Cynthia Lennon
Encyclopedia
Cynthia Lillian Lennon is the former wife of musician John Lennon
, and mother of Julian Lennon
. She grew up in the middle-class section of Hoylake
, on the Wirral Peninsula
in North West England
. At the age of twelve, she was accepted into the Junior Art School, and was later enrolled in the Liverpool College of Art
. Lennon also attended the college; a meeting with Powell in a calligraphy
class led to their relationship.
When Lennon was performing in Hamburg with The Beatles
, she rented Lennon's bedroom from his aunt and legal guardian, Mimi Smith
. After she became pregnant, the Lennons were married on 23 August 1962, at the Mount Pleasant
Register office
in Liverpool. Their marriage was kept secret during the beginning period of Beatlemania
and she was the object of female fans' ire once it became known. Starting in 1964, the Lennon family lived at Kenwood
in Weybridge
, where she kept house and participated with her husband in a London-based social life. In 1968, Lennon left her for Yoko Ono
; the couple's divorce was legally granted on 8 November 1968.
She married an Italian hotelier, Roberto Bassanini, in 1970, divorcing him in 1973. In 1976, she married John Twist, an engineer from Lancashire
, but divorced him in 1983. After her divorce from Twist, she changed her name back to Lennon by deed poll
and met Jim Christie, her partner for 17 years. She published a book of memoirs, A Twist of Lennon, in 1978, and later married Noel Charles, a night club owner, in 2002. In September 2005, she published a more intimate biography, John. Over the years she staged several auctions of memorabilia associated with her life with Lennon. In 2006, she and her son attended the Las Vegas premiere of the Cirque du Soleil
production of Love
, which was her first public appearance with Ono. She currently lives in Majorca, Spain.
Cynthia Lillian Powell was the youngest of three children born to Charles Powell and his wife Lillian (née Roby) who already had two sons named Charles and Anthony. Charles Powell worked for the GEC
company. In 1939, Lillian Powell was sent to Blackpool
after World War II had been declared, and lived in a small room in a bed-and-breakfast on the Blackpool seafront. After the birth, the Powell family moved to a two-bedroomed semi-detached house in Hoylake
, a middle-class area across the water on the Wirral Peninsula
that was considered posh by those in Liverpool.
At the age of 11, Cynthia won an art prize in a competition organised by the Liverpool Echo
. One year later she was accepted into Liverpool's Junior Art School, which was also attended by Bill Harry
, later editor of Liverpool's Mersey Beat
newspaper, and Lennon's friend.
. She was told she had to wear glasses at the college, but disliked wearing them, which resulted in misreading notices in college. Although studying graphics, she also took calligraphy classes, as did Lennon. He never had any drawing tools with him, so he constantly borrowed pens and pencils from Powell, who found out that he was only in the class because other teachers had refused to instruct him. She had an air of respectability and moved in different social circles to her future boyfriend; Lennon and an art school friend, Geoff Mohammed, used to make fun of her by stopping the conversation when she walked in the room, saying: "Quiet please! No dirty jokes, it's Cynthia".
Powell once overheard Lennon give a compliment to a girl with blonde hair in the college, who looked similar to Brigitte Bardot
. The next Saturday, Powell turned up at the college with her hair several shades blonder. Lennon noticed straight away, exclaiming, "Get you, Miss Hoylake!", which was Lennon's nickname for her along with "Miss Powell" or "Miss Prim". Dressed like a Teddy Boy
, he sometimes brought a guitar with him into class, and once sang "Ain't She Sweet
" directly to Powell.
pub. She was confused when Lennon ignored her all evening, but as she was ready to leave, he grabbed her hand and asked her to stay. They later went to a room that Lennon's fellow student, Stuart Sutcliffe
, was renting, where they had sex for the first time.
They began dating, with Lennon now referring to her as simply "Cyn". In the autumn of 1958, she ended her engagement to be with him, and he ended his relationship with another art student, Thelma Pickles. During the beginning of their relationship, they often had intercourse in alleyways or shop doorways, if Sutcliffe's room was not available. Powell had to be careful of Lennon's angry reactions at the time, because of his "jealous anxieties that made him turn pale, clench his fists and make exasperating scenes" if she greeted another art student. His jealousy could also manifest itself in violent behaviour towards her, as when he slapped her across the face (causing her head to hit against the wall), after watching her dance with Sutcliffe. After the incident, she broke up with Lennon for three months, but resumed their relationship after his profuse apology. Another time a cleaning woman at the college caught Lennon hitting her and suggested that she stay away from him. Her work at art school began to suffer and teachers told her that the relationship with Lennon was doing her no good. Lennon continued to be casually inconsiderate towards her; he later said, "I was in sort of a blind rage for two years. I was either drunk or fighting. It had been the same with other girl friends I'd had. There was something the matter with me." Tony Bramwell—a friend of Lennon's since his youth—said: "Cynthia was beautiful, physically, and on the inside. Although she knew he [Lennon] was apt to find love on the road, she was totally dedicated to his success ... and extremely influential. He was insecure and Cynthia was there to pump him up, to buttress, sort of, his weak side."
The Beatles' first Hamburg residency
took place in 1960, with Lennon writing frequent and passionate letters back home to Powell. But after returning home from there, Lennon's aunt and legal guardian, Mimi Smith
, threw a hand-mirror at him for spending money on a suede coat for her. Smith later referred to Powell as "a gangster's moll
", and was often unpleasant towards her. The Beatles went to Hamburg for the second time in 1961, and both Powell and Dot Rhone (McCartney's girlfriend at the time), visited them two weeks later, during the Easter holidays. They had to stay up all night because of the long sets, with both taking Preludin, which the group were also taking to stay awake. Lennon and Powell stayed with Sutcliffe's girlfriend, Astrid Kirchherr
. After the trip to Hamburg, Powell's mother said that Powell's cousin and husband were emigrating to Canada with their new-born baby, and that she would be going with them while they studied to become teachers. Powell waited until Lennon came back from Hamburg before she asked Smith—who had taken in lodgers before at 251 Menlove Avenue
—if she would rent a room to her. Smith rented out the box-room above the front door (which used to be Lennon's bedroom) but insisted that she do chores around the house. To pay the rent, she took a job at a Woolworths
store in Liverpool after her student grant
had run out. In the same year, when Lennon was 21 years old, he received £100 from his aunt Mater who lived in Edinburgh, and went to Paris with McCartney. Powell could not accompany them as she was studying for her final exams.
When Lennon went to Hamburg again in April 1962, she found a bedsit
in a terraced house
at 93 Garmoyle Road, Liverpool. Shortly after having failed her art teacher's diploma exam, in August 1962, she found out that she was pregnant with Lennon's child. She later explained that she and Lennon had never used contraception, had never talked about it, and didn't think about it at the time. When she told Lennon he said, "There's only one thing for it Cyn, we'll have to get married".
, were in attendance, as was their manager Brian Epstein
, who was best man; no parents were there. The wedding was farcical, because as soon as the ceremony began a workman in the backyard of the building opposite started using a pneumatic drill
which drowned out anything the registrar, Lennon, or Powell said. When the registrar asked for the groom to step forward, Harrison stepped forward instead. With no photographs or flowers the wedding party celebrated afterwards, at Epstein's invitation, in Reece's restaurant in Clayton Square, which was the same restaurant where Lennon's parents, Alfred Lennon
and Julia Lennon
, had celebrated their marriage 24 years earlier, in 1938. Lennon was 21-years-old, and Cynthia, 22. The newlyweds had no honeymoon, as Lennon had to play an engagement at the Riverpark Ballroom in Chester
the same night, although they did travel to the Hotel George V
in Paris, for a belated honeymoon on 16 September, but were accompanied by Epstein, even though he had not been invited to join them.
During her pregnancy, Epstein offered the couple the use of his flat at 36 Faulkner Street, and later paid for a private hospital room when the pregnancy was coming to term. Although still completely unknown outside of Liverpool, by now the Beatles had a fanatical following among girls within the city. Epstein had one condition which the Lennons had to follow: the marriage and the baby were to be kept a close secret, so as not to upset any of these fans. One time when news of the wedding leaked out, the group denied it. Cynthia was happy to keep a low profile, not wanting to be the subject of public attention the way her husband was.
The Lennons' son, John Charles Julian Lennon, was born at 7.45 am on 8 April 1963, in Sefton Hospital. Lennon, being on tour at the time, did not see his son until three days later, and when he finally arrived at the hospital, said: "He's bloody marvellous, Cyn! ... Who's gonna be a famous rocker like his Dad then?" He then explained that he would be going on on a four-day holiday to Barcelona
, with Epstein. Lennon would later refer to Julian as being a "Saturday night special; the way that most people get here", or that his son "came out of a whisky bottle".
", with their first album Please Please Me
climbing to the top of the charts, with their becoming the headlining act in concerts for the first time, and with Beatles fan magazines starting up. That one of the members was married and gaining a family was not publicly known; a 1963 "Lifelines of the Beatles" page in New Musical Express detailed over 25 biographical facts about, and likes and dislikes of, each of the four, but never gave any hint Lennon was married and indeed listed "girls" as one of his hobbies.
The press heard rumours about Lennon's wife and child at the end of 1963—after full-scale Beatlemania
had already swept the UK and Europe—and descended on her mother's house in Hoylake (where mother and son were staying) in November and December. Friends and neighbours protected their anonymity, but she was often approached by journalists. In November she had Julian christened at the Hoylake parish church, but didn't tell Lennon (who was on tour at the time) because she feared a media circus. She told him two days after, but he was angry as he hadn't wanted his son to be christened, even though Epstein had asked to be Julian's godfather
. Not long after the christening, every newspaper was full of the story about Lennon's secret wife and baby boy. Epstein told the other Beatles to make the best of the situation, and hoped that newspapers would not mention that Cynthia was pregnant before marrying him. After living at Lennon's aunt's house for some months, the couple moved to London and found a three-bedroomed flat in Emperor's Gate, off Cromwell Road
. The top floor flat was the third of three, which were each built over two floors. This meant climbing six flights of stairs, as the building had no lift. Cynthia firstly had to carry Julian up to the flat, and then go back down to collect shopping bags. The Beatles' fans soon found out where they were living, and she would find them camping out in the hallway, and would have to push through them when leaving or arriving.
She accompanied Lennon to America on the first Beatles' tour there, with Lennon agreeing to press photos of them together, which infuriated Epstein, as he had worked to keep their marriage a secret. She was left behind in New York when Lennon and the other Beatles were quickly ushered into a car, and in Miami she had to ask the help of fans to convince a security guard who she was. Lennon's response was, "Don't be so bloody slow next time—they could have killed you". It would be the only time Cynthia would go on tour with them. At the Emperor's Gate address the situation grew worse, with fans sticking chewing gum in the lock of the flat and tearing at any article of clothing when she or Lennon were leaving or arriving. American girls would write her letters proclaiming their desperate love for John; the women in the lives of the other Beatles would get equivalent missives. As late as 1967, Beatles' wives were still dealing with occasional physical danger from female Beatles fans, with Cynthia being kicked in the legs by one who demanded that she leave John alone.
