Book Review: I'm Your Man: The Life of Leonard Cohen, by Sylvie Simmons (2012, Updated Edition 2021)

 

Cover of the updated paperback edition of I'm Your Man: The Life of Leonard Cohen, by Sylvie Simmons, 2021. (Photo by Mark C. Taylor)

To me, Leonard Cohen is the definition of an artist. Driven, dedicated to his craft, living his life unapologetically. Sylvie Simmons’ biography of Cohen, I’m Your Man: The Life of Leonard Cohen, is a fascinating look at this enduring artist.

One of my first introductions to Leonard Cohen was the live album Field Commander Cohen: Tour of 1979. Released in 2001, Field Commander Cohen finds Cohen backed by a fantastic band, touring in support of his album Recent Songs. When I worked for a small bookseller, one of my co-workers was a huge Leonard Cohen fan, and there was a period of several months where Field Commander Cohen was in the rotation of CD’s we listened to, and so every afternoon Leonard’s baritone would bid adieu to Marianne. At first listen, I was unimpressed. I was going through a Bob Dylan phase at the time, and I suspect I found Cohen just too similar to Dylan. And after a while I was simply sick of listening to Field Commander Cohen every single day. However, I was impressed with the different musical textures that are found on Field Commander Cohen, with its nods towards world music and jazz, and “Memories” pastiche of 1950’s doo-wop. Eventually, Field Commander Cohen got to me. I started to love John Bilezikijan’s long oud solo on “Lover Lover Lover,” and the way Leonard sings “lover” seven times in a row on that song. Seven times in a row might seem a bit much, but it fits the rhythm of the song so perfectly. And one day I needed my own copy of Field Commander Cohen, which occupies an odd place in my personal discography. It’s not one of my favorite albums, but it's one of the albums I’ve heard the most. Suffice it to say, Leonard Cohen has grown on me over the years.

I’m Your Man was first published in 2012, and an updated edition with a new Afterword came out in 2021. When I was paging through I’m Your Man in a bookstore last December, I knew I wanted to read this book. I had to learn more about Leonard Cohen the man.

I’m Your Man is not an authorized biography, but Simmons interviewed Cohen several times, and occasionally their dialogue appears in the book as a Q&A. Simmons does an excellent job of tracing Cohen’s life and career, from Montreal to Hydra to New York City, and Los Angeles, with many stops in-between.

Cohen described to Simmons some of the reasoning behind his decision to become a poet and novelist: “The word ‘career’ always had an unattractive and burdensome resonance in my heart. My idea mostly was to avoid participating in that activity called career, and I’ve been pretty much able to avoid it.” (p.39)

Cohen was 33 years old and well-established as a poet and novelist when his first album, Songs of Leonard Cohen, was released in late 1967. Cohen claimed that he became a songwriter to make money. But, as Simmons informs us, Cohen had been singing folk songs on his guitar since he was a teenager. So perhaps he was simply following his muse. Or perhaps music was simply another way of avoiding a career.

Cohen explained his artistic philosophy in a 1976 interview: “A cry of pain in itself is just that. It can affect you or you can turn away from it. But a piece of work that treats the experience that produced the cry of pain is a different matter altogether. The cry is transformed, alchemized, by the work by a certain objectivity that doesn’t surrender the emotion but gives it form. That’s the difference between life and art.”

I’m Your Man follows Cohen through the difficulties of the music business, including the period in the 1990’s when he essentially abandoned his music career in order to study to become a Buddhist monk. The book also covers Cohen’s remarkable return to live performance in 2008, after a break of some 15 years, and the ecstatic reception he received around the world. The world tour eventually stretched to 2 ½ years, from May of 2008 until December of 2010, as Cohen performed just shy of 250 concerts.

Throughout I’m Your Man, Simmons refers to Cohen as “Leonard,” a familiar touch that is well-earned by her thorough research. Leonard Cohen was certainly a complicated man, and he was not without his demons. Yet throughout the 500-plus pages of the book, I liked him. Frankly, Leonard Cohen seemed like a really nice guy. When Cohen’s manager Kelley Lynch stole millions from him, leaving him nearly bankrupt, Cohen would tell friends “It’s enough to put a dent in one’s mood.” (p.447) You have to like a man who can make light of such a difficult situation.

I’m Your Man is an absorbing examination of the life of a talented artist who is still “speaking to you sweetly from a window in the Tower of Song.”