"The strangest rumour started floating around just as the Beatles were breaking up that I was dead. We had heard it long before, but suddenly, in that autumn of 1969, stirred up by a DJ in America, it took on a force all its own, so that millions of fans around the world believed I was actually gone. At one point, I turned to my new wife and asked, Linda, how can I possibly be dead?"
"But now that over a half century has passed since those truly crazy times, I'm beginning to think that the rumours were more accurate than one might have thought at the time. In so many ways, I was dead A 27-year-old about-to-become-ex-Beatle, drowning in a sea of legal and personal rows that were sapping my energy, in need of a complete life makeover."
"Three years earlier, I had bought this sheep farm in Scotland on the suggestion of one of my accountants. At the time, I wasn't very keen on the idea the land seemed sort of bare and rugged. But, exhausted by the business problems, and realising that if we were going to raise a family, it would not be under the magnifying glass that was London, we turned to each other and said, We should just escape."
A false rumour of death circulated as the Beatles broke up, fueled by an American DJ in autumn 1969. Millions believed the claim. The narrator and his new wife Linda retreated to a remote Scottish sheep farm with their newborn Mary to escape malevolent gossip and the London spotlight. At 27, worn down by legal and personal disputes, the narrator felt metaphorically dead and sought a complete life makeover. The farm's isolation, despite harshness and inexperience, provided space for family life and renewed creativity. Linda later became known for cookbooks, though she initially lacked farming experience.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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