As Lennon was either touring or recording, supposed family holidays were skiing in St. Moritz
with producer George Martin
and his girlfriend, or staying at a castle in Ireland with George Harrison
and Pattie Boyd
(Harrison's wife). Even these were subject to being discovered by fans, with Cynthia and Pattie having to escape the Irish location by being dressed as maids. As a result of the long recording sessions and tours, Lennon would usually sleep for days afterwards. When Lennon started filming How I Won the War
in Almeria
, Spain, he promised his wife and son that they could join him there after two weeks of filming. The small apartment they were allocated was swiftly replaced by a villa when Starr and his wife joined them.
, so Lennon bought a house called Kenwood
; a mock-Tudor-style house on three acres in Weybridge
, where Tom Jones
and Cliff Richard
already lived.
Lennon then spent twice the original £20,000 purchase price on renovations for Kenwood, reducing its 22 rooms to 17. The new kitchen was so modern and complicated that someone had to be sent to explain how everything worked, and during the extensive renovations the couple had to live in the attic bedroom for nine months. Although Cynthia enjoyed entertaining in the larger rooms, Lennon could usually be found in a small sunroom at the back of the house overlooking the swimming pool, which was similar to his aunt's conservatory in Liverpool. They had a cat called "Mimi", named after Lennon's aunt. Cynthia took care of Julian herself, without a nanny, although babysitters were frequently employed. She also did the cooking herself, but employed a housekeeper, gardener, and chauffeur, who lived off the premises.
When she passed her driving test, Lennon serially bought her a white Mini
, a gold Porsche
, a red Ferrari
, and a green Volkswagen Beetle
, usually as surprises without consulting her first. Cynthia enjoyed the closeness of Maureen Starkey (Ringo Starr's
wife) and Boyd, as both lived nearby, often going on holiday together or shopping. She was often photographed at Beatles' movie premieres and special occasions, and sometimes with Lennon and Julian at home, which meant she had the role of a Beatle wife, as well as being a mother. The Lennons would often go to a nightclub in central London until nearly dawn, but in the morning she would take her son to school. Kenwood became the place to visit for the other Beatles, various American musicians, and total strangers that Lennon had met the previous night in London nightclubs.
In 1965, she opened the front door of Kenwood to see a man who "looked like a tramp", but with her husband's features. He explained that he was Alfred Lennon
, the father whom Lennon had supposedly not seen for years. Lennon was annoyed when he came home, telling her for the first time that his father had visited the NEMS office a few weeks before. Three years after the meeting in the NEMS office, Alfred Lennon (who was then 56 years old) turned up at Kenwood again with his fiancée, 19-year-old student Pauline Jones. He asked if the Lennons could give Pauline a job, so she was hired to help with Julian and the piles of Beatles' fan mail. Lennon's father and his fiancée then spent a few months living in the attic
bedroom. During an interview at Kenwood with Evening Standard reporter Maureen Cleave
, Lennon said, "Here I am in my Hansel and Gretel
house, famous and loaded
, and I can't go anywhere. There's something else I'm going to do, only I don't know what it is, but I do know this isn't it for me".
and Preludin
, but thought of them as not being very dangerous. On 27 March 1965, at a dinner party given by a dentist, John Riley, the Lennons, Harrison and Boyd were given LSD
without their knowledge. Against the repeated advice of Riley and his wife not to leave the house, Harrison drove them to various nightclubs, with Riley following them by taxi. Lennon was crying and banging his head against the windows, and Boyd wanted to get out of the car and smash shop windows in Regent Street. At the Ad Lib club, they thought the lift up to the club was on fire and started screaming, before finally crawling out of the lift for which Mick Jagger
, Marianne Faithfull
, and Starr were waiting. Harrison later drove them back home in Boyd's Mini Cooper at no more than 10 mph, as he was also feeling the effects of the drug. They stayed up all night at Kenwood, experiencing the full effects of their first LSD trip.
Lennon then started taking LSD on a regular basis, as well as his daily use of cannabis. After much encouragement from him, Cynthia agreed to try LSD one more time, but the adverse effects were the same. Although she said at the time she would never take the drug again, she relented and took it for the last time a few weeks later, on the way to a party at Epstein's country house in Warbleton
, East Sussex. Although she hated the psychological effects of the drug, she could see the change taking place in her husband: "It was like living with someone who had just discovered religion ... Tensions, bigotry, and bad temper were replaced by understanding and love". In 1970, Lennon confessed that he had probably taken LSD one thousand times since 1965, saying: "I used to just eat it all the time". In the decades ahead, Cynthia would always maintain that Lennon's drug use was the beginning of the end for the couple.
On 22 July 1967, Harrison, Boyd, Starr, and assistant Neil Aspinall
, flew to Athens, where they stayed overnight until Lennon, his wife and son, McCartney and Jane Asher
(McCartney's girlfriend), Boyd's 16-year-old sister, Paula, roadie Mal Evans
, and publicist Alistair Taylor
set off for Athens. Looking for an island they could buy to live on together, they chartered a yacht, the MV Arvi. McCartney later said that whilst sailing around Greek islands, everybody just "sat around and took LSD". Lennon and the other Beatles publicly renounced drugs—although never completely—after their initial meetings with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
in London, and Bangor
, Wales.
By 1967, Lennon's aggressive edges from his childhood had disappeared, and he spent considerable amounts of time living inside his head, sitting in his sunroom or garden and daydreaming for hours at end. He became somewhat uncommunicative towards most people, including Cynthia, except for the other Beatles, all of whom had an almost unspoken ability to understand one another. Cynthia once complained, saying: "What I'd like is a holiday of our own ... John, Julian and me". Lennon replied with, "OK, I know, we'll all retire to a little cottage on a cliff in Cornwall, all right?" He then added, "No, I've got these bloody songs to write. I have to work, to justify living." She understood his temperament, but felt somewhat frustrated at never having developed a career or using her art college background for anything.
to Lennon that made it clear that he had had contact with her over a period of some time. Lennon denied that he was involved with Ono, explaining that she was just some "crazy artist" who wanted to be sponsored, although Ono kept up a stream of telephone calls and visits to Kenwood. On 15 February 1968, the Lennons flew to India, followed by the other Beatles and their partners four days later: Boyd, Asher, and Maureen Starkey
(Starr's wife). The division between the sexes was emphasized by the male musicians sitting outside at night composing songs, while their partners would gather together in one of their rooms, often talking about life as the wife or partner of a Beatle. The Lennons shared a four-poster bed at the ashram, with Lennon playing guitar and Cynthia drawing and writing poetry between their long sessions of meditation.
"Magic Alex" (Greek-born Alex Mardas, who controlled Apple Electronics) arrived later, smuggling in alcohol from the nearest village as it was not allowed in the ashram. After two weeks Lennon asked to sleep in a separate room, saying he could only meditate when he was alone, but walked down to the local post office every morning to see if he had received a telegram from Ono, who sent one almost daily. Cynthia found out about these secretive trips much later, saying: "I had thought our magical interlude with the Maharishi would be the making of our marriage – but in reality it just presaged the end". Paul Saltzman
later published a book of photographs, The Beatles in Rishikesh, showing Lennon deep in thought, and Cynthia's confused expression. Despite the alienation from Lennon, she later spoke about her time there, saying: "I loved being away from the fans, hordes of people, deadlines, demands and flashing cameras".
During the flight back to England, Lennon got very drunk on scotch and coke and confessed that he had been involved with other women during their marriage. He went on to detail his liaisons with groupie
s, friends (such as Joan Baez
, and journalist Cleave), and "thousands" of women around the globe. Although not wanting to hear Lennon's confession, she knew women were attracted to him, "like moths to a flame". Two weeks later, in May 1968, Lennon suggested that Cynthia take a holiday in Greece with Mardas, Donovan
, and two friends, as he would be very busy recording The White Album
. She arrived back at Kenwood from Greece earlier than expected, at four o'clock on 22 May 1968, to discover Lennon and Ono sitting cross-legged on the floor in matching white robes, staring into each others eyes, and then found Ono's slippers outside the Lennons' bedroom door. Shocked, she asked Jenny Boyd
and Mardas if she could spend the night at their apartment. At the apartment Boyd went straight to bed, but she and Mardas drank more alcohol, with Mardas trying to convince her that they should run away together. After she had vomited in the bathroom, she collapsed on a bed in the spare bedroom, with Mardas joining her and trying to kiss her until she pushed him away.
Lennon seemed absolutely normal when she returned home the next day, and steadfastly maintained his love for her and their son, saying: "It's you I love Cyn ... I love you now more than ever before". Lennon went to New York with McCartney shortly after, but as she was specifically not invited, a trip to Pesaro
, in Italy, was arranged with her mother. After an evening with Italian hotelier, Roberto Bassanini, Mardas was waiting at the hotel to break the news that Lennon was planning to sue for divorce on grounds of adultery, seek sole custody of Julian, and "send her back to Hoylake". She said in 2005: "The mere fact that ‘Magic Alex’ [Mardas] arrived in Italy in the middle of the night without any prior knowledge of where I was staying made me extremely suspicious. I was being coerced into making it easy" ... [for Lennon and Ono] "to accuse me of doing something that would make them not look so bad." As Lennon had initiated divorce proceedings, it prompted her to exclaim: "Suing me for divorce? On what grounds is he suing me? When the news broke that Ono was pregnant, Cynthia started her own divorce proceedings against Lennon on 22 August 1968. The financial settlement was hampered by Lennon refusing to offer any more than £75,000, telling her on the phone, "That's like winning the pools
, so what are you moaning about? You're not worth any more." The settlement was then raised to £100,000, £2,400 annually, and custody of Julian. Another £100,000 was put into a trust fund which Julian would inherit when he was 21. Until that time, his mother would receive the interest payments. Their decree nisi
was granted on 8 November 1968. The trust fund had one one codicil, in that it also provided for any further children by Lennon, so when Sean Lennon
was born, Julian's inheritance was cut to £50,000.
She lived for a few months in a flat Starr owned at 34 Montagu Square, central London, but returned to Kenwood as Lennon and Ono preferred to live there instead, rather than in isolated Weybridge. Lennon and his wife had one last short meeting at Kenwood (with Ono alongside Lennon) with Lennon accusing her of having an affair in India, saying that she was no "innocent little flower". McCartney visited her and Julian that year, and on the way to Kenwood he composed a song in his head that would later become "Hey Jude
". Talking about their divorce, McCartney later said: "We'd been very good friends for millions of years and I thought it was a bit much for them suddenly to be personae non gratae and out of my life". Cynthia recalled, "I was truly surprised when, one afternoon, Paul arrived on his own. I was touched by his obvious concern for our welfare ... On the journey down he composed 'Hey Jude' in the car. I will never forget Paul's gesture of care and concern in coming to see us." She was once asked if Lennon had written any songs about their time together, and answered: "It was too sloppy when you were young to dedicate anything to anybody. Macho Northern men didn't do that in those days". In contrast, Lennon did write the 1965 song "Norwegian Wood
" about an affair he was having, but rendered it in "gobbledegook" so that Cynthia would not know.
