"Puff, the Magic Dragon" (or just "Puff") is a song written by

Peter Yarrow Peter Yarrow (born May 31, 1938) is an American singer and songwriter who found fame for being in the 1960s folk trio Peter, Paul and Mary. Yarrow co-wrote (with Leonard Lipton) one of the group's best known hits, "Puff, the Magic Dragon". He is ...

Peter, Paul and Mary Peter, Paul and Mary was an American folk group formed in New York City in 1961 during the American folk music revival phenomenon. The trio consisted of tenor Peter Yarrow, baritone Paul Stookey, and contralto Mary Travers. The group's repertoir ...

from a poem by

Leonard Lipton Leonard Lipton (May 18, 1940 – October 5, 2022) was an American author, filmmaker, lyricist and inventor. At age 19, Lipton wrote the poem that became the basis for the lyrics to the song "Puff, the Magic Dragon". He went on to write books on ...

. It was made popular by Yarrow's group in a 1962 recording released in January 1963. Lipton wrote a poem about a dragon in 1959, and when Yarrow found it, he wrote the lyrics to "Puff" based on the poem. After the song was released, Yarrow searched for Lipton to give him credit for the song.

Lyrics

The lyrics for "Puff, the Magic Dragon" are based on a 1959 poem by Leonard Lipton, then a 19-year-old

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teac ...

student. Lipton was inspired by an

Ogden Nash Frederic Ogden Nash (August 19, 1902 – May 19, 1971) was an American poet well known for his light verse, of which he wrote over 500 pieces. With his unconventional rhyming schemes, he was declared by ''The New York Times'' the country's bes ...

poem titled " The Tale of Custard the Dragon", about a "realio, trulio little pet dragon". The lyrics tell a story of the ageless

dragon A dragon is a reptilian legendary creature that appears in the folklore of many cultures worldwide. Beliefs about dragons vary considerably through regions, but dragons in western cultures since the High Middle Ages have often been depicted as ...

, Puff, and his playmate, Jackie Paper, a little boy who grows up and moves on from the imaginary adventures of childhood, leaving a disheartened Puff on his own. The song's story takes place "by the sea" in the fictional land of "Honah Lee". Lipton was friends with Yarrow's housemate when they were all students at Cornell. He used Yarrow's typewriter to get the poem out of his head. He then forgot about it until years later, when a friend called and told him Yarrow was looking for him, to give him credit for the lyrics. On making contact, Yarrow gave Lipton half the songwriting credit, and he received royalties to the song until his death in 2022. Yarrow now sings the line "A dragon lives forever, but not so little boys" as "A dragon lives forever, but not so girls and boys", to be fair to boys and girls. The original poem also had a stanza that was not incorporated into the song. In it, Puff found another child and played with him. Neither Yarrow nor Lipton remembers the verse in detail, and the paper left in Yarrow's typewriter in 1958 has since been lost.

Reception

Cash Box ''Cashbox'', also known as ''Cash Box'', was an American music industry trade magazine, originally published weekly from July 1942 to November 1996. Ten years after its dissolution, it was revived and continues as ''Cashbox Magazine'', an online ...

'' described it as "a charming folk tune, about a magic dragon, right-up-the-vocal-alley of the remarkably successful folksters."

Speculation about drug references

After the song's initial success, speculation arose—as early as a 1964 article in ''

Newsweek ''Newsweek'' is an American weekly online news magazine co-owned 50 percent each by Dev Pragad, its president and CEO, and Johnathan Davis, who has no operational role at ''Newsweek''. Founded as a weekly print magazine in 1933, it was widely ...

''—that the song contained veiled references to smoking

marijuana Cannabis, also known as marijuana among other names, is a psychoactive drug from the cannabis plant. Native to Central or South Asia, the cannabis plant has been used as a drug for both recreational and entheogenic purposes and in various tra ...

