Sheila Take a Bow Lyrics
No, it's not wrong - but I must know
How can someone so young
Sing words so sad?
Boot the grime of this world in the crotch, dear
And don't go home tonight
Come out and find the one that you love and who loves you
The one that you love and who loves you
Oh...
No, it's not wrong - but I must add
How can someone so young
Sing words so sad ?
Boot the grime of this world in the crotch, dear
And don't go home tonight
Come out and find the one that you love and who loves you
The one that you love and who loves you
Oh, la...
You're a girl and I'm a boy
La...
Take my hand and off we stride
Oh, la...
I'm a girl and you're a boy
La...
La...
Throw your homework onto the fire
Come out and find the one that you love
Come out and find the one you love

"Interesting enougth this film is about a teenage pregnant girl and her realationship with a young gay man.Thay love each other but in the end the pressures from the outside (mostly the girl's mum) forces them to separate. " Mark Simpson has a very interesting theory in his book "Saint Morrissey" that Morrissey identified strongly with the main character of the play - the girl, Jo. From what I know about the play and the character, it seems quite probable: she has an overbearing mother, she is bored in school and generally unhappy, then, wishing some excitement in life, she has a one-night stand (with a black sailor who she would not see again) which leaves her pregnant. Then she finds real love as non-sexual love. Unhappy teenager, sick of school and family, trying to escape an overbearing parent, looking for love - sounds a lot like "Shakespeare's Sister" as well as "Sheila Take A Bow".
ISheila is probably a nod to Shelagh Delaney, and I totally agree that the girl Sheila is the imagined "female Morrissey" (kind of like the girl in the "Everyday Is Like Sunday" video, don't you think?) and that all he tells her can be said to him as well. He seems to be speaking to himself in several of his songs, adivising himself: Accept Yourself, Handsome Devil ("there's more to life than books you know", in Moz's words the song is aimed at a scholar who should get more physical instead of jsut reading), Sheila Take A Bow, you migh say Ask as well.
She might also be his ideal partner: "Take my hand and off we stride/ You're a girl and I'm a boy" /Take my hand and off we stride / I'm a girl and you're a boy " - the switching of gender roles back and forth (nicked by Massive Attack 10 years later in Protection LOL) is very much in tune with Morrissey's views, too. In Girl Afraid we see that traditional gender roles hinder understanding and contact between two people who like each other. Here we see that traditional gender roles should be disposed of,, in order for people to trully understand themselves and each other.
@nightandday -- YES the on gender switching especially. I've always thought Morrissey is implying this too.
@nightandday -- YES the on gender switching especially. I've always thought Morrissey is implying this too.

This is obviouisly based on teenage angst- 'Throw your homework onto the fire' and the anger that they go thru 'Boot the grime of this world in the crotch, dear And don't go home tonight'

I don't know if anyone will agree with me, but I always understood this song to be a sort of feminist cry. If you listen to what the words mean, they're saying, "Do what's unexpected! Don't just follow with what you're 'supposed' to do, be a change." Sheila wants to "live on her own", in other words, live independently, support herself. She is "not always glad", which means she isn't just satisfied with what she is and what she will become, she wants more, she wants to be more. Then in the end, when it says, "I'm a girl and you're a boy", I think it's supposed to mean that our gender doesn't matter, whether I'm a girl or you are, whether you're a boy or I am, we're the same, and we can be happy together ("Off we stride").

I think this song refers to Sheilagh Delany, who's on the cover of "louder than bombs" . Morissey seems to be slightly obssesed about her and the movie "a touch of honey" that she scripted.Interesting enougth this film is about a teenage pregnant girl and her realationship with a young gay man.Thay love each other but in the end the pressures from the outside (mostly the girl's mum) forces them to separate.

It was the video MTV played when they announced the breakup of the smiths. I sat in the bar and literally cried in my beer while I watched

Well, I can see that no-one else has yet had this reading, but what I get from this song isn't so much about the narrator being inlove with the girl. Rather, I'm hearing a slightly older [but still young] narrator telling this prodigy-esque young woman who is spouting nihlistic veiws that while she's right that the world is a pretty drafty place, she should try and find her youthful joy while she can. "You're brilliant, but lay off the exitentialism or you'll end up like me." So it's not even that the narrotor is presenting himself as a love interest, just that Sheila should loosen up a bit.

drop everything and go to your lover

ive got a very close friend who happens to be named sheila, and whenever she accomplishes anything (even somethin simple like winning a board game or making a good sandwich) i quote this song to her :3

I think this song is about someone who has been stung by love and is apprehensive about getting close to anyone else as a result. I think he is telling the girl in question that she isnt wrong to feel hurt but is still encouraging her to get back in the saddle and move on with her life...then again maybe only reminds me of that because my friend played it constantly after i split up from my boyfriend.....

This song is about, a boy who simply loves a girl, and wants nothing more than to be with her, 'throw your homework onto the fire', 'don't go home tonight'.
'take my hand and off we stride'. it means, we need nobody else, just the two of them together. My View anyway :)