JPF Home Page Forums General Messages General Message Forum The Dutchman

What's your take...

What is the relationship between Margaret and the main character?
Why is he mad?
What are their approximate ages?

I can't believe I just now discovered this song. And it was even covered by one of my faves, Jerry Jeff Walker.

===

The Dutchman
Michael Smith

The Dutchman's not the kind of man
To keep his thumb jammed in the dam
That holds his dreams in
But that's a secret only Margaret knows
When Amsterdam is golden in the morning
Margaret brings him breakfast
She believes him
He thinks the tulips bloom beneath the snow
He's mad as he can be but Margaret only sees that sometimes
Sometimes she sees her unborn children in his eyes

(chorus)
Let us go to the banks of the ocean
Where the walls rise above the Zuider Zee
Long ago I used to be a young man
And dear Margaret remembers that for me

The Dutchman still wears wooden shoes
His cap and coat are patched with love
That Margaret sewed in
Sometimes he thinks he's still in Rotterdam
He watches tugboats down canals
And calls out to them when he thinks he knows the captain
'Til Margaret comes to take him home again
Through unforgiving streets that trip him
Though she holds his arm
Sometimes he thinks that he's alone and calls her name

(chorus)

The windmills whirl the winter in
She winds his muffler tighter
They sit in the kitchen
Some tea with whiskey keeps away the dew
He sees her for a moment calls her name
She makes the bed up humming some old love song
She learned it when the tune was very new
He hums a line or two
They hum together in the night
The Dutchman falls asleep and Margaret blows the candle out

(chorus)

Hey Duke,

I believe Steve Goodman may have been the first to record this. It's possible I may have been the second (on the Album "Redhead" on Legend Records, Chicago Illinois). WFMT played our version often on "The Midnight Special" a syndicated folk radio show.

Mike is one of my all time favorite songwriters. He used to sit in on lead electric guitar with our band, Redhead, and was in the process of producing our second album, all songs by him, when the band split up. Check out some of his other songs such as Crazy Mary which was recorded by David Allan Coe. I'm sure you can find them on the web. He has also written some excellent rock songs, one of them, Car on Fire, was probably going to be the single release from Redhead's second album.

The way I understand it, he wrote The Dutchman about someone he knew, then set in the Netherlands to give it more color. Mike is a truly great songwriter, Rolling Stone called him the best songwriter in the English language. Glad you found him.

Mike

Steve: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XeBD3rcAMFw

Michael: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7FIF5vh3BY

Kevin

Mike, were can we hear your version of the song???????

Tom

We do the Dutchman sometimes, as well. Michael Smith is a local legend around these parts, as is Mr D. his own self!

Tom, it's been out of print for years. I don't even have a copy except for an unopened 33 1/3 (what does that mean, Mr. Dunbar?).

WFMT radio still plays it now and then, as of at least a few years ago.

My version is different from either Steve or Michael's. On a tour of Europe, I got to play it for a few friends near the Zuider Zee dam. It's Michael's most famous song, arguably his best, though he's written some powerfully good tunes.

He's 71 - she's 49.

She's his daughter.

He's not mad - he's in the early stages of Alzheimers.

Hope that helps.....

Seriously, thanks, Duke, for calling our attention to that song and thanks to Mike for providing some history. Now gotta go find it...

Scott

Scott,

I read them as being husband and wife.

Kevin

You might be right, Kevin. Not much to go by....

In support of your interpretation, she makes up THE bed instead of making up HIS bed. Is a small thing but perhaps significant.

Scott

I believe it was father and daughter, that is how I have always pictured it in my mind when we do the song. I am sure Mike has more insight on that point.

The way I hear the song, though I could be all wrong on this is that the person telling the story is the one who was in love with Margaret and they both sacrificed so that she could take care of her father. The telling parts are the sacrifice of not having her own children and the chorus:

(chorus)
Let us go to the banks of the ocean
Where the walls rise above the Zuider Zee
Long ago I used to be a young man
And dear Margaret remembers that for me

where the singer relates to Margaret in a way that makes me think they were in love, but he sacrificed, as well.

What a beautiful lyric. I'd never heard the song, though I've lived in the Netherlands for a few years.

Here's what I've just read somewhere:

"Smith has song after song that good, that moving. Songs that are full of techniques that you don't see very often--alternating narrators, points of view, time shifts, internal rhymes, elliptical storytelling and hidden climaxes.

There is no 'typical' Michael Smith song, they are all so different in tone. But The Dutchman is perhaps his signature tune. It tells the tender story of a a crazy Dutch fellow and his loving companion Margaret.