, Wales, called Oliver's Bistro, which also had a B&B
above the premises. She enrolled her son into the Ruthin School
, and he later joined the local Combined Cadet Force
. During Lennon's separation from Ono in 1973/74, his partner at the time, May Pang
, actively tried to get Lennon to spend more time with his son, forming a friendship with Lennon's ex-wife in the process, which continued even after Lennon and Ono were reconciled. A meeting during this period was the last time Cynthia saw John.
Previously, Julian had been allowed to visit his father twice a year by himself, but Lennon complained that during his time with Pang his ex-wife also wanted to be present, saying: "She [Cynthia] thought she could walk back in 'cos I wasn't with Yoko!" After his reconciliation with Ono, he complained again that his son was not being allowed to visit him.
On 1 May 1976, she married John Twist, an engineer from Lancashire
. She published a memoir during their time together, A Twist of Lennon, in 1978, telling about her life before and with Lennon, and containing her own illustrations and poetry. Lennon tried to stop the publication of the book, after an excerpt was published in a newspaper.
On 9 December 1980 (UK time), whilst staying at Starr's ex-wife's home, she received a phone call from Starr, two hours after Lennon had been shot in New York. "The memory of Ringo's words, the sound of his tearful voice crackling over the transatlantic line, is crystal clear: 'Cynthia, I'm so sorry, John's dead'. I had only one clear thought. My son, our son, [Julian] was at home in bed, I had to get back to Ruthin so that I could tell him about his father's death".
Cynthia's memoir gained renewed interest, and went to a third printing of 200,000 copies in the weeks after Lennon's death. She and Twist separated in 1981, and were divorced in 1983. She sold the Bistro, and changed her name back to Lennon by deed poll, later commenting about why it was financially necessary: "Do you imagine I would have been awarded a three-year contract to design bedding and textiles [for Vantona Vyella
in 1983] with the name Powell? Neither did they. When it is necessary to earn a living, it is necessary to bite the bullet and take the flack".
She began a relationship with Liverpudlian chauffeur Jim Christie in 1981, who became her partner for 17 years as well as her business manager, living in Penrith
, Cumbria. She said at the time: "Jim has never felt he's living in John Lennon's shadow. He's four years younger than me and wasn't really part of that whole Beatles' scene." They later lived on the Isle of Man
and then Normandy
for some years, but separated in 1998.
She had kept mementos of Lennon for years, but began auctioning off them after his death, including a personally drawn Christmas card from Lennon to her that fetched £8,800 at Christie's
in August 1981. With her finances in an unsteady state – she would say in 1999 that "Apart from John, the men I have fallen in love with have never been good at earning a living" – more of her memorabilia of Lennon went up for auction in 1991, including antiques from Kenwood. She said at the time, "I've enjoyed these things for 30 years. But it's time for a change." Another set of items, including some of Lennon's drug paraphernalia, brought over $60,000 for her in 1995. She later stated, "I think in life we collect so much baggage, when you have a clearout, you send it to a car-boot sale, etc. My baggage was in demand and sold at Christie's. When you have to pay the bills, you're not proud and you can't take it with you".
Over the years she entered some failed business ventures, including in 1988 a perfume named Woman (after the 1980 John Lennon song) and, in April 1989, a restaurant named Lennon's—at 13/14 Upper St. Martin's Lane
, Covent Garden
—which had menu items such as Rubber Sole (a play on the already-punning 1965 Beatles album
), as well as Sgt. Pepper's Steak and Penny Lane Pâté. It had a short life as a business venture, as it was considered to be far too expensive. She would later blame some of these efforts on the men in her life encouraging her.
The Beatles' Hamburg days were the subject of the 1994 film Backbeat
, with Jennifer Ehle
portraying Cynthia Powell. The film characterizes Lennon and Cynthia's relationship as one that will eventually be doomed by their wanting different things from life, but with Lennon not wanting to hurt her. Cynthia later complained that the film made her out "as a clingy, dim, little girlfriend in a headscarf". Cynthia was subsequently portrayed in the troubled, Ono-centric 2005 American musical Lennon
, with her character – played by Julia Murney
– gaining a little more prominence during one of the show's rewrites. Her life had a more central role in the 2010 BBC Four
film Lennon Naked
, with Claudie Blakley
playing the part. However, her character was absent from the 2009 British film Nowhere Boy
, which purported to cover the story of Lennon from 1955 to 1960 but focused on his relationships with his aunt and mother.
In 1995, Cynthia made her recording début with a rendition of "Those Were the Days
", which as produced by McCartney had been a number one hit for Mary Hopkin
in 1968. It failed to chart. Whilst living in Normandy, an exhibition of her drawings and paintings were displayed at Portobello Road
's KDK Gallery in 1999. By the 1990s she was appearing at some Beatles conventions, but appeared ambivalent about the practice. At times she maintained she was moving on with her life and putting her Beatles past behind her and at other times seemed to embrace continued interest in that past as inevitable. The Daily Telegraph
said in a 1999 profile, "In essence, she is a suburban woman who – almost in spite of herself – got caught up with one of the most extraordinary men of modern times. More than 30 years since her marriage to John Lennon ended, she is as entangled as ever."
In 2002, she married Noel Charles, a night club owner. In September 2005, she published a new biography, John, that re-examined her life with Lennon and the years afterwards, including the events following his death. Michel Faber
, writing in The Guardian
, said of the book: "John is Cynthia's attempt to prove how much more she was worth. In theory, the disclosures of Lennon's loyal partner from 1958 to 1968 cannot fail to be valuable. On the page, the potential withers". In 2006, she and her son attended the Las Vegas
premiere of the Cirque du Soleil
production of Love
, which marked a rare public appearance with Ono. In 2009, she and her son opened an exhibition of memorabilia at The Beatles Story
exhibition in Liverpool, and she and Pattie Boyd staged a first-ever joint appearance at the opening of the Cafesjian Center for the Arts in Yerevan
, Armenia
. On 30 September 2010, Julian opened his "Timeless" exhibition of photographs at the Morrison Hotel Gallery in New York. In attendance were Cynthia, Julian, Ono, Sean, and Pang, which was the first time that all five had been in the same room together.
The John Lennon Peace Monument
was unveiled by Cynthia and Julian at a ceremony in Chavasse Park
, Liverpool, on 9 October 2010 to celebrate what would have been Lennon’s 70th birthday. She currently lives with her husband on the island of Majorca in Spain.
John Lennon
John Winston Lennon, MBE was an English musician and singer-songwriter who rose to worldwide fame as one of the founding members of The Beatles, one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music...
, and mother of Julian Lennon
Julian Lennon
John Charles Julian Lennon is an English musician, songwriter, actor, and photographer. He is the son of John Lennon and Lennon's first wife, Cynthia Powell. Beatles manager Brian Epstein was his godfather. He has a younger half-brother, Sean Lennon. Lennon was named after his paternal...
. She grew up in the middle-class section of Hoylake
Hoylake
Hoylake is a seaside town within the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral, on Merseyside, England. It is located at the north western corner of the Wirral Peninsula, near to the town of West Kirby and where the River Dee estuary meets the Irish Sea...
, on the Wirral Peninsula
Wirral Peninsula
Wirral or the Wirral is a peninsula in North West England. It is bounded by three bodies of water: to the west by the River Dee, forming a boundary with Wales, to the east by the River Mersey and to the north by the Irish Sea. Both terms "Wirral" and "the Wirral" are used locally , although the...
in North West England
North West England
North West England, informally known as The North West, is one of the nine official regions of England.North West England had a 2006 estimated population of 6,853,201 the third most populated region after London and the South East...
. At the age of twelve, she was accepted into the Junior Art School, and was later enrolled in the Liverpool College of Art
Liverpool College of Art
Liverpool College of Art is located at 68 Hope Street, in Liverpool, England. It is a Grade II listed building.The building is currently owned by Liverpool John Moores University housing its School of Social Science....
. Lennon also attended the college; a meeting with Powell in a calligraphy
Calligraphy
Calligraphy is a type of visual art. It is often called the art of fancy lettering . A contemporary definition of calligraphic practice is "the art of giving form to signs in an expressive, harmonious and skillful manner"...
class led to their relationship.
When Lennon was performing in Hamburg with The Beatles
The Beatles
The Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...
, she rented Lennon's bedroom from his aunt and legal guardian, Mimi Smith
Mimi Smith
Mary Elizabeth "Mimi" Smith was the maternal aunt and parental guardian of the English musician John Lennon. Mimi was born in Liverpool, England and was the oldest of five daughters. She became a resident trainee nurse at the Woolton Convalescent Hospital, and later worked as a private secretary...
. After she became pregnant, the Lennons were married on 23 August 1962, at the Mount Pleasant
Mount Pleasant, Liverpool
Mount Pleasant is a street in Liverpool City Centre. It is towards one end of Hope Street, and is the location of Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral.57 Mount Pleasant Street is referenced in the song Weather With You by Crowded House....
Register office
Register office
A register office is a British term for a civil registry, a government office and depository where births, deaths and marriages are officially recorded and where you can get officially married, without a religious ceremony...
in Liverpool. Their marriage was kept secret during the beginning period of Beatlemania
Beatlemania
Beatlemania is a term that originated during the 1960s to describe the intense fan frenzy directed toward The Beatles during the early years of their success...
and she was the object of female fans' ire once it became known. Starting in 1964, the Lennon family lived at Kenwood
Kenwood, St. George's Hill
Kenwood is a house on the St. George's Hill estate, Weybridge, Surrey, England. Originally called the Brown House, it was designed by architect T.A. Allen, and built in 1913 by local builders, Love & Sons. The estate was constructed around the Weybridge Golf Club, which was designed in 1912 by...
in Weybridge
Weybridge
Weybridge is a town in the Elmbridge district of Surrey in South East England. It is bounded to the north by the River Thames at the mouth of the River Wey, from which it gets its name...
, where she kept house and participated with her husband in a London-based social life. In 1968, Lennon left her for Yoko Ono
Yoko Ono
is a Japanese artist, musician, author and peace activist, known for her work in avant-garde art, music and filmmaking as well as her marriage to John Lennon...
; the couple's divorce was legally granted on 8 November 1968.
She married an Italian hotelier, Roberto Bassanini, in 1970, divorcing him in 1973. In 1976, she married John Twist, an engineer from Lancashire
Lancashire
Lancashire is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in the North West of England. It takes its name from the city of Lancaster, and is sometimes known as the County of Lancaster. Although Lancaster is still considered to be the county town, Lancashire County Council is based in Preston...
