According to a number of outlets, Paul McCartney has officially announced that he will publish a lyric-based memoir, The Lyrics: 1956 To The Present this year. The release date is set for November 2, 2021.
According to British monthly Uncut, the book is described as “a self-portrait in 154 songs.” It will feature the definitive lyrics to McCartney’s best-known songs along with his commentary describing the circumstances in which they were written, the people and places that inspired them, and what he thinks of them now. The book will also include never-before-seen drafts, letters, and photographs from McCartney’s personal archive.
Announcing the book, McCartney said that “more often than I can count, I’ve been asked if I would write an autobiography, but the time has never been right.”
“I hope that what I’ve written will show people something about my songs and my life which they haven’t seen before. I’ve tried to say something about how the music happens and what it means to me and I hope what it may mean to others too.”
Book’s editor Paul Muldoon added that “based on conversations I had with Paul McCartney over a five-year period, these commentaries are as close to an autobiography as we may ever come. His insights into his own artistic process confirm a notion at which we had but guessed — that Paul McCartney is a major literary figure who draws upon, and extends, the long tradition of poetry in English.”