. The word "paper" in the name of Puff's human friend Jackie Paper was said to be a reference to

rolling paper Rolling paper is a specialty paper used for making cigarettes (commercially manufactured filter cigarettes and individually made roll-your-own cigarettes). Rolling papers are packs of several cigarette-size sheets, often folded inside a cardboa ...

s, the words "by the sea" were interpreted as "by the C" (as in

cannabis ''Cannabis'' () is a genus of flowering plants in the family Cannabaceae. The number of species within the genus is disputed. Three species may be recognized: ''Cannabis sativa'', '' C. indica'', and '' C. ruderalis''. Alternativel ...

), the word "mist" stood for "smoke", the land of "Honahlee" stood for

hashish Hashish ( ar, حشيش, ()), also known as hash, "dry herb, hay" is a drug made by compressing and processing parts of the cannabis plant, typically focusing on flowering buds (female flowers) containing the most trichomes. European Monitoring ...

, and "dragon" was interpreted as "draggin'" (i.e., inhaling smoke). Similarly, the name "Puff" was alleged to be a reference to taking a "puff" on a joint. The supposition was claimed to be common knowledge in a letter by a member of the public to ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' in 1984. The authors of the song have repeatedly rejected this interpretation and have strongly and consistently denied that they intended any references to drug use. Both Lipton and Yarrow have stated, "'Puff, the Magic Dragon' is not about drugs." Yarrow has frequently explained that the song is about the hardships of growing older and has no relationship to drug-taking. He has also said that the song has "never had any meaning other than the obvious one" and is about the "loss of innocence in children." He has dismissed the suggestion of it being associated with drugs as "sloppy research". In 1973, Peter Yarrow's bandmate,

Paul Stookey Noel Paul Stookey (born December 30, 1937) is an American singer-songwriter who was famous for being in the 1960s folk trio Peter, Paul and Mary; however, he has been known by his first name, Noel, throughout his life. Nowadays, he continues to ...

of Peter, Paul and Mary, also upheld the song's innocence in a novel way. He recorded a version of the song at the

Sydney Opera House The Sydney Opera House is a multi-venue performing arts centre in Sydney. Located on the foreshore of Sydney Harbour, it is widely regarded as one of the world's most famous and distinctive buildings and a masterpiece of 20th-century architec ...

in March 1973 where he set up a fictitious trial scene. The prosecutor of the trial claimed the song was about marijuana, but Puff and Jackie protested. The judge finally left the case to the "jury" (the Opera House audience) and said if they would sing along, the song would be

acquitted In common law jurisdictions, an acquittal certifies that the accused is free from the charge of an offense, as far as criminal law is concerned. The finality of an acquittal is dependent on the jurisdiction. In some countries, such as the ...

. The audience joined in with Stookey and at the end of their sing-along, the judge declared the "case dismissed."

Notable recordings and chart performance

In 1961, Peter Yarrow joined Paul Stookey and

Mary Travers Mary Allin Travers (November 9, 1936 – September 16, 2009) was an American singer-songwriter who was known for being in the famous 1960s folk trio Peter, Paul and Mary, along with Peter Yarrow and Paul Stookey. Travers grew up amid the burge ...

to form

. The group incorporated the song into their live performances before recording it in 1962. The trio's 1962 recording of "Puff the Magic Dragon" entered the top 40 of the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 charts on March 30, 1963, and peaked at number two, kept out of the top spot by "

I Will Follow Him "I Will Follow Him" is a popular song that was first recorded in 1961 by Franck Pourcel, as an instrumental titled "Chariot". The song achieved its widest success when it was recorded by American singer Little Peggy March with English lyrics in 1 ...

" by

Little Peggy March Peggy March (born Margaret Annemarie Battavio, March 8, 1948) is an American pop singer. In the United States, she is primarily known for her 1963 million-selling song "I Will Follow Him". Although she is sometimes remembered as a one-hit wonde ...

. It topped Billboard's Adult Contemporary charts. It also reached number ten on Billboard's R&B chart. In Canada, the song reached number five in April 1963.

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Notable cover versions

During the autumn of 1966, Swedish pop band Fabulous Four, which included

Lalla Hansson Lars Erik "Lalla" Hansson (born 10 June 1944, in Stockholm) is a Swedish progg, pop and rock singer. He participates/has participated in the music groups Fabulous Four and Idolerna, and as solo singer he has had great prosperities with hits as ...

recorded the song; the session was produced by keyboardist

Benny Andersson Göran Bror Benny Andersson (; born 16 December 1946) is a Swedish musician, singer, composer and producer best known as a member of the musical group ABBA and co-composer of the musicals '' Chess'', '' Kristina från Duvemåla'', and ''Mamma ...

