{"id":84732,"date":"2015-04-13T14:26:43","date_gmt":"2015-04-13T18:26:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=84732"},"modified":"2015-04-13T15:40:56","modified_gmt":"2015-04-13T19:40:56","slug":"testimony-of-simplicity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/04\/13\/testimony-of-simplicity\/","title":{"rendered":"Testimony of Simplicity"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"diana-ross-upside-down-motown-4\"<\/a>

Quaker in disguise?<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cPersonal pride does not end with noble blood. It leads people to a fond value of their persons, especially if they have any pretense to shape or beauty. Some are so taken with themselves it would seem that nothing else deserved their attention.\u201d \u2014William Penn<\/p>\n

\u201cUpside Down<\/a>\u201d was the lead single on Diana Ross\u2019s 1980 disco record Diana<\/em>. The song, written by Chic\u2019s\u00a0Bernard Edwards and Nile Rodgers, topped the charts for a month, and it\u2019s one of the great late-era disco dance hits: catchy, unexpected, propulsive, feisty.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The plot is simple. A boy is turning her upside down, inside out, round and round, et cetera. And then: <\/p>\n

\n

Instinctively you give to me
The love that I need
I cherish the moments with you
Respectfully I say to thee
I\u2019m aware that you\u2019re cheatin\u2019
When no one makes me feel like you do<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

In the way of disco songs, it\u2019s on the longer side, clocking in at a stately four minutes and five seconds. The outro goes on for a while, too, to facilitate easy DJ segues and uninterrupted boogieing.<\/p>\n

\n

Upside down you\u2019re turning me
You\u2019re giving love instinctively
Around and round you\u2019re turning me
I say to thee respectfully<\/p>\n

Upside down you\u2019re turning me
You\u2019re giving love instinctively
Around and round you\u2019re turning me
I say to thee respectfully<\/p>\n

I said a upside down you\u2019re turning me
You\u2019re giving love instinctively
Around and round you\u2019re turning me
I say to thee respectfully<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

All those thee<\/em>s! This is an orgy of Quaker plain speech of the sort seldom heard outside a meeting of the Religious Society of Friends. Certainly the popular airwaves hadn\u2019t carried such formal, Quaker-style language since Pat Boone\u2019s hit cover of the 1956 movie theme \u201cFriendly Persuasion (Thee I Love).\u201d Of course, that song is about a bunch of 1860s Friends, so its use of thee <\/em>is readily defensible\u2014Diana Ross\u2019s testament to late twentieth-century girl power is, on the other hand, a strange match for the formality of the second-person singular.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Is her speaker a Quaker, then? Is this a conscious, anachronistic nod to the values of simplicity and pacifism in a materialistic, violent world? Has Ross manifested a stoic, Christian self-respect in the face of her man\u2019s cheating? All the turning, shaking, flipping, and direction-shifting may signal, somehow, agitation to the point that her language is addled. In any case, \u201cUpside Down\u201d is one of the more polite confrontations in the annals of popular music. And it\u2019s strange, the centrality of motion in the song, given the traditional lack of dancing in early Quaker worship.<\/p>\n

Still, I maintain there\u2019s a connection\u2014even if the video<\/a>, I regret to say, is not helpful in resolving any questions of Quakerness. It\u2019s just a bunch of shots of Diana Ross looking fabulous in different outfits.<\/p>\n

Sadie Stein is contributing editor of <\/em>The Paris Review, and the <\/em>Daily\u2019s correspondent.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cPersonal pride does not end with noble blood. It leads people to a fond value of their persons, especially if they have any pretense to shape or beauty. Some are so taken with themselves it would seem that nothing else deserved their attention.\u201d \u2014William Penn \u201cUpside Down\u201d was the lead single on Diana Ross\u2019s 1980 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":178,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13115],"tags":[7913,11802,7643,46,17740,11182,17739,17742,13487,17741,17738],"class_list":["post-84732","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-our-daily-correspondent","tag-chic","tag-diana-ross","tag-disco","tag-music","tag-nile-rodgers","tag-quakers","tag-religious-society-of-friends","tag-second-person-singular","tag-songs","tag-thee","tag-william-penn"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nDiana Ross, \u201cUpside Down,\u201d and Quakers<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Is Diana Ross\u2019s late-era disco hit a quiet tribute to the Religious Society of Friends? 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