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“'Heroes'“ tells the tale of two lovers, one from East Berlin and the other from West Berlin. Under constant fear of death, they dream they are free, swimming with dolphins. Bowie placed the title in quotation marks as an expression of irony on the otherwise romantic or triumphant words and music. Directly inspired by David Bowie witnessing a kiss between Visconti and singer Antonia Maass next to the Berlin Wall, other inspirations included a painting by Otto Mueller and a short story by Alberto Denti di Pirajno. Another source of inspiration included Otto Mueller's 1916 painting Lovers Between Garden Walls, which Bowie and Iggy Pop saw at Berlin's Brücke Museum. The painting depicts an embracing couple between two walls representing the brutality of World War I. Bowie also revealed in the foreword of his wife Iman's 2001 book I Am Iman that Alberto Denti di Pirajno's 1956 short story A Grave for a Dolphin, which concerns a doomed love affair between an Italian soldier and a Somalian girl during World War II, provided inspiration. The destiny of the story's female protagonist is linked with that of a dolphin she swims with, and when she dies, so does the dolphin. “I thought it a magical and beautiful love story and in part it had inspired my song,“ Bowie said. I do not own any content. Any copyright infringement is not intended.