, later of

ABBA ABBA ( , , formerly named Björn & Benny, Agnetha & Anni-Frid or Björn & Benny, Agnetha & Frida) are a Swedish supergroup formed in Stockholm in 1972 by Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad. The group' ...

fame. Released as a single in November of that year, it was the group's first release on

independent record label An independent record label (or indie label) is a record label that operates without the funding or distribution of major record labels; they are a type of small- to medium-sized enterprise, or SME. The labels and artists are often represente ...

Hep House, started by Andersson's band

Hep Stars The Hep Stars are a Swedish rock band formed in Stockholm in 1963. During 1965–1966 the band was the most successful of contemporary 1960s Swedish pop groups performing in the English language. Outside the Nordic countries the band is best ...

, following Fabulous Four's departure from

Fontana Records Fontana Records is a record label that was started in the 1950s as a subsidiary of the Dutch Philips Records. The independent label distributor Fontana Distribution takes its name from the label. History Fontana started in the 1950s as a sub ...

. The single, backed by a cover of

Woody Guthrie Woodrow Wilson Guthrie (; July 14, 1912 – October 3, 1967) was an American singer-songwriter, one of the most significant figures in American folk music. His work focused on themes of American Left, American socialism and anti-fascism. He ...

's "

This Land Is Your Land "This Land Is Your Land" is one of the United States' most famous folk songs. Its lyrics were written by American folk singer Woody Guthrie in 1940 in critical response to Irving Berlin's "God Bless America", with melody based on a Carter Fami ...

", became a hit. It debuted at number one on ''

Tio i Topp ''Tio i Topp'' (English: ''Ten At The Top'') was a Swedish record chart and radio program broadcast by Sveriges Radio P3 between the years of 1961 and 1974. It was launched to combat pirate radio charts and was the first official Swedish record ch ...

'' on 26 November 1966, staying there for three consecutive weeks before being replaced by

Donovan Donovan Phillips Leitch (born 10 May 1946), known mononymously as Donovan, is a Scottish musician, songwriter, and record producer. He developed an eclectic and distinctive style that blended folk, jazz, pop, psychedelic rock and world musi ...

's "

Mellow Yellow "Mellow Yellow" is a song written and recorded by Scottish singer-songwriter Donovan. In the US, it reached No. 2 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100. Outside the US, "Mellow Yellow" peaked at No. 8 in the UK in early 1967. Content The song was rum ...

". On sales chart Kvällstoppen, the single reached number three on 20 December 1966.

Adaptations

A 1978 animated television special, ''

Puff the Magic Dragon "Puff, the Magic Dragon" (or just "Puff") is a song written by Peter Yarrow of Peter, Paul and Mary from a poem by Leonard Lipton. It was made popular by Yarrow's group in a 1962 recording released in January 1963. Lipton wrote a poem about a ...

'', adapted the song. It was followed by two sequels, ''

Puff the Magic Dragon in the Land of the Living Lies ''Puff the Magic Dragon in the Land of the Living Lies'' is a 24-minute animated television special that first aired November 17, 1979 on CBS. A sequel to the 1978 TV special ''Puff the Magic Dragon'', with Burgess Meredith returning as the voi ...

'' and ''

Puff and the Incredible Mr. Nobody ''Puff and the Incredible Mr. Nobody'' is a 24-minute animated television special that first aired May 17, 1982 on CBS. The third in a series, it serves as a sequel to ''Puff the Magic Dragon'' (1978) and ''Puff the Magic Dragon in the Land of the ...

