thoughts on the misunderstood beatle

[harrisonstories]

"While we talked, a few flies would buzz around from the garden and Mrs. Harrison went to hit them. She said she couldn’t do that when George was there because he believed that everything had a right to live – no matter how small."

-- Susan Maier on meeting George Harrison's mother, Louise Harrison, in 1969. "A Special Day," Harrison Alliance (1979) [x]

[harrisonthoughts]

You know, something which never gets discussed is how traumatic it would've been for George to go through life with this philosophy, and then be put in a position where he not only faced extreme violence towards his and his family's lives, he had to consider the possibility of doing whatever it took to protect his family.

[harrisonthoughts]

hey i love your blog and the work you 're doing very much... thanks for it all

Thank you! That's very kind.

I feel bad for not investing more time into this blog since making it but am hoping to change that soon.

[harrisonthoughts]

This is just my 2 cents, but I think the way Get Back is framed as Paul being the only one who cared is incorrect.

It's not that George didn't care. He was in good spirits at the start, offered songs, offered suggestions to make the songs as good as they could be, etc. The others weren't interested.

At one point George mentions Magical Mystery Tour, and I think that's significant. George decided to stay silent and let things play out when MMT was being filmed, and it turned out to be a bit of a disaster. It was like he could see Get Back was going to end the same way unless he spoke up. He was determined to prevent The Beatles from repeating a mistake.

To me, that's the opposite of not caring.

And look what happened as a result. The Beatles did change course, and the Get Back sessions became monumentally better.

Paul said once that George was the one who always got them out of doing things none of them actually wanted to do because he wasn't afraid to put his foot down, and this was one of those cases imo. It might not make him the most popular with fans, but George saved the band a lot of grief by being that person.

[harrisonthoughts]

Hello!

About 7 years ago I started a blog called harrisonstories in an attempt to both archive stories about George Harrison and understand him better.

George was the Beatle I was immediately most drawn to, but I couldn’t get a full grasp of his personality. The people closest to him obviously adored him, but I’d often hear from fans that he was this total curmudgeon who hated The Beatles and their fanbase. Even when his friends talk about him you get a sense of confusion. What I found irritating was that there are all these questions around him, yet no biographers seem terribly interested in finding real answers.

From all the stories I found, I began forming my own picture of who George was, and eventually I reached a point where he made total sense to me. Now, I don’t know how accurate my picture of him is since, to my great sorrow, I never got a chance to meet him. However, I’ve read about him from as many angles as is possible from the limited position of being a fan, and I finally feel confident enough to put it out there.

I wanted to have a place where I could put my thoughts together without interfering with my other blog, so I decided to start this one!

I’ve always felt George was the “Misunderstood Beatle”, so my aim at least for now is to tackle this idea, the various claims about him I disagree with, and hopefully figure out some answers.