, but divorced him in 1983. After her divorce from Twist, she changed her name back to Lennon by deed poll
Deed poll
A deed poll is a legal document binding only to a single person or several persons acting jointly to express an active intention...
and met Jim Christie, her partner for 17 years. She published a book of memoirs, A Twist of Lennon, in 1978, and later married Noel Charles, a night club owner, in 2002. In September 2005, she published a more intimate biography, John. Over the years she staged several auctions of memorabilia associated with her life with Lennon. In 2006, she and her son attended the Las Vegas premiere of the Cirque du Soleil
Cirque du Soleil
Cirque du Soleil , is a Canadian entertainment company, self-described as a "dramatic mix of circus arts and street entertainment." Based in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, and located in the inner-city area of Saint-Michel, it was founded in Baie-Saint-Paul in 1984 by two former street performers, Guy...
production of Love
LOVE (Cirque du Soleil)
Love is a 2006 theatrical production by Cirque du Soleil which combines the re-produced and re-imagined music of The Beatles with an interpretive, circus-based artistic and athletic stage performance. The show plays at a specially built theatre at The Mirage in Las Vegas.A joint venture between...
, which was her first public appearance with Ono. She currently lives in Majorca, Spain.
Early years
The General Electric Company plc
The General Electric Company or GEC was a major British-based industrial conglomerate, involved in consumer and defence electronics, communications and engineering. The company was once a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index. It was renamed Marconi Corporation plc in 1999 after its defence arm,...
company. In 1939, Lillian Powell was sent to Blackpool
Blackpool
Blackpool is a borough, seaside town, and unitary authority area of Lancashire, in North West England. It is situated along England's west coast by the Irish Sea, between the Ribble and Wyre estuaries, northwest of Preston, north of Liverpool, and northwest of Manchester...
after World War II had been declared, and lived in a small room in a bed-and-breakfast on the Blackpool seafront. After the birth, the Powell family moved to a two-bedroomed semi-detached house in Hoylake
Hoylake
Hoylake is a seaside town within the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral, on Merseyside, England. It is located at the north western corner of the Wirral Peninsula, near to the town of West Kirby and where the River Dee estuary meets the Irish Sea...
, a middle-class area across the water on the Wirral Peninsula
Wirral Peninsula
Wirral or the Wirral is a peninsula in North West England. It is bounded by three bodies of water: to the west by the River Dee, forming a boundary with Wales, to the east by the River Mersey and to the north by the Irish Sea. Both terms "Wirral" and "the Wirral" are used locally , although the...
that was considered posh by those in Liverpool.
At the age of 11, Cynthia won an art prize in a competition organised by the Liverpool Echo
Liverpool Echo
The Liverpool Echo is a newspaper published by Trinity Mirror in Liverpool, Merseyside, England. It is published Monday to Saturday, and is Liverpool's evening newspaper while its sister paper, the Liverpool Daily Post, is the morning paper...
. One year later she was accepted into Liverpool's Junior Art School, which was also attended by Bill Harry
Bill Harry
Bill Harry is the creator of Mersey Beat, an important newspaper of the early 1960s, which focused on the Liverpool music scene...
, later editor of Liverpool's Mersey Beat
Mersey Beat
Mersey Beat was a music publication in Liverpool, England in the early 1960s. It was founded by Bill Harry, who was one of John Lennon's classmates at Liverpool Art College...
newspaper, and Lennon's friend.
Art college
When Powell was 17, her father died after a long battle with lung cancer. Before he died, he told his daughter that she would have to get a job to support her mother, and would not be able to go to art school. As her mother wanted her daughter to receive a better education, she rented out a room to four apprentice electricians. In September 1957, Powell gained a place at the Liverpool College of ArtLiverpool College of Art
Liverpool College of Art is located at 68 Hope Street, in Liverpool, England. It is a Grade II listed building.The building is currently owned by Liverpool John Moores University housing its School of Social Science....
. She was told she had to wear glasses at the college, but disliked wearing them, which resulted in misreading notices in college. Although studying graphics, she also took calligraphy classes, as did Lennon. He never had any drawing tools with him, so he constantly borrowed pens and pencils from Powell, who found out that he was only in the class because other teachers had refused to instruct him. She had an air of respectability and moved in different social circles to her future boyfriend; Lennon and an art school friend, Geoff Mohammed, used to make fun of her by stopping the conversation when she walked in the room, saying: "Quiet please! No dirty jokes, it's Cynthia".
Powell once overheard Lennon give a compliment to a girl with blonde hair in the college, who looked similar to Brigitte Bardot
Brigitte Bardot
Brigitte Anne-Marie Bardot is a French former fashion model, actress, singer and animal rights activist. She was one of the best-known sex-symbols of the 1960s.In her early life, Bardot was an aspiring ballet dancer...
. The next Saturday, Powell turned up at the college with her hair several shades blonder. Lennon noticed straight away, exclaiming, "Get you, Miss Hoylake!", which was Lennon's nickname for her along with "Miss Powell" or "Miss Prim". Dressed like a Teddy Boy
Teddy Boy
The British Teddy Boy subculture is typified by young men wearing clothes that were partly inspired by the styles worn by dandies in the Edwardian period, styles which Savile Row tailors had attempted to re-introduce in Britain after World War II...
, he sometimes brought a guitar with him into class, and once sang "Ain't She Sweet
Ain't She Sweet
Ain't She Sweet was an American album featuring four tracks recorded in Hamburg in 1961 by The Beatles featuring Tony Sheridan and cover versions of Beatles and British Invasion-era songs recorded by the Swallows...
" directly to Powell.
Relationship with Lennon
After a college party to celebrate the end of term, Lennon asked Powell if she would like to "go out" with him. She quickly replied that she was engaged to a young man in Hoylake, so Lennon stormed off, shouting, "I didn't ask you to fuckin' marry me, did I?" He later approached her and asked if she would go to the Ye CrackeYe Cracke
Ye Cracke is a pub in Rice Street off Hope Street, Liverpool, England. The 'Y' is a Thorn , thus the name is pronounced 'The Crack'. Despite the faux Old English name, Ye Cracke is in fact a 19th-century public house...
pub. She was confused when Lennon ignored her all evening, but as she was ready to leave, he grabbed her hand and asked her to stay. They later went to a room that Lennon's fellow student, Stuart Sutcliffe
Stuart Sutcliffe
Stuart Fergusson Victor Sutcliffe was a Scottish artist and musician, best known as the original bass player of The Beatles. Sutcliffe left the band to pursue a career as an artist, having previously attended the Liverpool College of Art...
, was renting, where they had sex for the first time.
They began dating, with Lennon now referring to her as simply "Cyn". In the autumn of 1958, she ended her engagement to be with him, and he ended his relationship with another art student, Thelma Pickles. During the beginning of their relationship, they often had intercourse in alleyways or shop doorways, if Sutcliffe's room was not available. Powell had to be careful of Lennon's angry reactions at the time, because of his "jealous anxieties that made him turn pale, clench his fists and make exasperating scenes" if she greeted another art student. His jealousy could also manifest itself in violent behaviour towards her, as when he slapped her across the face (causing her head to hit against the wall), after watching her dance with Sutcliffe. After the incident, she broke up with Lennon for three months, but resumed their relationship after his profuse apology. Another time a cleaning woman at the college caught Lennon hitting her and suggested that she stay away from him. Her work at art school began to suffer and teachers told her that the relationship with Lennon was doing her no good. Lennon continued to be casually inconsiderate towards her; he later said, "I was in sort of a blind rage for two years. I was either drunk or fighting. It had been the same with other girl friends I'd had. There was something the matter with me." Tony Bramwell—a friend of Lennon's since his youth—said: "Cynthia was beautiful, physically, and on the inside. Although she knew he [Lennon] was apt to find love on the road, she was totally dedicated to his success ... and extremely influential. He was insecure and Cynthia was there to pump him up, to buttress, sort of, his weak side."
The Beatles' first Hamburg residency
The Beatles in Hamburg
The Beatles members John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Stuart Sutcliffe and Pete Best regularly performed at different clubs in Hamburg, Germany, during the period from August 1960 to December 1962; a chapter in the group's history which honed their performance skills, widened their...
took place in 1960, with Lennon writing frequent and passionate letters back home to Powell. But after returning home from there, Lennon's aunt and legal guardian, Mimi Smith
Mimi Smith
Mary Elizabeth "Mimi" Smith was the maternal aunt and parental guardian of the English musician John Lennon. Mimi was born in Liverpool, England and was the oldest of five daughters. She became a resident trainee nurse at the Woolton Convalescent Hospital, and later worked as a private secretary...
, threw a hand-mirror at him for spending money on a suede coat for her. Smith later referred to Powell as "a gangster's moll
Gun moll
Gun moll is a term that refers to the female companion of a male professional criminal. In some contexts, gun moll more specifically suggests that the woman handles a firearm....
", and was often unpleasant towards her. The Beatles went to Hamburg for the second time in 1961, and both Powell and Dot Rhone (McCartney's girlfriend at the time), visited them two weeks later, during the Easter holidays. They had to stay up all night because of the long sets, with both taking Preludin, which the group were also taking to stay awake. Lennon and Powell stayed with Sutcliffe's girlfriend, Astrid Kirchherr
Astrid Kirchherr
Astrid Kirchherr is a German photographer and artist and is well known for her association with The Beatles and her photographs of The Beatles during their Hamburg days....
. After the trip to Hamburg, Powell's mother said that Powell's cousin and husband were emigrating to Canada with their new-born baby, and that she would be going with them while they studied to become teachers. Powell waited until Lennon came back from Hamburg before she asked Smith—who had taken in lodgers before at 251 Menlove Avenue
251 Menlove Avenue
251 Menlove Avenue, named "Mendips", was the childhood home of John Lennon, singer and songwriter with the Beatles, and is now preserved by the National Trust....
—if she would rent a room to her. Smith rented out the box-room above the front door (which used to be Lennon's bedroom) but insisted that she do chores around the house. To pay the rent, she took a job at a Woolworths
Woolworths Group
Woolworths Group plc was a listed British company that owned the high-street retail chain, Woolworths, as well as other brands such as the entertainment distributor Entertainment UK and book and resource distributor Bertram Books...
store in Liverpool after her student grant
Grant (money)
Grants are funds disbursed by one party , often a Government Department, Corporation, Foundation or Trust, to a recipient, often a nonprofit entity, educational institution, business or an individual. In order to receive a grant, some form of "Grant Writing" often referred to as either a proposal...
had run out. In the same year, when Lennon was 21 years old, he received £100 from his aunt Mater who lived in Edinburgh, and went to Paris with McCartney. Powell could not accompany them as she was studying for her final exams.
