The Danish Peace Academy

Greenham Common Women's Peace Camp Songbook

44 Womanly times

Shall There Be Womanly Times
Shall there be womanly times or shall we die?
Are there men unafraid of gentleness?
Can we have strength without aggression,
Without disgust,
Strength to bring feeling to the intellect?
Shall we change or shall we die?

They fear the dove, they clip her wings

Chorus: Shall there be womenly times or shall we die?
But still she flies and still she sings
Chorus: There will be womanly times, we will not die.

Missiles sleep in concrete tombs Shall ...
Born of the head and not the womb
There ...

The greatest gift to give each child Shall ...
Is science and nature reconciled
There ...

Make a circle round this land
Shall ...
Join heart and hearts and hand in hand
There ...

Listen, hear the women cry Shall ...
What good is life if the earth must die
There ...

The sun has ruled the age of men Shall ...
Now moon take up your place again
There ...

Raise the question, let it ring
Shall there be womanly times or shall we die?
Here's the answer, join and sing
There will be womanly times, we will not die.

[McEwan's aim in writing the book [The Comfort of Strangers] is best summed up by an extract from the words he wrote soon afterwards for an oratorio set to music by Michael Berkeley, or Shall We Die? (1983).
http://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=1228
Ian McEwan, libretto for, or Shall We Die?
http://backword.me.uk/2004/December/shallthere.html
McEwan, Ian: The Comfort of Strangers (1981).
Frankie Armstrong: Ways of Seeing (Harbourtown Records, UK) tracks: ... Shall There be Womanly Times.
http://www.cdroots.com/harb-009.html]

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