"When Amsterdam is golden in the morning
Margaret brings him breakfast and she believes him
He thinks the tulips bloom beneath the snow
He's mad as he can be
But Margaret only sees that sometimes
Sometimes she sees her unborn children in his eyes."

And then the chorus, where the narration shifts to the Dutchman himself:

"Let us go to the banks of the ocean
Where the walls rise above the Zuider Zee
Long ago, I used to be a young man
Now dear Margaret remembers that for me."

For me, the "unborn children in his eyes" line, along with the bed scenario, would indicate they're in a relationship (or marriage), probably a long-standing one. If Margaret remembers when he was a young man, she's possibly about the same age.

Donna

When I first heard the song, I took it more or less the same way as whoever you quoted, and I certainly see it could be taken that way. However, when we perform it, I always picture in my mind the loving daughter and the narrator being the her love. That is just the way the song comes across to me when we are performing it. Like I said, it is only my interpretation and it could be entirely wrong. Michael is probably the only one who is certain about it, but either way it is a brilliant song and storyline.

When I first heard the song, I took it more or less the same way as whoever you quoted, and I certainly see it could be taken that way. However, when we perform it, I always picture in my mind the loving daughter and the narrator as her love. That is just the way the song comes across to me when we are performing it. Like I said, it is only my interpretation and it could be entirely wrong. Michael is probably the only one who is certain about it, but either way it is a brilliant song and storyline.

Jack, it was taken from Smith's website Michael Smith .

I can see why you interpret it the way you have done, but I think the "unborn children" line would seem a little odd if she were his daughter.

But there's no doubt that the lyric/song is brilliant. I'm so pleased to have found this thread. I plan to acquaint myself with Smith's music.

Donna

That link took me to a realtor, Donna.....

That's okay though - sometimes even the writer is not sure who the song is about.

Scott

Oops! Sorry, Scott. I've fixed it.

Donna

This is not Whistler's American Gothic folks...Childless old couple who once lived in Rotterdam. Read anything ya want into it if it helps, but c'mon!....Oh, and the Zuider Zee hasn't really existed for decades. Those crafty Dutch claimed the land back with a dam.

Midnite

My Take... husband and wife... No kids and he is suffering Dementia.. a really sweet folk song about love ...

What Noel said:-)....Oh, and the last line:

Long ago I used to be a young man
and dear Margaret remembers that of me.

I remember my father when he was around 40, but not as a young man.

Midnite

Does anyone know the year this song (Dutchman) was written? I'm wondering about the possibility of political innuendo. As far as the relationship between these two... I'm undecided. Guess I'll have to study the lyric a while longer. Well written and downright intriguing.

Thanks for bringing it up, Bill. Happy New Year.

Steve Goodman did it in 1973, from what I can tell, was likely just before that.

Dave,

I don't know the exact date it was written, I learned it around 1973-74. The relationship is whatever you want it to be. Don't look at how sausage is made LOL. I've heard, not verified, that Mike wrote it based on a guy he knew who was a drug burn out being cared for by his girlfriend, then when he decided to set the story in the Netherlands, he took everything he knew about the Dutch (dams, windmills, wooden shoes) and put them in the song.

In songs, in my opinion, the details bring spice but the feeling is the meat.

Thanks Bill and Mike:

That would seem to eliminate Ronald "Dutch" Reagan. I know, I think too much... LOL!

Life imitates art.

"...and lady Nancy remembers that for me..."

Humm,
Don't remember ever hearing this song but do remember LITTLE DUTCH GIRL by George Morgan. Lorrie's father. Maybe this is a knockoff of that song.

This song has nothing in common with Little Dutch Girl, other than they are songs and the word Dutch is in the title.

I agree with this entirely.

My description of the song was what I perceive in my mind's eye when I play it and I mentioned it could be entirely wrong. The hint of mystery through a touch of ambiguity is one of the more evocative qualities of this song as with many great pieces of literature. By offering up so many beautiful details, while not assigning an entirely concrete outline of character and plot, the mind is free to be part of the creative process. This is one of the keys for me in great story-telling. The specific details of character and plot, in this case, are not as important as what the song evokes in the mind of the listener.

I imagine a third character from my interpretation which adds another depth of meaning to the song for me. Nevermind that I did or did not get it quite right, because it ultimately does not matter.

Humm,
LITTLE DUTCH GIRL, most likely from the 50's and THE DUTCHMAN both set in the Netherlands, who knows for sure? Nothing in common except the place and the general title. New songs develop from older songs but......