When Lennon went to Hamburg again in April 1962, she found a bedsit
Bedsit
A bedsit, also known as a bed-sitting room, is a form of rented accommodation common in Great Britain and Ireland consisting of a single room and shared bathroom; they are part of a legal category of dwellings referred to as Houses in multiple occupation....
in a terraced house
Terraced house
In architecture and city planning, a terrace house, terrace, row house, linked house or townhouse is a style of medium-density housing that originated in Great Britain in the late 17th century, where a row of identical or mirror-image houses share side walls...
at 93 Garmoyle Road, Liverpool. Shortly after having failed her art teacher's diploma exam, in August 1962, she found out that she was pregnant with Lennon's child. She later explained that she and Lennon had never used contraception, had never talked about it, and didn't think about it at the time. When she told Lennon he said, "There's only one thing for it Cyn, we'll have to get married".
Marriage and Julian
The Lennons were married on 23 August 1962, at the Mount Pleasant Register office in Liverpool. Fellow Beatles, McCartney and George HarrisonGeorge Harrison
George Harrison, MBE was an English musician, guitarist, singer-songwriter, actor and film producer who achieved international fame as lead guitarist of The Beatles. Often referred to as "the quiet Beatle", Harrison became over time an admirer of Indian mysticism, and introduced it to the other...
, were in attendance, as was their manager Brian Epstein
Brian Epstein
Brian Samuel Epstein , was an English music entrepreneur, and is best known for being the manager of The Beatles up until his death. He also managed several other musical artists such as Gerry & the Pacemakers, Billy J. Kramer and the Dakotas, Cilla Black, The Remo Four & The Cyrkle...
, who was best man; no parents were there. The wedding was farcical, because as soon as the ceremony began a workman in the backyard of the building opposite started using a pneumatic drill
Jackhammer
A jackhammer is a pneumatic tool that combines a hammer directly with a chisel that was invented by Charles Brady King. Hand-held jackhammers are typically powered by compressed air, but some use electric motors. Larger jackhammers, such as rig mounted hammers used on construction machinery, are...
which drowned out anything the registrar, Lennon, or Powell said. When the registrar asked for the groom to step forward, Harrison stepped forward instead. With no photographs or flowers the wedding party celebrated afterwards, at Epstein's invitation, in Reece's restaurant in Clayton Square, which was the same restaurant where Lennon's parents, Alfred Lennon
Alfred Lennon
Alfred "Alf" Lennon was the father of English musician John Lennon. He spent many years in an orphanage—with his sister, Edith—after his father died. He was known as being very witty and musical throughout his life—he sang and played the banjo—but not as being very dependable...
and Julia Lennon
Julia Lennon
Julia Lennon was the mother of English musician John Lennon, who was born during her marriage to Alfred Lennon. After complaints to Liverpool's Social Services by her eldest sister, Mimi Smith , she handed over the care of her son to her sister...
, had celebrated their marriage 24 years earlier, in 1938. Lennon was 21-years-old, and Cynthia, 22. The newlyweds had no honeymoon, as Lennon had to play an engagement at the Riverpark Ballroom in Chester
Chester
Chester is a city in Cheshire, England. Lying on the River Dee, close to the border with Wales, it is home to 77,040 inhabitants, and is the largest and most populous settlement of the wider unitary authority area of Cheshire West and Chester, which had a population of 328,100 according to the...
the same night, although they did travel to the Hotel George V
Hotel George V, Paris
Hôtel George-V is a famous luxury five-star hotel set just off the Champs-Élysées on Avenue George V, in Paris, France. It is named, like the street in which it is situated, after King George V.-History:...
in Paris, for a belated honeymoon on 16 September, but were accompanied by Epstein, even though he had not been invited to join them.
During her pregnancy, Epstein offered the couple the use of his flat at 36 Faulkner Street, and later paid for a private hospital room when the pregnancy was coming to term. Although still completely unknown outside of Liverpool, by now the Beatles had a fanatical following among girls within the city. Epstein had one condition which the Lennons had to follow: the marriage and the baby were to be kept a close secret, so as not to upset any of these fans. One time when news of the wedding leaked out, the group denied it. Cynthia was happy to keep a low profile, not wanting to be the subject of public attention the way her husband was.
The Lennons' son, John Charles Julian Lennon, was born at 7.45 am on 8 April 1963, in Sefton Hospital. Lennon, being on tour at the time, did not see his son until three days later, and when he finally arrived at the hospital, said: "He's bloody marvellous, Cyn! ... Who's gonna be a famous rocker like his Dad then?" He then explained that he would be going on on a four-day holiday to Barcelona
Barcelona
Barcelona is the second largest city in Spain after Madrid, and the capital of Catalonia, with a population of 1,621,537 within its administrative limits on a land area of...
, with Epstein. Lennon would later refer to Julian as being a "Saturday night special; the way that most people get here", or that his son "came out of a whisky bottle".
Beatlemania
Around the time of Julian's birth, The Beatles' career really took off as a pop sensation in Britain, with their second number one single "From Me to YouFrom Me to You
"From Me to You" is a song written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney and released by The Beatles as a single in 1963. The single was the Beatles' first number one in some of the United Kingdom charts, second in others, but failed to make an impact in the United States at the time of its initial...
", with their first album Please Please Me
Please Please Me
Please Please Me is the debut album by the English rock band The Beatles. Parlophone rush-released the album on 22 March 1963 in the United Kingdom to capitalise on the success of singles "Please Please Me" and "Love Me Do" .Of the album's fourteen songs, eight were written by Lennon–McCartney...
climbing to the top of the charts, with their becoming the headlining act in concerts for the first time, and with Beatles fan magazines starting up. That one of the members was married and gaining a family was not publicly known; a 1963 "Lifelines of the Beatles" page in New Musical Express detailed over 25 biographical facts about, and likes and dislikes of, each of the four, but never gave any hint Lennon was married and indeed listed "girls" as one of his hobbies.
The press heard rumours about Lennon's wife and child at the end of 1963—after full-scale Beatlemania
Beatlemania
Beatlemania is a term that originated during the 1960s to describe the intense fan frenzy directed toward The Beatles during the early years of their success...
had already swept the UK and Europe—and descended on her mother's house in Hoylake (where mother and son were staying) in November and December. Friends and neighbours protected their anonymity, but she was often approached by journalists. In November she had Julian christened at the Hoylake parish church, but didn't tell Lennon (who was on tour at the time) because she feared a media circus. She told him two days after, but he was angry as he hadn't wanted his son to be christened, even though Epstein had asked to be Julian's godfather
Godparent
A godparent, in many denominations of Christianity, is someone who sponsors a child's baptism. A male godparent is a godfather, and a female godparent is a godmother...
. Not long after the christening, every newspaper was full of the story about Lennon's secret wife and baby boy. Epstein told the other Beatles to make the best of the situation, and hoped that newspapers would not mention that Cynthia was pregnant before marrying him. After living at Lennon's aunt's house for some months, the couple moved to London and found a three-bedroomed flat in Emperor's Gate, off Cromwell Road
Cromwell Road
Cromwell Road is a major road in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, London, and is designated part of the A4. It was created in the 19th century and is named after Oliver Cromwell....
. The top floor flat was the third of three, which were each built over two floors. This meant climbing six flights of stairs, as the building had no lift. Cynthia firstly had to carry Julian up to the flat, and then go back down to collect shopping bags. The Beatles' fans soon found out where they were living, and she would find them camping out in the hallway, and would have to push through them when leaving or arriving.
She accompanied Lennon to America on the first Beatles' tour there, with Lennon agreeing to press photos of them together, which infuriated Epstein, as he had worked to keep their marriage a secret. She was left behind in New York when Lennon and the other Beatles were quickly ushered into a car, and in Miami she had to ask the help of fans to convince a security guard who she was. Lennon's response was, "Don't be so bloody slow next time—they could have killed you". It would be the only time Cynthia would go on tour with them. At the Emperor's Gate address the situation grew worse, with fans sticking chewing gum in the lock of the flat and tearing at any article of clothing when she or Lennon were leaving or arriving. American girls would write her letters proclaiming their desperate love for John; the women in the lives of the other Beatles would get equivalent missives. As late as 1967, Beatles' wives were still dealing with occasional physical danger from female Beatles fans, with Cynthia being kicked in the legs by one who demanded that she leave John alone.
As Lennon was either touring or recording, supposed family holidays were skiing in St. Moritz
St. Moritz
St. Moritz is a resort town in the Engadine valley in Switzerland. It is a municipality in the district of Maloja in the Swiss canton of Graubünden...
with producer George Martin
George Martin
Sir George Henry Martin CBE is an English record producer, arranger, composer and musician. He is sometimes referred to as "the Fifth Beatle"— a title that he often describes as "nonsense," but the fact remains that he served as producer on all but one of The Beatles' original albums...
and his girlfriend, or staying at a castle in Ireland with George Harrison
George Harrison
George Harrison, MBE was an English musician, guitarist, singer-songwriter, actor and film producer who achieved international fame as lead guitarist of The Beatles. Often referred to as "the quiet Beatle", Harrison became over time an admirer of Indian mysticism, and introduced it to the other...
and Pattie Boyd
Pattie Boyd
Patricia Anne "Pattie" Boyd is an English model and photographer, and the former wife of both George Harrison and Eric Clapton...
(Harrison's wife). Even these were subject to being discovered by fans, with Cynthia and Pattie having to escape the Irish location by being dressed as maids. As a result of the long recording sessions and tours, Lennon would usually sleep for days afterwards. When Lennon started filming How I Won the War
How I Won the War
How I Won the War is a black comedy film directed by Richard Lester, released in 1967. The film stars Michael Crawford as bungling British Army Officer Lieutenant Earnest Goodbody, with John Lennon , Jack MacGowran , Roy Kinnear and Lee Montague as soldiers under his command...
in Almeria
Almería
Almería is a city in Andalusia, Spain, on the Mediterranean Sea. It is the capital of the province of the same name.-Toponym:Tradition says that the name Almería stems from the Arabic المرية Al-Mariyya: "The Mirror", comparing it to "The Mirror of the Sea"...
, Spain, he promised his wife and son that they could join him there after two weeks of filming. The small apartment they were allocated was swiftly replaced by a villa when Starr and his wife joined them.
Kenwood
Domestic life
The Beatles' accountant advised Epstein that the group members should move to houses near his in EsherEsher
Esher is a town in the Surrey borough of Elmbridge in South East England near the River Mole. It is a very prosperous part of the Greater London Urban Area, largely suburban in character, and is situated 14.1 miles south west of Charing Cross....
, so Lennon bought a house called Kenwood
Kenwood, St. George's Hill
Kenwood is a house on the St. George's Hill estate, Weybridge, Surrey, England. Originally called the Brown House, it was designed by architect T.A. Allen, and built in 1913 by local builders, Love & Sons. The estate was constructed around the Weybridge Golf Club, which was designed in 1912 by...
; a mock-Tudor-style house on three acres in Weybridge
Weybridge
Weybridge is a town in the Elmbridge district of Surrey in South East England. It is bounded to the north by the River Thames at the mouth of the River Wey, from which it gets its name...
