this play.
Written as letters from a Senior Demon to his nephew in regard to the corruption and capture of a human soul, this slender but deep volume has inspired an entire album by The Oh Hellos. The title track Dear Screwtape evokes the recognition of the "patient" of the junior demon, Wormwood, coming to himself; coming to the realization of who his enemy has been and also who his ally has been in the battle against sin.
Powerful, worth reading slowly and more than once.
Before the days of Apple Music and Spotify, playlists were called mixtapes. In a series of personal essays each accompanied by the playlists of a mixtape he made, music journalist Rob Sheffield tells the story of his life with music. He also details the life he had with his first wife, who died of a pulmonary embolism at age 31. As he listens to the mixtapes that shaped and were shaped by his life, his family, and his love for her, he begins the long road through grief.
The inspiration for movies, other books, and the song "Invisible String" by Taylor Swift, Jane Eyre has everything a gothic reader could ask for: a lonely heroine with a tragic past, a brooding hero with a dark secret, and an ending that feels earned.
The song title comes from a speech given by the brooding hero, Mr. Rochester, to Jane. In it he says he feels as if there were a string tied to his left ribs connected to a similar place in her, and if she should leave him, the string should break and he'd begin to bleed inwardly. Swoon.