Tony Wilson Refuses the Buyout, Explained：sell out

What's really going on

The offer looks like a triumph, but Tony treats it as a category error: you can't buy Factory because Factory isn't structured to be owned. 'We are an experiment in human nature,' he says, and the detail that follows — the artists own their work, the label owns nothing, there are no contracts — is the whole scene's argument. His refusal is also self-protection. 'I don't have to deal with you at all,' he tells the buyer, then explains that he has kept himself from ever facing the dilemma of selling out 'by having nothing to sell out.' It's an idealist's boast and a coward's hedge at once, and both readings are true at once. When his friend says, 'Tony, you're fucking mad,' he answers, 'That's a point of view' — neither defending nor denying. The Hacienda's closing years later gives the scene its echo: 'Glorious. The Hacienda is dead, it will never grow old.'

Theme

このチャプターで学べること

• To sell out is to betray your principles.
• A princely sum is a very large amount of money.
• To labour under a misapprehension is to be plainly mistaken.
• To take root means to settle and start growing.

発音のポイント

• worth such a — Link worth-such-a together in one breath.
• sum total of — Keep of weak: sum-total-uv.
• dandelion — Stress the middle syllable: dan-DE-li-on.