Little Boxes

A protest song

Littie boxes Words and music by M. Reynolds

From “A Song-book of Folk and Pop Music”

by Mario Papa & Giuliano Iantorno, Zanichelli Editore, Bologna, 1977

 

Little boxes (1) on the hillside, little boxes made of ticky tacky (2)

Little boxes, little boxes, little boxes all the same.

There's a green one, then a pink one and a blue one and a yellow one

And they're all made out of ticky tacky and they all look just the same.

 

And the people in the houses all go to the university

And they all get put in boxes, little boxes, all the same.

And there's doctors and there's lawyers and business executives

And they're all made out of ticky tacky and they all look just the same.

 

And they all play on the golf-course (3) and drink their Martini dry

And they all have pretty children and the children go to school.

And the children go to summer camp (4) and then to the university

And they all get put in boxes and they all come out the same.

 

And the boys go into business and marry and raise a family

And they all get put in boxes, little boxes, all the same.

There's a green one, and a pink one and a blue one and a yellow one

And they're all made out of ticky tacky and they all look just the same.

 

(1) Little boxes is a metaphor for the clean and neat American houses and cottages which are all alike. In

this song, however, `little boxes' means also com¬partments, categories.

(2) Ticky tacky: trashy material.

(3) Golf-course: it is the area where golf is played. It is a green open area with nine or eighteen holes. A person plays a round of golf when he plays eighteen holes in their correct order. He hits the ball into the holes.

4. Summer camp: nowadays camping is known ali over the world as an important source of enjoyment and recreation for many people. In the USA there are summer camps where school departments, colleges and uni¬versities send young people for a week or more. Nearly every¬where, camping has become an important business. Millions of dollars are spent each year on hunting, fishing and camping e¬quipment.

 

The housing problem

The housing crisis in the United States and in Great Britain is a big problem. The quality of housing in the United States has been improving in recent years, but thousands of families stili live in poor, unsanitary and overcrowded dwellings. Many Negroes, groups of Mexicans, Puerto Ricans and other immigrants live in these poor areas, called 'slums', and it is very difficult for these minority groups to improve their conditions because of prejudice and discrimination. In April, 1968, Congress passed a Civil Rights Bill which aimed at eliminating discrimination on the base of race, colour or religion in the sale or in the rent of most hpusing. But the situation is still bad.

In Great Britain things are not much better. There are not enough houses, especially in London and other industrial cities. Many people spend the night in bus-shelters or or on park benches; others live in a tent or in a van. Moreover, there are still some three million substandard dwellings (houses that do not have inside W.C. or bath or hot water), generally inhabited by immigrants. These slums are being cleared at the rate of 70,000 houses destroyed each year, but a lot of people are going to wait a long time before they can leave damp, mice and lice behind and live in a new house.

The present government is trying to do something, and an important contribution to the housing programme is being made by the 'New Towns’, built primarily to relieve congestion in the big cities. Most of the new houses being built are for families of four to six people and have three bedrooms, two living rooms, a kitchen and a bathroom, and they are let at a relatively low rent to large families or to those with small incomes. There have also been interesting experiments in tiny flats on the ground floor, or with special lifts for old or disabied people who wish to be independent.

In general, however, English families prefer two-storey houses with gardens, but only the lucky ones can get them.