Bobbie Gentry: The Heart Of A Real Writer

It's Bobbie Gentry's birthday today. I know you expect the one song, and that's coming; but I think birthdays present a particular opportunity to look more closely at a person's unsung and undervalued accomplishments. That's where I want to start.

Reba McEntire had a huge hit with a lesser-known Bobbie Gentry composition, and a lot of people used that occasion to revive some ugly Southern stereotypes. It seems that survival sex is only a tragedy if sex workers don't belong to a subset of people that most white, middle-class folks despise. It seems that a Southern writer's work is only valuable if she uses it to repudiate her raising by heaping scorn on poor, southern whites.

Bobbie Gentry refused to respond to the dog whistle of the white middle class. Here's what she had to say about the song that would become a hit for Reba McEntire:

"Fancy" is my strongest statement for women's lib, if you really listen to it. I agree wholeheartedly with that movement and all the serious issues that they stand for—equality, equal pay, day care centers, and abortion rights.

Viewed through the lens of Gentry's comments, her performance of  "Fancy" on The Johnny Cash Show seems uncomfortably-daring. She's asking us to look -- really look -- at what this girl had to go through, and how much it cost her to be this person without once dropping the mask:

Bobbie Gentry is still around, but she's since retired. How big a loss is that? Read what she said about her lone American hit, and weep:

"Those questions [of why Billie Joe committed suicide, and what he and the girl threw off the Tallahatchie Bridge] are of secondary importance in my mind. The story of Billie Joe has two more interesting underlying themes. First, the illustration of a group of people's [indifferent] reactions to the life and death of Billie Joe, and its subsequent effect on their lives, is made. Second, the obvious gap between the girl and her mother is shown, when both women experience a common loss (first, Billie Joe and, later, Papa), and yet Mama and the girl are unable to recognize their mutual loss or share their grief."

That, folks, is how deeply a real writer thinks. It's a crying shame she's not writing new songs to comment on today's times. That's our loss, and it's a big one.

Bobbie Gentry's songwriting career was mowed down by the American hit machine. She left us this, the record of a woman who was not only a real writer, but a real performer, too.

This is Bobbie Gentry with "Ode To Billie Joe".