Listening to The Beatles’ Michelle today, a question begs answering: was this the first song to be sung from the perspective of a TEFL teacher? Listen as Paul McCartney croons:
“I will say the only words I know that you’ll understand, my Michelle.”
Surely there are plenty of TEFL teachers all about the world experiencing a similar social frustration. Perhaps McCartney had taken a short break before recording Rubber Soul to teach English in France and had fallen into a saucy teacher-student situation. This may have all been a precursor to Simon and Garfunkel’s Mrs Robinson…
Richard MS Kemp 