Storyweb: Storytime For Grownups

This week on StoryWeb: June Carter and Johnny Cash’s song “Ring of Fire.” For the bride and groom “Ring of Fire” – written by June Carter and Merle Kilgore and recorded by Johnny Cash – is no ordinary love song. For it tells not only of the sweetness of new love but even more so the all-consuming, burning nature of a deeply passionate love. According to the most widely accepted account of the song’s composition, June Carter came across a phrase in a book of Elizabethan poetry that had belonged to her uncle, the famed A.P. Carter. He had underlined the words “Love is like a burning ring of fire.” June suggested to songwriter Merle Kilgore that they write a song based on those words. June said, “There is no way to be in that kind of hell, no way to extinguish a flame that burns, burns, burns.” Apparently, June Carter knew what she was talking about. In 1962, when she wrote the song with Kilgore, she was touring with Johnny Cash for the first time, and theirs was a burning new love indeed. Kilgore was also on th