"Dancing in the Dark"

”Dancing in the Dark” was the last song that Bruce Springsteen wrote to his album ”Born in the U.S.A” which was issued in 1984.

The setting in the song is characterized by the fact that the main person is not content with his life and want a change. I choose to call the main person ”he” because it is Bruce Springsteen who sings, but it can also be a ”she”.

The song is about a person who feels bad about himself. He is tired and bored, and so he looks in the mirror: He wants to change his clothes, hair and face. He is living in a dump and wants a big change in his life. In the song there are only the words in the refrain which are repeated. The reason for that is because Bruce Springsteen tell a story with the song.

The refrain says: ” You can't start a fire, you can't start a fire without a spark”. A fire do not start with a big fire, it starts with a small spark. That means that everything starts in the small.

Then the song says: ”You sit around getting older” and ” I'm dying for some action”. That means that he is longing for a change, and if nothing happens he is going to live the same bad life.

The end underlines that everything starts in the small. So every kind of changes begin in the small.