Bob Dylan and Poetry

There’s always been a question about what Dylan is, exactly – lyricist, song-writer, musician, rebel, social commentator, balladeer, poet or singer and instrumental player – which is why there’s such a public uproar currently about him winning the Nobel Prize for Literature. Not that it matters: the Prize Committee decided that his work has had a lasting impact on literary culture and that is that.

As a student in the early 60s, I first came across Dylan at the Troubadour Club in London and, initially, wasn’t sure whether I was impressed or not. I recognised that his songs were deeply rooted in the folk/blues culture and owed not a little to Woody Guthrie, among others. I recognised the spirit of dissent, not difficult as dissent and activism were keywords among students in those years. I also knew I’d met up with a loner, one who stands back and watches the scene around him. In that club atmosphere, when he wasn’t singing or playing, he was scrutinising other musicians and the audience carefully. I knew what it meant: if he was doing so in those surroundings it wasn’t a huge leap to understand the long views and social and political commentary in his work. “All Along the Watchtower,” from the disc of “John Wesley Harding,” still seems, to me, to sum up the core of Dylan’s output. 

I can’t say I was ever hooked in the way that some of his student fans were, but I found his songs and discs original and compelling and still listen to them occasionally. I liked, too, that he gave full credit to his mentors and predecessors.  

But is he a poet? Sometimes yes, sometimes no. It’s difficult to argue that “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” isn’t poetry, especially as the style of the first four lines of each stanza is taken directly from the Child Ballad, “Lord Randall,” and the imagery used is crisply delivered:

“And what did you hear, my blue-eyed son?

And what did you hear, my darling young one?

I heard the sound of a thunder, it roared out a warnin’

Heard the roar of a wave that could drown the whole world...”

At other times, he produced polemical lyrics in the “Come, All Ye” ballad style in such overtly political works as “The Times They Are A-Changin':”

“Come senators, congressmen...

For he that gets hurt

Will be he who has stalled

There’s a battle outside and it’s ragin’... ”

The best of his output is poetic, however that’s defined (stanzaic form, a sense of rhythm, use of imagery, fresh perspectives, original presentation, aesthetic use of language, and more). The songs “It’s Alright, Ma,”  “Just Like A Woman,” “Idiot Wind,” “Desolation Row,”  “Not Dark Yet,” "Mr Tambourine Man” attest to that.

There are others, though, that are nothing more than they seem to be – song lyrics. “Til I Fell In Love With You,” is one:

“Well, my nerves are exploding and my body’s tense

I feel like the whole world got me pinned up against the fence

I’ve been hit too hard, I’ve seen too much

Nothing can heal me now, but your touch...”

“Alberta,” too, is more concerned to be song than poem:

“Alberta what’s on your mind

Alberta what’s on your mind

You keep me worried and bothered

All of the time...”

“Baby, I’m In The Mood For You,”  “Under Your Spell,” “Try Me, Little Girl,” “Beyond The Horizon” are in similar vein. Interestingly, these and others like them are love songs going for easy feelings and, I suspect, wanting to arouse those in audiences and readers. There’s nothing wrong with that: everyone needs to make a living. His best poetry, by contrast, is evident in the songs of politics and society.

It’s difficult to categorize Dylan’s work and that isn’t a criticism. There is no reason why a public figure involved in the arts shouldn’t cross boundaries or mix disciplines, which the Nobel Prize Committee clearly recognised. Perhaps criticism of him says more about the literary worlds, each of which is usually more concerned to preserve the tight boundaries of its own small patch.  For myself, I have a final criticism: he’s not up to much as an instrument player and his voice is like gravel raked over steel sheets.  Still, those chunky hoe-down sounds were a reasonable medium through which to deliver his messages and both are striking enough to have helped keep him fixed in the public eye for a lifetime.

If I were pushed to categorize him, I'd say he's a balladeer of time-honoured tradition, one eye always on the weather vane of the news.

Dylan’s lyrics and output.