Half a century ago, Bob Dylan shocked the music world by plugging in an electric guitar and alienating folk purists. For decades he continued to confound expectations, selling millions of records with dense, enigmatic songwriting.
Now, Mr. Dylan, the poet laureate of the rock era, has been rewarded with the Nobel Prize in Literature, an honor that elevates him into the company of T. S. Eliot, Gabriel García Márquez, Toni Morrison and Samuel Beckett.
Mr. Dylan, 75, is the first musician to win the award, and his selection on Thursday is perhaps the most radical choice in a history stretching back to 1901. In choosing a popular musician for the literary world’s highest honor, the Swedish Academy, which awards the prize, dramatically redefined the boundaries of literature, setting off a debate about whether song lyrics have the same artistic value as poetry or novels.
Joe Guy wrote:"I'm a poet and I know it. I hope I don't blow it."
Bob Dylan
From that same song ("I Shall Be Free No.10"):
Now, I’m liberal, but to a degree
I want ev’rybody to be free
But if you think that I’ll let Barry Goldwater
Move in next door and marry my daughter
You must think I’m crazy!
I wouldn’t let him do it for all the farms in Cuba
Gotta love the way he skewered both the Birchers and the self-righteous liberals way back in the 60s...(Ah, but I was so much older then; I’m younger than that now...)
People who are wrong are just as sure they're right as people who are right. The only difference is, they're wrong.
— God@The Tweet of God
Leaving out his born again gospel phase (but then I'm not a fan of contemporary gospel), I like listening to Dylan. He still turns out provocative songs after all these years. And that is a major achievement.
If you had to recommend a best first Dylan album for someone to buy, which would it be?
I obviously know some of his more famous songs but don't own any of his stuff. Feel like I should now he's a Nobel winner - and maybe I'm old enough to appreciate him properly now.
For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
~ Carl Sagan
I'd probably start with 'The Freewheeling Bob Dylan' but you could jump to 'Bringing it All Back Home' or 'Highway 61 Revisited' if you want something less folkie and more upbeat...
I don't feel I ever had a favorite Dylan album but I'm thinking "Blood On The Track" says a lot about who he is.
He's had some good product along with the bad. Objectively you have to look at the entire body of work in order to critique him properly. He has been fairly opaque most of his career. You may find some light but you'll never see clearly through him.
“In a world whose absurdity appears to be so impenetrable, we simply must reach a greater degree of understanding among us, a greater sincerity.”
For Christianity, by identifying truth with faith, must teach-and, properly understood, does teach-that any interference with the truth is immoral. A Christian with faith has nothing to fear from the facts