, where Tom Jones
Tom Jones (singer)
Sir Thomas John Woodward, OBE , known by his stage name Tom Jones, is a Welsh singer.Since the mid 1960s, Jones has sung many styles of popular music – pop, rock, R&B, show tunes, country, dance, techno, soul and gospel – and sold over 100 million records...
and Cliff Richard
Cliff Richard
Sir Cliff Richard, OBE is a British pop singer, musician, performer, actor, and philanthropist who has sold over an estimated 250 million records worldwide....
already lived.
Lennon then spent twice the original £20,000 purchase price on renovations for Kenwood, reducing its 22 rooms to 17. The new kitchen was so modern and complicated that someone had to be sent to explain how everything worked, and during the extensive renovations the couple had to live in the attic bedroom for nine months. Although Cynthia enjoyed entertaining in the larger rooms, Lennon could usually be found in a small sunroom at the back of the house overlooking the swimming pool, which was similar to his aunt's conservatory in Liverpool. They had a cat called "Mimi", named after Lennon's aunt. Cynthia took care of Julian herself, without a nanny, although babysitters were frequently employed. She also did the cooking herself, but employed a housekeeper, gardener, and chauffeur, who lived off the premises.
When she passed her driving test, Lennon serially bought her a white Mini
Mini
The Mini is a small car that was made by the British Motor Corporation and its successors from 1959 until 2000. The original is considered a British icon of the 1960s, and its space-saving front-wheel-drive layout influenced a generation of car-makers...
, a gold Porsche
Porsche
Porsche Automobil Holding SE, usually shortened to Porsche SE a Societas Europaea or European Public Company, is a German based holding company with investments in the automotive industry....
, a red Ferrari
Ferrari
Ferrari S.p.A. is an Italian sports car manufacturer based in Maranello, Italy. Founded by Enzo Ferrari in 1929, as Scuderia Ferrari, the company sponsored drivers and manufactured race cars before moving into production of street-legal vehicles as Ferrari S.p.A. in 1947...
, and a green Volkswagen Beetle
Volkswagen Beetle
The Volkswagen Type 1, widely known as the Volkswagen Beetle or Volkswagen Bug, is an economy car produced by the German auto maker Volkswagen from 1938 until 2003...
, usually as surprises without consulting her first. Cynthia enjoyed the closeness of Maureen Starkey (Ringo Starr's
Ringo Starr
Richard Starkey, MBE better known by his stage name Ringo Starr, is an English musician and actor who gained worldwide fame as the drummer for The Beatles. When the band formed in 1960, Starr was a member of another Liverpool band, Rory Storm and the Hurricanes. He became The Beatles' drummer in...
wife) and Boyd, as both lived nearby, often going on holiday together or shopping. She was often photographed at Beatles' movie premieres and special occasions, and sometimes with Lennon and Julian at home, which meant she had the role of a Beatle wife, as well as being a mother. The Lennons would often go to a nightclub in central London until nearly dawn, but in the morning she would take her son to school. Kenwood became the place to visit for the other Beatles, various American musicians, and total strangers that Lennon had met the previous night in London nightclubs.
In 1965, she opened the front door of Kenwood to see a man who "looked like a tramp", but with her husband's features. He explained that he was Alfred Lennon
Alfred Lennon
Alfred "Alf" Lennon was the father of English musician John Lennon. He spent many years in an orphanage—with his sister, Edith—after his father died. He was known as being very witty and musical throughout his life—he sang and played the banjo—but not as being very dependable...
, the father whom Lennon had supposedly not seen for years. Lennon was annoyed when he came home, telling her for the first time that his father had visited the NEMS office a few weeks before. Three years after the meeting in the NEMS office, Alfred Lennon (who was then 56 years old) turned up at Kenwood again with his fiancée, 19-year-old student Pauline Jones. He asked if the Lennons could give Pauline a job, so she was hired to help with Julian and the piles of Beatles' fan mail. Lennon's father and his fiancée then spent a few months living in the attic
Attic
An attic is a space found directly below the pitched roof of a house or other building . Attic is generally the American/Canadian reference to it...
bedroom. During an interview at Kenwood with Evening Standard reporter Maureen Cleave
Maureen Cleave
Maureen Cleave is an English journalist who worked for the London Evening News and London Evening Standard in the 1960s, conducting interviews with famous musicians of the era, including Bob Dylan and John Lennon....
, Lennon said, "Here I am in my Hansel and Gretel
Hansel and Gretel
"Hansel and Gretel" is a well-known fairy tale of German origin, recorded by the Brothers Grimm and published in 1812. Hansel and Gretel are a young brother and sister threatened by a cannibalistic hag living deep in the forest in a house constructed of cake and confectionery. The two children...
house, famous and loaded
Wealth
Wealth is the abundance of valuable resources or material possessions. The word wealth is derived from the old English wela, which is from an Indo-European word stem...
, and I can't go anywhere. There's something else I'm going to do, only I don't know what it is, but I do know this isn't it for me".
Drugs
Cynthia knew that her husband took drugs like cannabisCannabis (drug)
Cannabis, also known as marijuana among many other names, refers to any number of preparations of the Cannabis plant intended for use as a psychoactive drug or for medicinal purposes. The English term marijuana comes from the Mexican Spanish word marihuana...
and Preludin
Phenmetrazine
Phenmetrazine is a stimulant drug of the morpholine chemical class that was previously used as an appetite suppressant, but has since been withdrawn from the market...
, but thought of them as not being very dangerous. On 27 March 1965, at a dinner party given by a dentist, John Riley, the Lennons, Harrison and Boyd were given LSD
LSD
Lysergic acid diethylamide, abbreviated LSD or LSD-25, also known as lysergide and colloquially as acid, is a semisynthetic psychedelic drug of the ergoline family, well known for its psychological effects which can include altered thinking processes, closed and open eye visuals, synaesthesia, an...
without their knowledge. Against the repeated advice of Riley and his wife not to leave the house, Harrison drove them to various nightclubs, with Riley following them by taxi. Lennon was crying and banging his head against the windows, and Boyd wanted to get out of the car and smash shop windows in Regent Street. At the Ad Lib club, they thought the lift up to the club was on fire and started screaming, before finally crawling out of the lift for which Mick Jagger
Mick Jagger
Sir Michael Philip "Mick" Jagger is an English musician, singer and songwriter, best known as the lead vocalist and a founding member of The Rolling Stones....
, Marianne Faithfull
Marianne Faithfull
Marianne Evelyn Faithfull is an award-winning English singer, songwriter and actress whose career has spanned five decades....
, and Starr were waiting. Harrison later drove them back home in Boyd's Mini Cooper at no more than 10 mph, as he was also feeling the effects of the drug. They stayed up all night at Kenwood, experiencing the full effects of their first LSD trip.
Lennon then started taking LSD on a regular basis, as well as his daily use of cannabis. After much encouragement from him, Cynthia agreed to try LSD one more time, but the adverse effects were the same. Although she said at the time she would never take the drug again, she relented and took it for the last time a few weeks later, on the way to a party at Epstein's country house in Warbleton
Warbleton
Warbleton is a civil parish in the Wealden District of East Sussex, England. Within its bounds are four settlements, one of which gives its name to the parish. It is located south-east of Heathfield on the slopes of the Weald.-History:...
, East Sussex. Although she hated the psychological effects of the drug, she could see the change taking place in her husband: "It was like living with someone who had just discovered religion ... Tensions, bigotry, and bad temper were replaced by understanding and love". In 1970, Lennon confessed that he had probably taken LSD one thousand times since 1965, saying: "I used to just eat it all the time". In the decades ahead, Cynthia would always maintain that Lennon's drug use was the beginning of the end for the couple.
On 22 July 1967, Harrison, Boyd, Starr, and assistant Neil Aspinall
Neil Aspinall
Neil Stanley Aspinall was a British music industry executive. A school friend of Paul McCartney and George Harrison, he went on to head The Beatles' company Apple Corps....
, flew to Athens, where they stayed overnight until Lennon, his wife and son, McCartney and Jane Asher
Jane Asher
Jane Asher is an English actress. She has also developed a second career as a cake decorator and cake shop proprietor.-Early life:...
(McCartney's girlfriend), Boyd's 16-year-old sister, Paula, roadie Mal Evans
Mal Evans
Malcolm Frederick 'Mal' Evans was best known as the road manager, assistant, and a friend of The Beatles: John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr....
, and publicist Alistair Taylor
Alistair Taylor
James Alistair Taylor was the English personal assistant of Brian Epstein who accompanied him to the Cavern Club when he first saw The Beatles play on 9 November 1961...
set off for Athens. Looking for an island they could buy to live on together, they chartered a yacht, the MV Arvi. McCartney later said that whilst sailing around Greek islands, everybody just "sat around and took LSD". Lennon and the other Beatles publicly renounced drugs—although never completely—after their initial meetings with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi , born Mahesh Prasad Varma , developed the Transcendental Meditation technique and was the leader and guru of the TM movement, characterised as a new religious movement and also as non-religious...
in London, and Bangor
Bangor, Gwynedd
Bangor is a city in Gwynedd, north west Wales, and one of the smallest cities in Britain. It is a university city with a population of 13,725 at the 2001 census, not including around 10,000 students at Bangor University. Including nearby Menai Bridge on Anglesey, which does not however form part of...
, Wales.
By 1967, Lennon's aggressive edges from his childhood had disappeared, and he spent considerable amounts of time living inside his head, sitting in his sunroom or garden and daydreaming for hours at end. He became somewhat uncommunicative towards most people, including Cynthia, except for the other Beatles, all of whom had an almost unspoken ability to understand one another. Cynthia once complained, saying: "What I'd like is a holiday of our own ... John, Julian and me". Lennon replied with, "OK, I know, we'll all retire to a little cottage on a cliff in Cornwall, all right?" He then added, "No, I've got these bloody songs to write. I have to work, to justify living." She understood his temperament, but felt somewhat frustrated at never having developed a career or using her art college background for anything.
India and Ono
The Beatles were scheduled to fly to India to visit the Maharishi for two or three months of Transcendental Meditation. Before they left, Cynthia found letters from Yoko OnoYoko Ono
is a Japanese artist, musician, author and peace activist, known for her work in avant-garde art, music and filmmaking as well as her marriage to John Lennon...
to Lennon that made it clear that he had had contact with her over a period of some time. Lennon denied that he was involved with Ono, explaining that she was just some "crazy artist" who wanted to be sponsored, although Ono kept up a stream of telephone calls and visits to Kenwood. On 15 February 1968, the Lennons flew to India, followed by the other Beatles and their partners four days later: Boyd, Asher, and Maureen Starkey
Maureen Starkey
Maureen "Mo" Starkey Tigrett, née Mary Cox, was the first wife of The Beatles drummer, Ringo Starr. She met Starr at The Cavern Club, where The Beatles were playing, when she was a trainee hairdresser in Liverpool. Starr proposed marriage at the Ad-Lib Club in London, on 20 January 1965...
