"Don't Stand So Close to Me" is a hit song by the rock band the Police, released in September 1980 as the lead single from their third album Zenyatta Mondatta. It concerns a teacher who has a sexual relationship with a student, which in turn is discovered. The band's third on the UK Singles Chart, it was also the best selling single of 1980 in the UK selling 808,000 copies in 1980 alone. The song also charted in the top ten in Australia, Canada and the US. The Police won the 1982 Grammy Award for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal for this song. Background The music and lyrics of the song were written by the lead singer of the Police, Sting. The song deals with the mixed feelings of lust, fear and guilt that a school teacher has for a student and the fallout when the inappropriate relationship is discovered by other adults. The line "Just like the old man in that book by Nabokov" alludes to Vladimir Nabokov's novel Lolita, which covers somewhat similar issues. The line was criticised for rhyming "shake and cough" with Nabokov. Sting replied, "I've used that terrible, terrible rhyme technique a few times." Before joining the Police, Sting had previously worked as an English teacher. He referred to the song's story progression as "the teacher, the open page, the virgin, the rape in the car, getting the sack." In 1993, however, he said of the song's inspiration, "You have to remember we were blond bombshells at the time and most of our fans were young girls so I started roleplaying a bit. Let's exploit that." He also stated that the song does not have a basis in fact, stating that "To be frank, it was right in our market. A lot of teenage girls were buying our records. So the idea was, let's write a Lolita story." Ultimate Classic Rock critic Mike Duquette describes the theme as "a man going insane in a post-apocalyptic world." In a 2001 interview for the concert DVD ...All This Time, Sting denied that the song is autobiographical. Production "Don't Stand So Close to Me" appeared on the Police album Zenyatta Mondatta (A&M), and became a hit No. 1 UK single, along with a corresponding music video. In the US, it reached the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, peaking at No.