Diary of a Shopkeeper, 30th August
I came into work on Wednesday morning to find that Lauren was streaming a Dolly Parton playlist around the shop. Of course she was: everybody loves Dolly, and everyone is sad to see her go. If it was a surprise to hear of her death at the age of 80, it was because she looked and sounded more or less the same at 80 as she had at 40. She did not grow old like we grow old.
Her public persona was a carefully constructed paradox, which she’d maintained since the earliest days of her career in the 1960s. On the one had she cultivated a look that was garish and glitzy to the point of being country kitsch. On the other hand, in innumerable interviews and actions, she revealed her true self: thoughtful, tolerant, liberal.
Born in a different place at a different time, she might have expressed political views more openly, but being a woman from Tennessee, working in an industry renowned for its conservatism, it’s a miracle she said as much as she did. As long ago as 1966, in her first hit, ‘Dumb Blonde’, she sang, ‘Just because I'm blonde don't think I'm dumb / Cause this dumb blonde ain't nobody's fool.’ Right from the beginning she was telling us not to judge her on her appearance, but on her achievements.
And what amazing achievements they were. 10 Grammy awards and two Oscar nominations. 100 million records sold. 3,000 songs written. 25 No 1 country hits. A pioneering role, with pop hits like ‘There You Go Again’ and ‘9 to 5’, in introducing urban audiences to the wonders of a music that originated in hardscrabble rural backwaters. Beyond that there was her philanthropy, most notably the creation of the Imagination Library, which posts books monthly to young children around the world, including parts of the UK. Since its founding 30 years ago, it’s reported to have sent out 332 million free books.
It’s a remarkable contribution to literacy and education, especially in a USA better known these days for banning and burning books than giving them away to families in need. In 2025, 5,668 books were banned from libraries across the USA. Nashville is often referred to as Music City USA, but it’s also known as The Buckle on the Bible Belt. It was there in 2022 that an evangelical pastor called Greg Locke organised a burning of books he had decided promoted witchcraft. Dangerous things like the Harry Potter and Twilight series.
Nashville is also home to the biggest Christian publisher in the world, Thomas Nelson. Yes, the same Thomas Nelson that was founded in Edinburgh in 1798, and remained one of Scotland’s leading generalist publishers for nearly two centuries. It’s owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp now. At the heart of this culture, Dolly wrote and recorded songs that appealed to listeners of every class, creed and colour. And she spoke out in support of every progressive cause, without alienating the conservative base of her home: as much as she could, she took them along with her. That might be her greatest achievement of all.
Or it might it be ‘Jolene’ with its insistent minor-key backing and melody line that repeatedly rises in plea and falls in despair. Or it might be the joyous feminism of ‘9 to 5.’ Or the irresistibly catchy ‘Here You Come Again’ with its unusual and clever key modulations: F# in the first two verses, A for the first bridge; an unexpected G for the third verse and Bb for the second bridge; then Ab for the final verse. (Keep up at the back!)
All day I asked customers and staff what their favourite Dolly Parton song was. Almost everybody had one. How many artists would get that response? Maybe The Beatles or Elvis, but very few others. ‘Coat of Many Colours’ got some votes, as did another narrative of Parton’s poverty-stricken childhood, ‘My Tennessee Mountain Home.’ Two customers named ‘I Will Always Love You’, while apologising for it being an obvious choice. Getting one vote each were ‘Down from Dover,’ a tragic tale of a teenage pregnancy from early in her career, and ‘Little Sparrow’, an eerie folk tune that sounds as if it it’s centuries old, but was in fact written by Dolly after the death of her father in 2000. So many favourite songs! And just a tiny fraction of what she recorded.
Until this week, I might have made up a wish-fulfilling fiction for this Diary that Dolly was going to headline next year’s Water Sound Bluegrass Festival. Knowing her habit of turning up in hospitals in Rotherham or pubs in the Dingle peninsula, it wouldn’t have been hard to imagine it. Now, imagination is all we have. And the Imagination Library. And songs, many many songs.
This diary appeared in The Orcadian on 3rd September 2026. A new diary appears weekly. I post them in this blog a few days after each newspaper appearance, with added illustrations, and occasional small corrections or additions.