(Starr's wife). The division between the sexes was emphasized by the male musicians sitting outside at night composing songs, while their partners would gather together in one of their rooms, often talking about life as the wife or partner of a Beatle. The Lennons shared a four-poster bed at the ashram, with Lennon playing guitar and Cynthia drawing and writing poetry between their long sessions of meditation.
"Magic Alex" (Greek-born Alex Mardas, who controlled Apple Electronics) arrived later, smuggling in alcohol from the nearest village as it was not allowed in the ashram. After two weeks Lennon asked to sleep in a separate room, saying he could only meditate when he was alone, but walked down to the local post office every morning to see if he had received a telegram from Ono, who sent one almost daily. Cynthia found out about these secretive trips much later, saying: "I had thought our magical interlude with the Maharishi would be the making of our marriage – but in reality it just presaged the end". Paul Saltzman
Paul Saltzman
Paul Saltzman is a two-time Canadian Emmy Award-winning film and television producer-director with more than 300 films to his credit. The 2008 documentary feature, Prom Night in Mississippi, featuring actor Morgan Freeman, was his most recent film and premiered at the 2009 Sundance Film...
later published a book of photographs, The Beatles in Rishikesh, showing Lennon deep in thought, and Cynthia's confused expression. Despite the alienation from Lennon, she later spoke about her time there, saying: "I loved being away from the fans, hordes of people, deadlines, demands and flashing cameras".
Divorce
Groupie
A groupie is a person who seeks emotional and sexual intimacy with a musician or other celebrity. "Groupie" is derived from group in reference to a musical group, but the word is also used in a more general sense, especially in casual conversation....
s, friends (such as Joan Baez
Joan Baez
Joan Chandos Baez is an American folk singer, songwriter, musician and a prominent activist in the fields of human rights, peace and environmental justice....
, and journalist Cleave), and "thousands" of women around the globe. Although not wanting to hear Lennon's confession, she knew women were attracted to him, "like moths to a flame". Two weeks later, in May 1968, Lennon suggested that Cynthia take a holiday in Greece with Mardas, Donovan
Donovan
Donovan Donovan Donovan (born Donovan Philips Leitch (born 10 May 1946) is a Scottish singer-songwriter and guitarist. Emerging from the British folk scene, he developed an eclectic and distinctive style that blended folk, jazz, pop, psychedelia, and world music...
, and two friends, as he would be very busy recording The White Album
The Beatles (album)
The Beatles is the ninth official album by the English rock group The Beatles, a double album released in 1968. It is also commonly known as "The White Album" as it has no graphics or text other than the band's name embossed on its plain white sleeve.The album was written and recorded during a...
. She arrived back at Kenwood from Greece earlier than expected, at four o'clock on 22 May 1968, to discover Lennon and Ono sitting cross-legged on the floor in matching white robes, staring into each others eyes, and then found Ono's slippers outside the Lennons' bedroom door. Shocked, she asked Jenny Boyd
Jenny Boyd
Helen Mary Boyd is a former 1960s London fashion model. She is also the younger sister of Pattie Boyd, who married Beatle George Harrison....
and Mardas if she could spend the night at their apartment. At the apartment Boyd went straight to bed, but she and Mardas drank more alcohol, with Mardas trying to convince her that they should run away together. After she had vomited in the bathroom, she collapsed on a bed in the spare bedroom, with Mardas joining her and trying to kiss her until she pushed him away.
Lennon seemed absolutely normal when she returned home the next day, and steadfastly maintained his love for her and their son, saying: "It's you I love Cyn ... I love you now more than ever before". Lennon went to New York with McCartney shortly after, but as she was specifically not invited, a trip to Pesaro
Pesaro
Pesaro is a town and comune in the Italian region of the Marche, capital of the Pesaro e Urbino province, on the Adriatic. According to the 2007 census, its population was 92,206....
, in Italy, was arranged with her mother. After an evening with Italian hotelier, Roberto Bassanini, Mardas was waiting at the hotel to break the news that Lennon was planning to sue for divorce on grounds of adultery, seek sole custody of Julian, and "send her back to Hoylake". She said in 2005: "The mere fact that ‘Magic Alex’ [Mardas] arrived in Italy in the middle of the night without any prior knowledge of where I was staying made me extremely suspicious. I was being coerced into making it easy" ... [for Lennon and Ono] "to accuse me of doing something that would make them not look so bad." As Lennon had initiated divorce proceedings, it prompted her to exclaim: "Suing me for divorce? On what grounds is he suing me? When the news broke that Ono was pregnant, Cynthia started her own divorce proceedings against Lennon on 22 August 1968. The financial settlement was hampered by Lennon refusing to offer any more than £75,000, telling her on the phone, "That's like winning the pools
Football pools
A football pool, often collectively referred to as "the pools", is a betting pool based on predicting the outcome of top-level association football matches set to take place in the coming week. The pools are typically cheap to enter, with the potential to win huge money. Entries were traditionally...
, so what are you moaning about? You're not worth any more." The settlement was then raised to £100,000, £2,400 annually, and custody of Julian. Another £100,000 was put into a trust fund which Julian would inherit when he was 21. Until that time, his mother would receive the interest payments. Their decree nisi
Decree nisi
A decree nisi is a court order that does not have any force until such time that a particular condition is met, such as a subsequent petition to the court or the passage of a specified period of time....
was granted on 8 November 1968. The trust fund had one one codicil, in that it also provided for any further children by Lennon, so when Sean Lennon
Sean Lennon
is an American singer, songwriter, musician, guitarist and actor. He is the only child of John Lennon and Yoko Ono. His godfather is Sir Elton John.-Early life and education:...
was born, Julian's inheritance was cut to £50,000.
She lived for a few months in a flat Starr owned at 34 Montagu Square, central London, but returned to Kenwood as Lennon and Ono preferred to live there instead, rather than in isolated Weybridge. Lennon and his wife had one last short meeting at Kenwood (with Ono alongside Lennon) with Lennon accusing her of having an affair in India, saying that she was no "innocent little flower". McCartney visited her and Julian that year, and on the way to Kenwood he composed a song in his head that would later become "Hey Jude
Hey Jude
"Hey Jude" is a song by the English rock band The Beatles, written by Paul McCartney and credited to Lennon–McCartney. The ballad evolved from "Hey Jules", a song widely accepted as being written to comfort John Lennon's son, Julian, during his parents' divorce—although this explanation is not...
". Talking about their divorce, McCartney later said: "We'd been very good friends for millions of years and I thought it was a bit much for them suddenly to be personae non gratae and out of my life". Cynthia recalled, "I was truly surprised when, one afternoon, Paul arrived on his own. I was touched by his obvious concern for our welfare ... On the journey down he composed 'Hey Jude' in the car. I will never forget Paul's gesture of care and concern in coming to see us." She was once asked if Lennon had written any songs about their time together, and answered: "It was too sloppy when you were young to dedicate anything to anybody. Macho Northern men didn't do that in those days". In contrast, Lennon did write the 1965 song "Norwegian Wood
Norwegian Wood
Norwegian Wood is a 1965 song by The Beatles.Norwegian Wood may also refer to:* Norwegian Wood , an annual music festival in Oslo, Norway* Norwegian Wood , by Haruki Murakami...
" about an affair he was having, but rendered it in "gobbledegook" so that Cynthia would not know.
Later life to present
On 31 July 1970, Cynthia married Bassanini, whom she had started dating after parting with Lennon; the couple divorced in 1973. She then opened a restaurant in RuthinRuthin
Ruthin is a community and the county town of Denbighshire in north Wales. Located around a hill in the southern part of the Vale of Clwyd - the older part of the town, the castle and Saint Peter's Square are located on top of the hill, while many newer parts of the town are on the floodplain of...
, Wales, called Oliver's Bistro, which also had a B&B
Bed and breakfast
A bed and breakfast is a small lodging establishment that offers overnight accommodation and breakfast, but usually does not offer other meals. Since the 1980s, the meaning of the term has also extended to include accommodations that are also known as "self-catering" establishments...
above the premises. She enrolled her son into the Ruthin School
Ruthin School
Ruthin School is one of the oldest public schools in the United Kingdom. Located on the outskirts of Ruthin, the county town of Denbighshire in North Wales, the school is over seven hundred years old and has been co-educational since 1990.- Beginnings :...
, and he later joined the local Combined Cadet Force
Combined Cadet Force
The Combined Cadet Force is a Ministry of Defence sponsored youth organisation in the United Kingdom. Its aim is to "provide a disciplined organisation in a school so that pupils may develop powers of leadership by means of training to promote the qualities of responsibility, self reliance,...
. During Lennon's separation from Ono in 1973/74, his partner at the time, May Pang
May Pang
May Fung Yee Pang is best known as the former girlfriend of John Lennon. She had previously worked as a personal assistant and production coordinator for Lennon and his wife, Yoko Ono....
, actively tried to get Lennon to spend more time with his son, forming a friendship with Lennon's ex-wife in the process, which continued even after Lennon and Ono were reconciled. A meeting during this period was the last time Cynthia saw John.
Previously, Julian had been allowed to visit his father twice a year by himself, but Lennon complained that during his time with Pang his ex-wife also wanted to be present, saying: "She [Cynthia] thought she could walk back in 'cos I wasn't with Yoko!" After his reconciliation with Ono, he complained again that his son was not being allowed to visit him.
On 1 May 1976, she married John Twist, an engineer from Lancashire
Lancashire
Lancashire is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in the North West of England. It takes its name from the city of Lancaster, and is sometimes known as the County of Lancaster. Although Lancaster is still considered to be the county town, Lancashire County Council is based in Preston...
. She published a memoir during their time together, A Twist of Lennon, in 1978, telling about her life before and with Lennon, and containing her own illustrations and poetry. Lennon tried to stop the publication of the book, after an excerpt was published in a newspaper.
On 9 December 1980 (UK time), whilst staying at Starr's ex-wife's home, she received a phone call from Starr, two hours after Lennon had been shot in New York. "The memory of Ringo's words, the sound of his tearful voice crackling over the transatlantic line, is crystal clear: 'Cynthia, I'm so sorry, John's dead'. I had only one clear thought. My son, our son, [Julian] was at home in bed, I had to get back to Ruthin so that I could tell him about his father's death".
Cynthia's memoir gained renewed interest, and went to a third printing of 200,000 copies in the weeks after Lennon's death. She and Twist separated in 1981, and were divorced in 1983. She sold the Bistro, and changed her name back to Lennon by deed poll, later commenting about why it was financially necessary: "Do you imagine I would have been awarded a three-year contract to design bedding and textiles [for Vantona Vyella
Viyella
Viyella was a blend of wool and cotton first woven in 1893 in England, and soon to be the "first branded fabric in the world". It was made of 55 percent merino wool and 45 percent cotton in a twill weave, developed by James and Robert Sissons of William Hollins & Company, spinners and hosiers...
in 1983] with the name Powell? Neither did they. When it is necessary to earn a living, it is necessary to bite the bullet and take the flack".
