These are some of the lyrics to the song Waterloo from the band ABBA: one of my favorite songs from one of my favorite bands. The whole song is an extended metaphor using Napoleon’s final defeat at the Battle of Waterloo as an example of how a person has been overcome by a lover’s advances and finally gives in to them. I know the song is meant to be sweet and about finally realizing love after trying to deny it, but these particular lyrics out of context always seemed to be oddly violent to me. It sends the exact opposite message as the rest of the song, as it seems the singer is being physically assaulted by their partner and, at the end, gives up on living a life for their own. Rather than learning to fall in love, it seems the singer is either being coerced into a loveless relationship by violence, or is so enamored with their lover that they cannot bear the possibility of being without them. That later theme is actually part of the subtext of SOS, another ABBA song, which has a singer who struggles to even imagine how to live now that their lover is gone, so my interpretation of these lyrics from Waterloo may have been intended.
