A Boy Named Sue by Johnny Cash

“A Boy Named Sue” live performance

You know Shel Silverstein? He’s the guy who wrote those beloved children’s books full of poems and drawings. His most famous books “A Light In The Attic,” “Where the Sidewalk Ends” and “The Giving Tree” continue to be some of the most popular children books.

Before Silverstein broke it big writing poems for children, he was a songwriter and his most famous song was “A Boy Named Sue.” Silverstein was inspired to write this song by a close friend named Jean who was often taunted for his feminine sounding name. During an informal gathering, Silverstein performed “A Boy Named Sue,” and Johnny Cash’s wife, June Carter happened to be there and she thought it was a great song. Johnny Cash had recently released At Folsom Prison, a live album recorded at a prison. Critics consider this album one of the most important albums in popular music and is one of Cash’s best-selling albums. As a follow up to this album, Cash went to another prison to do a live album and this time June Carter brought along, “A Boy Named Sue.”

June suggested that Johnny bring the sheet of paper that had “A Boy Named Sue” onto to stage with him at San Quentin Prison. Cash brought it with him and decided to perform it for the first time ever, never having rehearsed the song. Cash can be clearly seen looking down at the paper throughout the performance but if you were just listening to the song you would have never guessed that this was one of the first time he was encountering this song.

“A Boy Named Sue,” tells the story of a boy who struggles through life because of the fact that his father gave him a girl's name. Sue isn’t angry that his father left him, he’s just frustrated about the name his father gave him. Because of this name, Sue became a mean and hard. He vows search for his dad and “kill that man who gave that awful name.”

One day, Sue walks into a bar and recognizes his dad. They get into a fight and it builds to a standstill with Sue and his father pointing their guns at each other. Sue’s father explains:

Son, this world is rough
And if a man's gonna make it, he's gotta be tough
And I knew I wouldn't be there to help ya along.
So I give ya that name and I said goodbye
I knew you'd have to get tough or die
And it's the name that helped to make you strong.

Sue gets all chocked up and he embraces his dad. He sees the point of view that his dad was coming from and feels grateful for what his dad did. Sue lovingly thinks about his dad and promises, “And if I ever have a son, I think I'm gonna name him. . . . Bill or George! Anything damn name but Sue! I still hate that name!”

We think for a second that maybe because of Sue’s reconciliation with his dad, that he would name his son Sue as well, but then the bitter feelings of having a name like Sue come rumbling back.

As silly as this song is, it deals with some powerful themes about fathers and sons. The lack of anger at the dad walking out in an interesting commentary on the time and society’s double standard in which many seems to forgive fathers for leaving their family and not mothers It’s hard to know if Sue’s life is as hard as it is because of the name or because his father wasn’t around.

Sue’s dad provides Sue with what he needed to hear his whole life, that his dad cared about him and did something to help Sue. This intention and thought is enough for Sue to forgive him. Son’s often misunderstand what father’s try to do for them and many people including myself come to points in our lives when we realize that our dads were not there to make our lives more difficult but to help us grow. However, like Sue, just because our dads did something to try to help us, doesn’t mean we want to repeat their actions.

Silverstein’s humorous story in the hands of Cash becomes one of the funniest songs that I know. Cash’s dark baritone and earnest delivery expresses the pain and frustration of a boy who feels cursed by his father. The vocal delivery by Cash is a stylized half-singing which like rapping adds a melodic phrase to the words while exaggerating the natural rhythm in the lyrics. At certain points in the song at the ends of phrase, Cash slows balancing the pace of the lyrics and emphasizing certain lyrics. The way that the melody is shaped and the words are paced is a reflection of Cash’s musical instincts and story-telling ability from years of performing and composing.

As Silverstein grew older and became a father himself he decided to tell the story of Sue from the father’s perspective. He wrote a sequel to “A Boy Named Sue” called “The Father of a Boy Named Sue.”

So according to the father, he hated the kid, named him Sue in spite. When the bar fight happened Sue was cross-dressing and started the fight hitting him with his purse. The father admits that made up the stuff about naming him Sue to toughen him up. The father tells how they now live together and Sue takes care of him “better than a daughter can do.” And um . . . the punch-line at the end of this song, well, let’s just um . . . I can’t really . . . eh. . . eww . . . just listen to it yourself.