“A woman with a plastic axe”

Imagine one thousand suns in the sky at the same time.
Let them shine for one hour.
Then, let them gradually melt into the sky.
Make one tunafish sandwich and eat.

This is a piece extracted from Yoko Ono’s book titled GRAPEFRUIT. Yoko Ono is a Japanese origin multimedia artist. Yoko was marriaged to John Lennon in 1969. She might be more famous as a John Lennon’s partner. Yet, she had already been a very talented modern artist before she met John.

Yoko’s GRAPEFRUIT was first published in 1964. In the book we can find a very characterictic instruction like this: “Burn this book after you’ve read it.” This instruction may mean you’d better burn this book after reading it because it is so dangerous like some radical writings. 　　In a peaceful society that sounds like a joke and we can enjoy this kind of joke. In some social circumstances, however, it can suddenly stop being just a joke. We know this from many historical facts. As far as Yoko literally believes in the power of the Imagination to change the world, there is always a great possibility that the book is included in a list of dangerous banned books. (1)

At the same time I have to quickly emphasize a positive meaning of the instruction as well. By giving an instruction to burn her book after reading it Yoko wants her readers to be independent from her book itself as if she were a mother of all her readers. What Yoko wanted to say must be something like the following.

Stop passively accepting other person’s instruction after reading my book.
You are free.
You can do anything you want to do, because you can imagine anything.
You can act and live spontaneously believing in your own Imagination.

John confessed Yoko’s GRAPEFRUIT imspired him to write his song “Imagine.”
Yoko told John “how to” “Imagine”, and John told us how to build an alternative world, and now all around the world increasing number of the people have imagined how to join them.

Yoko and John formed a rock band named “The Plastic Ono Band” soon after their marriage. The word “Ono” is derived from Yoko’s family name, while “Ono” also means “axe” in Japanese.
In English slang “ax” means “any musical instrument,” and is appropriate for a name of a rock band. On the other hand, the word “axe” also literally means an instrument for chopping wood or something like that.” By using the plastic axe, however, we cannot chop any real wood. In stead, the plastic “Ono” connects the people with each other through music. It follows then that the plastic “Ono” is a very peaceful axe with invisible magical power upon the people all around the world.

John was shot to death in 1980. But after that Yoko has been devoting herself to world peace and humanitarian activity as an imaginative artist.

Yoko, I greatly admire you. I want to call you a great warrior of Imagination with a plastic axe to grind.

(This is based on a script of my second speech given on 20th November 2008.)

Notes:
(1)We cannot laugh at this because Harry Potter series have still been banned and thrown out of libraries in some areas of the southern United States.