On Saturday, September 15, 2018 at 9:40:59 AM UTC-5,
kevina...@gmail.com wrote:
Glocca Morra may accidentally be an actual place in real life, but it is intended to be a fictional place in and for the musical Finian’s Rainbow. Even in the play, Glocca Morra is only “sort of” a real place, where Finian and Sharon McLonergan
hail from back in Ireland. Or is it that they hail tosuch a place?
My take on it is that Glocca Morra is more of an idea, or a longing really. For Sharon it’s like Dorthy clicking her ruby heals and wishing, “There’s no place like home.” For Finian, it’s the elusive pot of gold and all the accompanying
notions of wealth that he hopes to find at the end of a rainbow. Actually, in his case, he has already has the pot of gold which he ‘borrowed’ from a leprechaun, but he intends to plant it at the rainbow’s end (like Jack’s magic beans) and grow
himself a magical fortune.
Glocca Morra the desired greener grass on the other side of the fence. It’s the carrot strung on a stick in front of a mule that the mule always pursues but never tastes. It is a driving hunger that is never satisfied. For some it is a place. For
others it’s a status. For some it is insatiable curiosity. For others it’s fame. Or greater wealth. Or total freedom. For adrenaline junkies it is the search for the ultimate rush. For illicit substance junkies it is shooting for the ultimate high.
Oddly, the closer you gets to this sort of goal, the further it get’s from you.
In the play, Sharon quotes an old legend (thought up by her father Finian). She tells Woody (her soon to be romantic interest):
“…in Glocca Morra where we come from, there’s an old legend. And it says:
You’ll never grow old And you’ll never grow poor,
If you look to the rainbow Beyond the next moor.”
At the end of the play Sharon is asked, “Where is Glocca Mora?” She answers,
“Well, you see,
it’s always somewhere…over there.”
For Finian, Glocca Morra seems always to be beyond the next moor; always ‘over there’; always just out of reach. For Sharon, Glocca Morra seems always to be the nostalgic sense of ‘back there’; a homesick memory of a ghost that can never return
to this world. Even if she were able to return to that place, the place would have changed, moved on, and not be what it was in her memories. Sadly, she would find, “The willow was cut down.” So even the willow from the past is a will-o’- wisp
always out of reach; an ignis fatuus leading people to a sad end.
In the musical, “Paint Your Wagon” the song, “I Was Born Under a Wandering Star,” indicates that for For Ben Rumson, Glocca Morra would be the act of leaving and saying “good-bye” and heading out to see what’s around the next bend.
In the movie “Around the Bend” Glocca Morra would be a road trip which becomes a metaphor for, and the means to discover, the desired sense of family.
In the song “If I Stand” Rich Mullins has a line “And if I weep let it be as a man who is longing for his home.” His lyrics indicate that he has already reached his home, at least by faith, if not yet by sight. But his longing for Glocca Morra
will be over on the day he dies and will see it face to face.
Glocca Morra is actually Finian’s Rainbow. Glocca Morra is like a rainbow who’s end is an optical illusion who’s end can never be reached because if forever recedes as you approach. Seeking Glocca Morra and Finian’s rainbow’s end are like
Don Quixote in Man of La Mancha standing over his armor and answering Dulcinea’s question about what he means by “following the quest” and singing, “The Impossible Dream (The Quest).”
To dream the impossible dream
To fight the unbeatable foe
To bear with unbearable sorrow
To run where the brave dare not go
To right the unrightable wrong
To love pure and chaste from afar
To try when your arms are too weary
To reach the unreachable star
This is my quest to follow that star
No matter how hopeless, no matter how far
To fight for the right without question or pause
To be willing to march into Hell for a heavenly cause
And I know if I'll only be true to this glorious quest
That my heart will lie peaceful and calm when I'm laid to my rest
And the world will be better for this
That one man, scorned and covered with scars
Still strove with his last ounce of courage
To reach the unreachable star
In the closing scene of Finian’s Rainbow, Finian leaves Rainbow Valley in search for his rainbow.
"I've an elegant legacy Waiting for ye
'Tis a rhyme for your lip And a song for your heart
To sing it whenever The world falls apart
Look, look Look to the rainbow
Follow it over The hill and stream
Look, look Look to the rainbow
Follow the fellow Who follows a dream
'Twas a sumptuous gift To bequeath to a child
For the lure of that song Keeps me head runnin’ wild
'Tis a rhyme for me lip And a song for me heart
And I sing it whenever The world falls apart
Look, look Look to the rainbow
Follow it over The hill and stream
Look, look Look to the rainbow
Follow the fellow Who follows a dream
So I bundled me heart And I roamed the world free
To the East with the light To the West with the sea
And I searched all the earth And I scanned all the skies
But I found it at last In my own true love's eyes
Look, look Look to the rainbow
Follow it over The hill and stream
Look, look Look to the rainbow
Follow the fellow Who follows a dream
--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)