''. In all three films,

Burgess Meredith Oliver Burgess Meredith (November 16, 1907 – September 9, 1997) was an American actor and filmmaker whose career encompassed theater, film, and television. Active for more than six decades, Meredith has been called "a virtuosic actor" and "on ...

voiced Puff. In December 2016, it was announced that Fox Animation would produce a live-action/animation film based on the song with Mike Mitchell as director. As of November 2020, the progress of this project had no updates, leading some fans to conclude that it has been quietly cancelled. In September 1979, a picture-book based on the animated feature, written by Romeo Muller, was published by Avon Books. The song was adapted for a children's pantomime, which played at Sydney's

Seymour Centre The Seymour Centre is a multi-purpose performing arts centre within the University of Sydney in the Australian city of Sydney. It is located on the corner of City Rd and Cleveland St in Chippendale, just south-west of the city centre. The ...

in 1983. A 2007 book adaptation of the song's lyrics by Yarrow, Lipton, and illustrator Eric Puybaret gives the story a happier ending with a young girl (presumed by reviewers to be Jackie Paper's daughter) seeking out Puff to become her new companion. The lyrics remain unchanged from the Peter, Paul, and Mary version; the young girl is only seen in the pictures by illustrator Puybaret. On the last page of the book, she is introduced to Puff by an older Jackie Paper. The tune was used by Versatec, a computer printer company, in the promotional LP ''Push the Magic Button'' for the song of the same name. American fabulist

Robert Coover Robert Lowell Coover (born February 4, 1932) is an American novelist, short story writer, and T.B. Stowell Professor Emeritus in Literary Arts at Brown University. He is generally considered a writer of fabulation and metafiction. Background C ...

wrote about the later lives of Puff and Jackie Paper in "Sir John Paper Returns to Honah-Lee", the first story in his collection ''A Child Again'' (McSweeney's Books, 2005).

Parodies

In the mid 1970s, an American

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

band named Ruach created a parody version of the song entitled "Puff the Kosher Dragon". In the course of the song, Kosher Puff eats

kosher (also or , ) is a set of dietary laws dealing with the foods that Jewish people are permitted to eat and how those foods must be prepared according to Jewish law. Food that may be consumed is deemed kosher ( in English, yi, כּשר), from ...

food, has a bar mitzvah, fights

anti-Semites Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism. Antis ...

, and finally marries and brings up his children as loyal members of the faith. The Ruach song has been noted as one of the first examples of a modern Jewish band using a popular secular tune. Both tune and elements of the lyrics were adapted in the controversial

parody A parody, also known as a spoof, a satire, a send-up, a take-off, a lampoon, a play on (something), or a caricature, is a creative work designed to imitate, comment on, and/or mock its subject by means of satiric or ironic imitation. Often its su ...

Barack the Magic Negro The Magical Negro is a trope in American cinema, television, and literature. In the cinema of the United States, the Magical Negro is a supporting stock character who comes to the aid of white protagonists in a film. Magical Negro characters, ...

," written and recorded by

Paul Shanklin Paul Shanklin (born 1962 in Memphis, Tennessee) is an American conservative political satirist, impressionist, comedian, and conservative speaker. Shanklin wrote and voiced the characters for the songs and satirical comedy segments used by conserva ...

for

Rush Limbaugh Rush Hudson Limbaugh III ( ; January 12, 1951 – February 17, 2021) was an American conservative political commentator who was the host of ''The Rush Limbaugh Show'', which first aired in 1984 and was nationally syndicated on AM and FM ra ...

's radio program, after the term was first applied to then presidential candidate

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...

by movie and culture critic

David Ehrenstein David Ehrenstein (born February 18, 1947) is an American critic who focuses primarily on gay issues in cinema. Life and career Ehrenstein was born in New York City. His father was a Jew with Polish ancestors, and his mother was half-black and ha ...

. In a ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the Un ...

'' op-ed column of March 19, 2007, Yarrow condemned the act as "shocking and saddening in the extreme," stating that "taking a children's song and twisting it in such vulgar, mean-spirited way, is a slur to our entire country and our common agreement to move beyond racism… It is almost unimaginable to me that Chip Saltzman, who sent the CD s a Christmas greeting to NRC members would seriously be considered for the top post of the Republican National Committee. Puff, himself, if asked, would certainly agree."

Vietnam War gunship

During the

Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam and ...

