“Puff, the Magic Dragon” (or “Puff”) is a song written by Leonard Lipton and Peter Yarrow, and made popular by Yarrow’s group Peter, Paul and Mary in a 1963 recording. The lyrics for “Puff, the Magic Dragon” are based on a 1959 poem by Leonard Lipton, then a 19-year-old Cornell University student. Lipton was inspired by an Ogden Nash poem titled “Custard the Dragon”, about a “realio, trulio little pet dragon”.

The lyrics tell a story of the ageless dragon Puff and his playmate, Jackie Paper, a little boy who grows up and loses interest in the imaginary adventures of childhood and leaves Puff to be with himself. (The line “A dragon lives forever, but not so little boys” is generally thought to imply only that “little Jackie Paper” grew up.) The story of the song takes place “by the sea” in the fictional land of “Honalee”.

Lipton was friends with Peter Yarrow’s housemate when they were all students at Cornell. He used Yarrow’s typewriter to get the poem out of his head. He then forgot about it until years later, when a friend called and told him Yarrow was looking for him, to give him credit for the lyrics. On making contact Yarrow gave Lipton half the songwriting credit, and he still gets royalties from the song.

In an effort to be gender-neutral, Yarrow now sings the line “A dragon lives forever, but not so little boys” as “A dragon lives forever, but not so girls and boys.” The original poem also had a verse that did not make it into the song. In it, Puff found another child and played with him after returning. Neither Yarrow nor Lipton remembers the verse in any detail, and the paper that was left in Yarrow’s typewriter in 1958 has since been lost.

In 1961, Peter Yarrow joined Paul Stookey and Mary Travers to form Peter, Paul and Mary. The group incorporated the song into their live performances before recording it in 1962.

After the song’s initial success, speculation arose — as early as a 1964 article in Newsweek — that the song contained veiled references to smoking marijuana. The word “paper” in the name of Puff’s human friend (Jackie Paper) was said to be a reference to rolling papers, and the word “dragon” was interpreted as “draggin’,” i.e. inhaling smoke; similarly, the name “Puff” was alleged to be a reference to taking a “puff” on a joint. The supposition was claimed to be common knowledge in a letter by a member of the public to The New York Times in 1984.

The authors of the song have repeatedly rejected this interpretation and have strongly and consistently denied that they intended any references to drug use. Leonard Lipton has stated “Puff the Magic Dragon is not about drugs.” Peter Yarrow has frequently explained that the song is about the hardships of growing older and has no relationship to drug-taking. He has also said of the song that it “never had any meaning other than the obvious one” and is about the “loss of innocence in children”, and dismissed the suggestion of association with drugs as “sloppy research”.

In 1976, Yarrow’s bandmate Paul Stookey of Peter, Paul and Mary also upheld the song’s innocence. He recorded a version of the song at the Sydney Opera House in March 1976, in which he set up a fictitious trial scene. The Prosecutor accused the song of being about marijuana, but Puff and Jackie protested. The judge finally left the case to the jury (the Opera House audience) and said if they will sing along with the song, it would be acquitted. The audience joined in with Stookey, and at the end of their sing-along, the judge declared: “case dismissed.”

Ed. Note: Again, but this time for personal reasons, I feel compelled to inform you that, though Mary has passed away, both Peter and Paul (Noel) regularly still perform, often at very reasonable prices. They both have a number of tour dates (together and solo) in 2018 and some scheduled tour dates in 2019.

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