bookslover
Puritan Board Doctor
Bob Dylan is 75 today. He still plays about 100 shows a year. He spent all of April in Japan, for example and, starting in June, he begins his American tour that will probably keep him on the road for the rest of this year. Amazing.
I've heard that he's been nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature at least twice. An interviewer once asked someone who's plugged into the Nobel process if he thought Dylan had a chance. His reply boiled down to: "If I had to guess, I'd say no, for two reasons: (1) Dylan is an American, and for many Leftists on the Nobel committee, Americans are, you know, evil. (2) The Literature prize is rarely awarded to poets in the first place. And Dylan would be considered, by some, as a lyricist, not a poet. So, probably: no. But, never say never, because the Committee just might surprise us one day."
Someone once wrote that the key to understanding Dylan is to remember that, in fact, he's NOT "the voice of a generation." He's (1) not a baby-boomer (born in 1941), (2) not a suburbanite (Hibbing, Minnesota, where he mostly grew up, is 200 miles north of Minneapolis, in the Iron Range), and (3) is not a university graduate (he spent just one semester at the University of Minnesota). So, he's not all those things the Baby Boom generation was, of which he supposedly is the voice of.
Just some rambling thoughts on his birthday.
I've heard that he's been nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature at least twice. An interviewer once asked someone who's plugged into the Nobel process if he thought Dylan had a chance. His reply boiled down to: "If I had to guess, I'd say no, for two reasons: (1) Dylan is an American, and for many Leftists on the Nobel committee, Americans are, you know, evil. (2) The Literature prize is rarely awarded to poets in the first place. And Dylan would be considered, by some, as a lyricist, not a poet. So, probably: no. But, never say never, because the Committee just might surprise us one day."
Someone once wrote that the key to understanding Dylan is to remember that, in fact, he's NOT "the voice of a generation." He's (1) not a baby-boomer (born in 1941), (2) not a suburbanite (Hibbing, Minnesota, where he mostly grew up, is 200 miles north of Minneapolis, in the Iron Range), and (3) is not a university graduate (he spent just one semester at the University of Minnesota). So, he's not all those things the Baby Boom generation was, of which he supposedly is the voice of.
Just some rambling thoughts on his birthday.