Bob Dylan and the Nobel Prize

Not much really shocks me anymore, but the announcement that Bob Dylan was the winner of this years Nobel Prize in Literature floored me. Not that he doesn't deserve it, he is a master wordsmith. I just never even thought of him in Nobel Prize terms. Dylan, of course, is being Dylan, and pretty much ignoring the Nobel Committee,

Dylan, in his autobiography Chronicles, makes it clear that he does not think of himself as a poet because his words don't read well on the written page, they need the rhythms of the music. He is correct. But, using words combined with music is an art form older than poetry. It is the form of the bards. The works of Homer were sung and in Celtic tradition, the bards were the true artists.

I want folks to think a moment about Dylan's work. I was not a huge fan of his early work, but in the mid 60s, he did three albums that perfectly captured the era. Bringing it All Back Home, Highway 61 Revisited, and the epic Blonde on Blonde. There is none of the Beatle's flower child hippy crap, none of the Stone's science fiction Satanic Majesty's Request, none of the Door's over the top theatrics, just song after song honestly showing just what was going on.

Politics, existential doubt, drugs, alcohol, sex, business, and love are all dealt with. In these albums, there is devastating pain (Just Like A Woman0, sheer insane joy (Rainy Day Women), and plenty of raunchiness (Leopard Skin Pillbox Hat). There is humorous seduction (I Want You) and romantic longing (Visions of Joanna and Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands).

There are two songs that show the World through the eyes of the era, the amphetamine-marijuana-alcohol-acid tinged era. Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues and Memphis Blues Again are the essence of the madness of the day. They are honest, displaying the sometimes pain of those days but also the bizarre unfettered joy that sometimes burst through.

And, there is nothing, nothing like the magnificent Like A Rolling Stone. It is perfect with its images of freedom and the cost of that freedom.

These are just highlights. All the songs are great: It's All Over Now, Baby Blue; Tambourine Man, Gates of Eden, Desolation Row, Highway 61 and more.

Very rarely does and artist so perfectly capture an era.  Dickens in his portraits of Victorian England, John Dos Pasos in his snapshots of New York, Joyce in writing of his native Ireland, Malcom Lowry in Under the Volcano's descriptions of pre-WW2 Mexico, and John Steinbeck's moving vision of the impoverished Okies in The Grapes of Wrath, all of these managed to show a no frills, no illusions view of the era and people they chose and they are all great writers. Dylan did the same with the mid 60s. No frills, no illusions are the keys to great art and they result in a wonderful blend of the sublime and the ridiculous, of the tragic and the very funny.

These are just three of Dylan' work, from one era. Next time I think I will write about one of the strangest albums ever recorded, his fine album John Wesley Harding.