In his book Lennon in America, the Beatles biographer and writer Geoffrey Giuliano wrote that "Imagine" was "anti-religious, anti-nationalistic, anti-conventional, anti-capitalistic . . . but because it's sugar-coated, it's accepted".

Amid the ferment of anti-war protests, Lennon envisaged a world without borders, where there would be "Nothing to kill or die for/And no religion too".

For the opening track on his 1971 album Imagine, Lennon was inspired by his partner Yoko Ono's poetry collection Grapefruit, which alluded to her wartime childhood in Japan. He composed it on a Steinway upright piano which was later sold to George Michael for more than $2m, who donated it to the Beatles museum in Liverpool.

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