This is an analysis of Joni Mitchell's "Little Green".
Parents have to value
the happiness of their offspring over their own happiness. Joni Mitchell was faced with this dilemma in
1965.The young musician was heavily pregnant and very poor. She wouldn’t be
able to raise her child well, if at all, so she gave her little girl up for
adoption when she was born. This broke the young artist’s heart, but she knew
her daughter would grow up better than the life Joni could provide. Joni
Mitchell makes use of comparisons to nature, the opinions of significant
others, and various characterizations to show that “sometimes there’ll be
sorrow” in life, but there is also joy in the mix.
Joni Mitchell uses
comparisons to nature in her musical piece. Life, like nature, is filled with
both sorrow and joy. Life is destined from birth to grow old and eventually
die. In the same way, so are our loves. For example, cuckoos lay their eggs in
other birds’ nests so as to have them raised better. Joni makes references to
“crocuses” and “Northern Lights” to relate her sorrow and hope for her child. Overall,
the relations to nature used combine to form something both happy and sad,
sorrow and joy.
This artist also
incorporates people she knew at the time into her musical piece. She mentions a
“he”, who “went to California/Hearing that everything’s warmer there”. This he
is the child’s father, who didn’t or couldn’t stay with Joni to raise their
child. Joni probably feels a bit vindictive towards this man, as he wouldn’t
stay with them. Joni also mentions that she is a “Child with a child
pretending”, meaning that she herself is young, and has parents still. Her
parents would probably be disappointed and maybe a bit scared for her, if they
knew. All in all, Joni’s citations of her family show that life contains facets
both good and bad.
Finally, Joni Mitchell
uses various characterizations and personifications of important aspects of her
life in her song. One of these that are used is her general outlook towards her
actions of giving her child up for adoption. The musician states that she is
“sad” and “sorry, but not ashamed”. Joni knows that her actions ultimately
affected her child positively, so she’s not ashamed about them. Had she made a
decision that kept her happy, her child would have been much worse off. On the
whole, characterizations are used to great use in Joni Mitchell’s musical
piece.
Reviewing this entire
musical composition, the final meaning becomes very clear. Joni Mitchell wants
her listeners to learn this message: Life has happiness and sorrow. One cannot
exist without the other. Sacrifices must be made, and life-changing decisions
often have a lesser of two evils quandary. Joni is also teaching that there is
no such things as black or white, just varying shades of grey. Taken as an
entire musical piece, taking into account the musician’s previous life
experiences, Joni Mitchell is teaching her audience a very important message of
love and sacrifice, a message that can be applied to all time periods.