, the

AC-47 Spooky The Douglas AC-47 Spooky (also nicknamed "Puff, the Magic Dragon") was the first in a series of fixed-wing gunships developed by the United States Air Force during the Vietnam War. It was designed to provide more firepower than light and mediu ...

gunship was nicknamed the "Dragon" or "Dragon ship" by the Americans because of its armament and firepower. The nickname soon caught on, and American troops began to call the AC-47 "Puff the Magic Dragon." Robert Mason's '' Chickenhawk'' states, in reference to the Peter, Paul, and Mary song playing on a turntable: Puff the Magic Dragon' was making me uncomfortable. It was the saccharine song that had inspired the naming of the murderous Gatling-gun-armed C-47s. I couldn't listen."

In popular culture

*The song is a favorite of

Robert De Niro Robert Anthony De Niro Jr. ( , ; born August 17, 1943) is an American actor. Known for his collaborations with Martin Scorsese, he is considered to be one of the best actors of his generation. De Niro is the recipient of various accolades ...

's character Jack Byrnes in the 2000 comedy film ''

Meet the Parents ''Meet the Parents'' is a 2000 American comedy film written by Jim Herzfeld and John Hamburg and directed by Jay Roach. It chronicles a series of unfortunate events that befall a good-hearted but hapless nurse (Ben Stiller as Greg Focker) while ...

''.

Ben Stiller Benjamin Edward Meara Stiller (born November 30, 1965) is an American actor, comedian, and filmmaker. He is the son of the comedians and actors Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara. Stiller was a member of a group of comedic actors colloquially known a ...

's character Greg Focker makes light of the urban legend of the song being about drugs, which an irritated Jack has never heard. In the film's sequel, ''

Meet the Fockers ''Meet the Fockers'' is a 2004 American comedy film directed by Jay Roach and the sequel to the 2000 film ''Meet the Parents''. The film stars Robert De Niro (who was also one of the film's producers), Ben Stiller, Dustin Hoffman, Barbra Streisand ...

'', Jack has rigged his RV's horn to honk out the first notes of "Puff, the Magic Dragon". *

Elon Musk Elon Reeve Musk ( ; born June 28, 1971) is a business magnate and investor. He is the founder, CEO and chief engineer of SpaceX; angel investor, CEO and product architect of Tesla, Inc.; owner and CEO of Twitter, Inc.; founder of The B ...

, founder of

SpaceX Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) is an American spacecraft manufacturer, launcher, and a satellite communications corporation headquartered in Hawthorne, California. It was founded in 2002 by Elon Musk with the stated goal of ...

, said his

Dragon spacecraft American private space transportation company SpaceX has developed and produced several spacecraft named Dragon. The first family member, now referred to as Dragon 1, flew 23 cargo missions to the ISS between 2010 and 2020 before being retired. ...

was named after "Puff, the Magic Dragon". *The

Orlando Magic The Orlando Magic are an American professional basketball team based in Orlando, Florida. The Magic compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the league's Eastern Conference Southeast Division. The franchise was establ ...

mascot is named " Stuff the Magic Dragon". *British comedian and magician John van der Put performs under the stage name " Piff the Magic Dragon" and jokes (as Piff) about having a more famous brother named ''Steve''. *A

comic strip A comic strip is a sequence of drawings, often cartoons, arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions. Traditionally, throughout the 20th and into the 21st ...

from

Gary Larson Gary Larson (born August 14, 1950) is an American cartoonist, environmentalist, and former musician. He is the creator of ''The Far Side'', a single-panel cartoon series that was syndicated internationally to more than 1,900 newspapers for fif ...

's ''

The Far Side ''The Far Side'' is a single-panel comic created by Gary Larson and syndicated by Chronicle Features and then Universal Press Syndicate, which ran from December 31, 1979, to January 1, 1995 (when Larson retired as a cartoonist). Its surreali ...

'' published on January 13, 1993, shows a dragon coated black by an

oil spill An oil spill is the release of a liquid petroleum hydrocarbon into the environment, especially the marine ecosystem, due to human activity, and is a form of pollution. The term is usually given to marine oil spills, where oil is released into t ...

from a sinking tanker, with the caption "A tragedy occurs off the coast of a land called Honah-Lee".