Associations with the title(pre-reading expectations)

“The Zoo Story” caught my attention at random. My pre-reading impression was unrightfully based on a couple of songs I really like, both bearing names containing the word “zoo” and hardly any resemblance to the atmosphere or thematic diapason of the play (but how was I to know that then?). The first song is called “The Zookeeper’s Boy” and it strikes me as a very pleasant, out-of-this-world, somewhat Scandinavian fairytale-like combination of voice, lyrics and music. The same could be spoken of the band playing it, which is called Mew. The lyrics do suggest a possibility of a comparison between people-animals, people-people and animals-animals relationships. The atmosphere of the song seems to be soaked through with love, cheerfulness and a feeling of being at ease with oneself, even though “evidently there’s a dark storm coming and the chain on my swing is squeaking like a mouse”.
The author of the song also compares the girl he`s singing to to a giraffe:
You`re tall just like a giraffe,
You have to climb to find its head,
But when there`s a glitch,
You`re an ostrich,
You`ve got your head in the sand.
This made me expect something like a kind allegory of a story starring a contemplative giraffe and some other animals it talks to and shares its wisdom with, at a zoo that is magically closed off from the rest of the world, or is located in a remote place, like a tiny suburban Swedish town.
Having also read a wonderful German story about a girl who wanted a giraffe for Christmas and her father, who got the zookeeper to hang a sign proclaiming the girl`s ownership over a giraffe at the zoo on the animal`s cage, I transferred the concept of a long-nurtured dream (the little girl`s) onto the allegorical character of the giraffe in what I imagined to be “The Zoo Story” – the giraffe, a bit of a philosopher in his nature, was supposed to be talking to various animals and then telling them a story with a veiled meaning, a parable of sorts. That is what I craved and expected from Albee`s play. Strange but true.
The other song I had mentioned that influenced my pre-reading expectations is called “At the Zoo”. It characterizes the animals as if they were human, e.g. “zebras are reactionary, antelopes are missionaries…penguins plot in secrecy”. What are those characteristics based on? It sounds a bit like Colonel Matterson`s ramblings in “One Flew Over the Cuckoo`s Nest”: “America is.. the plum. The peach. The pumpkin seed. America is…tell-ah-vision.” But somehow, one, like Chief Bromden, can see-and sense- what they`re driving at.
Both of the songs I have mentioned have been recorded on the cd included in my course paper. Perhaps it will be easier to understand what I felt if you try listening to them.