Yes - I'm sure he didn't. Because allusion is a literary technique. It's a deliberate echo of a line. And it's why he doesn't hide his inspirations.
Still no stealing or borrowing?
10. “Pretty Girls Make Graves” - also the name of a defunct band from Seattle,
Morrissey lifted the title for this song (from The Smiths’ debut) from a line in the novel The Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouac. “Oh really?”
9. “Bigmouth Strikes Again” - the novel First Among Equals, by Jeffery Archer, contains the line,
“I was only joking when I said you should be bludgeoned in your bed.” It probably goes without saying that this line was lifted directly and used in “Bigmouth Strikes Again,” one of the most praised songs The Smiths ever recorded.
8. “Satan Rejected My Soul” - released as a single in December 1997, “Satan Rejected My Soul” rips from a literary heavyweight in the fifth line of the song - “He knows heaven doesnt seem to be my home” - taken from Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë. The original line reads: “I was only going to say that
heaven did not seem to be my home; and I broke my heart with weeping to come back to earth; and the angels were so angry that they flung me out into the middle of the heath on the top of Wuthering Heights; where I woke sobbing for joy.”
7. “Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others” - one of the great album closers of the ’80s, “Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others” fades hypnotically in and out of existence while hitting upon a duo of lyrical sources. First, Morrissey references the film Carry on Cleo with the line “As Anthony said to Cleopatra as he opened a crate of ale,”
and then there’s the direct lift of the song title “Send Me The Pillow You Dream On” made popular by Dean Martin as the song nears an end - “Send me the pillow, the one that you dream on… and I’ll send you mine.”
6. “Found Found Found” - an underrated track from the criminally ignored Kill Uncle, “Found Found Found” was rumored to be about Morrissey’s budding friendship with R.E.M. lead vocalist Michael Stipe (Stipe first got Morrissey’s attention through a series of fan letters). The inspiration for the lyrics was never confirmed, but one thing’s for certain: the line
“I do believe that the more you give your love, and I do believe that the more you offer trust, the more you’re bound to lose” is directly taken from the Noël Coward song “If Love Were All”
5. “Well I Wonder” - one of the great songs by The Smiths from their second album Meat is Murder, “Well I Wonder” features slightly modified takes on many lines from Elizabeth Smart’s By Grand Central Station I Sat Down And Wept, a favorite source of Morrissey’s. Examples taken from Smart’s book: “for it is the fierce last stand of all I have,” “cries out hoarsely my name in the night,” and “…
do you hear me where you sleep?”
4. “Reel Around The Fountain” -
as stated by Morrissey in the above interview,
many lyrics from this song off of the debut album from The Smiths were lifted from the play A Taste of Honey by Shelagh Delaney. Most directly, the lines “You’re the bee’s knees, but so am I” and “I dreamt about you last night, and I fell out of bed twice” which can be heard at the 3:57 mark in the clip of the film version of A Taste of Honey linked to HERE.
3. “Cemetry Gates” - this previously referenced song highlights a literary grudge match with Morrissey feeling sure to win because “Keats and Yeats are on your side while Wilde is on mine.” He goes on to deride plagiarism (as evidenced above)
before borrowing nearly an entire verse of the song from the film The Man Who Came to Dinner. The borrowed lyrics: “All those people, all those lives, where are they now? Here was a woman who once lived and loved, full of the same passions, fears, jealousies, hates… and what remains of it now? I want to cry.”
2. “This Charming Man” - the second single released by The Smiths
features a line directly taken from the 1972 film Sleuth starring Laurence Olivier and Michael Caine. The line: “A jumped-up pantry boy who doesn’t know his place.” Go ahead and A/B the film and the song… cue THIS to 0:43 and compare it to THIS at 1:07. Now, aren’t you starting to feel like you “know so much about these things”?
1. “This Night Has Opened My Eyes” -
as admitted to by Morrissey himself, the lyrics for the transcendent “This Night Has Opened My Eyes” portray a musical version of A Taste Of Honey by Shelagh Delaney. Lines from the play that are referenced in the song include: “You can’t just wrap it up in a bundle of newspaper,” “…and dump it on a doorstep,” “that river, it’s the colour of lead,” “I’m not sorry and I’m not glad,” and “oh well, the dream’s gone, but the baby’s real enough.”