She began a relationship with Liverpudlian chauffeur Jim Christie in 1981, who became her partner for 17 years as well as her business manager, living in Penrith
Penrith, Cumbria
Penrith was an urban district between 1894 and 1974, when it was merged into Eden District.The authority's area was coterminous with the civil parish of Penrith although when the council was abolished Penrith became an unparished area....
, Cumbria. She said at the time: "Jim has never felt he's living in John Lennon's shadow. He's four years younger than me and wasn't really part of that whole Beatles' scene." They later lived on the Isle of Man
Isle of Man
The Isle of Man , otherwise known simply as Mann , is a self-governing British Crown Dependency, located in the Irish Sea between the islands of Great Britain and Ireland, within the British Isles. The head of state is Queen Elizabeth II, who holds the title of Lord of Mann. The Lord of Mann is...
and then Normandy
Normandy
Normandy is a geographical region corresponding to the former Duchy of Normandy. It is in France.The continental territory covers 30,627 km² and forms the preponderant part of Normandy and roughly 5% of the territory of France. It is divided for administrative purposes into two régions:...
for some years, but separated in 1998.
She had kept mementos of Lennon for years, but began auctioning off them after his death, including a personally drawn Christmas card from Lennon to her that fetched £8,800 at Christie's
Christie's
Christie's is an art business and a fine arts auction house.- History :The official company literature states that founder James Christie conducted the first sale in London, England, on 5 December 1766, and the earliest auction catalogue the company retains is from December 1766...
in August 1981. With her finances in an unsteady state – she would say in 1999 that "Apart from John, the men I have fallen in love with have never been good at earning a living" – more of her memorabilia of Lennon went up for auction in 1991, including antiques from Kenwood. She said at the time, "I've enjoyed these things for 30 years. But it's time for a change." Another set of items, including some of Lennon's drug paraphernalia, brought over $60,000 for her in 1995. She later stated, "I think in life we collect so much baggage, when you have a clearout, you send it to a car-boot sale, etc. My baggage was in demand and sold at Christie's. When you have to pay the bills, you're not proud and you can't take it with you".
Over the years she entered some failed business ventures, including in 1988 a perfume named Woman (after the 1980 John Lennon song) and, in April 1989, a restaurant named Lennon's—at 13/14 Upper St. Martin's Lane
St. Martin's Lane
St. Martin's Lane is a street on the edge of Covent Garden in Central London, which runs from the church of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, after which it is named, near Trafalgar Square northwards to Long Acre.A narrow street with relatively little traffic, St...
, Covent Garden
Covent Garden
Covent Garden is a district in London on the eastern fringes of the West End, between St. Martin's Lane and Drury Lane. It is associated with the former fruit and vegetable market in the central square, now a popular shopping and tourist site, and the Royal Opera House, which is also known as...
—which had menu items such as Rubber Sole (a play on the already-punning 1965 Beatles album
Rubber Soul
Rubber Soul is the sixth studio album by the English rock group The Beatles, released in December 1965. Produced by George Martin, Rubber Soul had been recorded in just over four weeks to make the Christmas market...
), as well as Sgt. Pepper's Steak and Penny Lane Pâté. It had a short life as a business venture, as it was considered to be far too expensive. She would later blame some of these efforts on the men in her life encouraging her.
The Beatles' Hamburg days were the subject of the 1994 film Backbeat
Backbeat (film)
Backbeat is a 1994 British-German drama film directed by Iain Softley. It chronicles the early days of The Beatles in Hamburg, Germany. The film focuses primarily on the relationship between Stuart Sutcliffe and John Lennon , and also with Sutcliffe's German girlfriend Astrid Kirchherr...
, with Jennifer Ehle
Jennifer Ehle
Jennifer Ehle is an American actress of stage and screen. She is known for her BAFTA winning role as Elizabeth Bennet in the 1995 mini-series Pride and Prejudice.-Early life:...
portraying Cynthia Powell. The film characterizes Lennon and Cynthia's relationship as one that will eventually be doomed by their wanting different things from life, but with Lennon not wanting to hurt her. Cynthia later complained that the film made her out "as a clingy, dim, little girlfriend in a headscarf". Cynthia was subsequently portrayed in the troubled, Ono-centric 2005 American musical Lennon
Lennon (musical)
Lennon is a musical with music and lyrics by John Lennon and book by Don Scardino, who also directed its premiere. The musical is about the life of John Lennon and was notable for Scardino's choice to be almost exclusively-based on Lennon's own words and to focus on Lennon's solo career, with no...
, with her character – played by Julia Murney
Julia Murney
Julia Kathleen Murney is an American actress, singer and theatre performer, primarily featured in theatre and television commercial voice-overs. Until 2005, she was commonly known as the Broadway actress who had technically never appeared on Broadway...
– gaining a little more prominence during one of the show's rewrites. Her life had a more central role in the 2010 BBC Four
BBC Four
BBC Four is a British television network operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation and available to digital television viewers on Freeview, IPTV, satellite and cable....
film Lennon Naked
Lennon Naked
Lennon Naked is a 2010 television biographical film focusing on the life of John Lennon between 1967 and 1971. It stars Christopher Eccleston as Lennon and was directed by Edmund Coulthard....
, with Claudie Blakley
Claudie Blakley
Claudia "Claudie" Blakley is an English actress.Her father was Alan Blakely, a member of the 1960s pop band The Tremeloes, and her sister Kirsten Blakley is lead singer of the indie band Little Spitfire. Blakley trained at the Central School of Speech and Drama...
playing the part. However, her character was absent from the 2009 British film Nowhere Boy
Nowhere Boy
Nowhere Boy is a 2009 British biopic about John Lennon's adolescence, his relationships with his guardian aunt and his birth mother, the creation of his first band, the Quarrymen, and its evolution into the Beatles. The film is based on a biography written by Lennon's half-sister Julia Baird...
, which purported to cover the story of Lennon from 1955 to 1960 but focused on his relationships with his aunt and mother.
In 1995, Cynthia made her recording début with a rendition of "Those Were the Days
Those Were the Days (song)
"Those Were the Days" is a song credited to Gene Raskin, who put English lyrics to the Russian song "Dorogoi dlinnoyu" , written by Boris Fomin with words by the poet Konstantin Podrevskii. It deals with reminiscence upon youth and romantic idealism...
", which as produced by McCartney had been a number one hit for Mary Hopkin
Mary Hopkin
Mary Hopkin , credited on some recordings as Mary Visconti, is a Welsh folk singer best known for her 1968 UK number one single "Those Were The Days". She was one of the first musicians to sign to The Beatles' Apple label....
in 1968. It failed to chart. Whilst living in Normandy, an exhibition of her drawings and paintings were displayed at Portobello Road
Portobello Road
Portobello Road is a street in the Notting Hill district of The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in west London, England. It runs almost the length of Notting Hill from south to north, roughly parallel with Ladbroke Grove. On Saturdays it is home to Portobello Road Market, one of London's...
's KDK Gallery in 1999. By the 1990s she was appearing at some Beatles conventions, but appeared ambivalent about the practice. At times she maintained she was moving on with her life and putting her Beatles past behind her and at other times seemed to embrace continued interest in that past as inevitable. The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
said in a 1999 profile, "In essence, she is a suburban woman who – almost in spite of herself – got caught up with one of the most extraordinary men of modern times. More than 30 years since her marriage to John Lennon ended, she is as entangled as ever."
In 2002, she married Noel Charles, a night club owner. In September 2005, she published a new biography, John, that re-examined her life with Lennon and the years afterwards, including the events following his death. Michel Faber
Michel Faber
Michel Faber is a Dutch-born writer of fiction. He writes in English.Faber was born in The Hague, Netherlands. He and his parents emigrated to Australia in 1967...
, writing in The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, said of the book: "John is Cynthia's attempt to prove how much more she was worth. In theory, the disclosures of Lennon's loyal partner from 1958 to 1968 cannot fail to be valuable. On the page, the potential withers". In 2006, she and her son attended the Las Vegas
Las Vegas metropolitan area
The Las Vegas Valley is the heart of the Las Vegas-Paradise, NV MSA also known as the Las Vegas–Paradise–Henderson MSA which includes all of Clark County, Nevada, and is a metropolitan area in the southern part of the U.S. state of Nevada. The Valley is defined by the Las Vegas Valley landform, a ...
premiere of the Cirque du Soleil
Cirque du Soleil
Cirque du Soleil , is a Canadian entertainment company, self-described as a "dramatic mix of circus arts and street entertainment." Based in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, and located in the inner-city area of Saint-Michel, it was founded in Baie-Saint-Paul in 1984 by two former street performers, Guy...
production of Love
LOVE (Cirque du Soleil)
Love is a 2006 theatrical production by Cirque du Soleil which combines the re-produced and re-imagined music of The Beatles with an interpretive, circus-based artistic and athletic stage performance. The show plays at a specially built theatre at The Mirage in Las Vegas.A joint venture between...
, which marked a rare public appearance with Ono. In 2009, she and her son opened an exhibition of memorabilia at The Beatles Story
The Beatles Story
The Beatles Story is a visitor attraction dedicated to the leading 1960s group The Beatles. It is based in Albert Dock, Liverpool, England.- Description :...
exhibition in Liverpool, and she and Pattie Boyd staged a first-ever joint appearance at the opening of the Cafesjian Center for the Arts in Yerevan
Yerevan
Yerevan is the capital and largest city of Armenia and one of the world's oldest continuously-inhabited cities. Situated along the Hrazdan River, Yerevan is the administrative, cultural, and industrial center of the country...
, Armenia
Armenia
Armenia , officially the Republic of Armenia , is a landlocked mountainous country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia...
. On 30 September 2010, Julian opened his "Timeless" exhibition of photographs at the Morrison Hotel Gallery in New York. In attendance were Cynthia, Julian, Ono, Sean, and Pang, which was the first time that all five had been in the same room together.
The John Lennon Peace Monument
John Lennon Peace Monument
The John Lennon Peace Monument, in Liverpool, England, is a peace monument dedicated to the memory of John Lennon.Also known as the European Peace Monument, it was unveiled by Julian and Cynthia Lennon at a ceremony in Chavasse Park, Liverpool, on Saturday October 9, 2010 to celebrate what would...
was unveiled by Cynthia and Julian at a ceremony in Chavasse Park
Chavasse Park
Chavasse park is an open space in the city centre of Liverpool, England, United Kingdom. It was named in commemoration of the Chavasse family; Francis and his twin sons Christopher Maude Chavasse , and Noel Godfrey Chavasse Chavasse park is an open space in the city centre of Liverpool, England,...
, Liverpool, on 9 October 2010 to celebrate what would have been Lennon’s 70th birthday. She currently lives with her husband on the island of Majorca in Spain.