And so he tried to be earthy and get his hands into the soil. And he was very guilty about his wealth-because it was inherited. He'd been married twice and was contemplating a third marriage and wasn't really sure that he liked her very much. He was a multi-millionaire and, uh, that was a good start, I suppose. Now, Henderson, the character in the book-is, was, one of those people who was born with everything going for them, at least it looked that way on paper. 'A short time ago, a friend gave me a book called Henderson the Rain King and I started to read it but I never got finished I got halfway through and sort of left the whole plot up in the air, literally, and got inspired to write the next song. There’s enchantment and dis-enchantment, what we’re taught to believe things are and what they really are.' In late 1967, she introduced the song like this: But in this song there are only two sides to things… there’s reality and I guess what you might call fantasy. In most cases there are both sides to things and in a lot of cases there are more than just both. 'This is a song that talks about sides to things. Interestingly, she gave the same introduction - word for word - on Octoat the Second Fret in Philadelphia:

Joni introduces the song this way at the White Swan in Leicester, England on September 16, 1967. And so I got this idea 'from both sides now.' There are a lot of sides to everything, and so the song is called 'From Both Sides, Now.' I was reading a book, and I haven't finished it yet, called 'Henderson the Rain King.' And there's a line in it that I especially got hung up on that was about when he was flying to Africa and searching for something, he said that in an age when people could look up and down at clouds, they shouldn't be afraid to die.

It - I should tell people a little bit about it. What have we got here? 'Night in the City,' 'Circle Game' - oh, 'From Both Sides, Now.' I'm really glad somebody requested that, because that's a very new song, and I've been driving everybody crazy by playing it twice and three times a night.

Gene: Want to do some of the requested songs? Joni in conversation with Gene Shay, 'Folklore Program' March 12, 1967: Well something's lost, but something's gained They shake their heads, they say I've changed I've looked at clouds from both sides now

George steel tor johnson