Bob Dylan Wins Nobel Prize For Literature*

I don't know what other people here are thinking (re your "doing Dylan a favour" point), but Dylan's songs are great in large part because of their poetic qualities, and it is primarily for those qualities that he is being recognized.

Yes, "songs can be wonderful in their own right", but the vast majority of songs do not warrant being viewed through a literary lens.

 

Return those library books Bob!!

 

Again, I don't think we have a disagreement here - Dylan is a worthy laureate. I have never suggested otherwise.

Obviously, there is more that goes into the decision than the brief citation text is able to cover. It is the condensation of months of deliberation. Declassified minutes from the Academy's meetings show various extra-literary factors being taken into consideration. But it will take 50 years until the ones from this year are released.

 

They would need a very, very, very detailed argument to persuade me that Dylan doesn't deserve this prize and their efforts would be in vain. Saying that Dylan doesn't deserve the prize because he doesn't write to a certain standard of poetic well-formedness is to miss the point: they don't generally give poetry prizes for sonnet sequences these days.

 

Yes you're probably right. You need talent but also some luck.

They don't give it to someone from the same country two years running and being Swedish gives you an advantage.

Some people didn't get it because they were considered too old but that's gone out of fashion.

It will be interesting to see if Dylan was short listed in previous years. The deliberations for 1966 should be available shortly but I doubt if many of the jury had bought Blonde On Blonde or even heard of it at the time.

 

Of course it is clearly up to Dylan himself to deal with his Nobel-prize. So far in the game he has (not surprisingly) been quiet on the issue. Before him-only one person-Jean Paul Sartre -has said no thanks to the Nobel prize. He is still a Nobel-prize winner anyway.
Dylan's quietness aside-the award has been widely discussed and seems to divide the participants. One claim is that it is wrong to award a songwriter. Another that Dylans lyrics just are not good enough poetry to be worthy of the prize. Perhaps Dylan himself feels that way-we don t know yet.
Personally I think that the great thing about rewarding Dylan is the fact that he is a songwriter. It was about time that the art of putting words to music finally got the recognition it deserves. The prize to Dylan is-as far as I see it-also a prize to myriads of great writers who has worked within this genre-from Hank Williams to Joni Mitchell. Not to mention all the nameless creators within the folk-and blues-tradition. The words of those and many others have affected both the way we look at ourselves and the world just as much(or more) than lot s of writers within the more high-culture literature.
Even though I read a lot I am not trained to judge the quality of poetry. However I can t help feeling songs like Visions of Johanna or Blind Willie McTell contains words that are just as cleverly put together, deeply meaningful and mysterious as the best "literate poetry ". Lines like this from Blind Willie McTell might be proof of that

"Well, I heard the hoot owl singing
As they were taking down the tents
The stars above the barren trees
Were his only audience "
If that is not great poetry I don t know what is.
In the end one should consider these great lines of poetry fromDylan taken from cross the Green Mountain-hope Dylan does

"Pride will vanish
And glory will rot
But virtue lives
And cannot be forgot"

 

I would.

 

God only knows what goes on in that great mind of his! I hope he does accept it as i would love to see him doing so. Selfish of me really

 

Didn't Dylan win an American award at the White House where he tore into the media? Not sure of it was a government award or one sponsored by journalists. It might be mentioned in Dont Look Back or in Robert Sheltons book. I'm probably getting some of the details wrong.

 

I thought someone had suggested to Dylan in the past that he might deserve a Nobel Prize to which he replied to the effect that he was just a songwriter in the Woody Guthrie tradition.
Does anyone else remember that?

 

yeah, why not?

 

I'd like to see him turn down the award but insist he still wants the money

 

i personally am mostly enjoying the conniptions that are going around whether or not he will accept it.

i suspect he is enjoying the fuss he's creating too.

 

I think typical Nobel award winners see the prize as recognition or validation of their life long work. Maybe after toiling away in some research lab for 30 years. I don't think Bob needs that same kind of validation.

 

He should give them a call pencil them in and give the money to charity, or do a free show in Stockholm, Sweden. Or take the money for the Nobel show, as the entertainment. His last schedule show is on November 23, in Fort Lauderdale FL. We will see...Bob?

 

Should he? Why not? Will he? Maybe only Dylan himself knows.

 

Of course he should!

 

He should accept the literary prize and then start a war, just to confuse them.

 

It's rock 'n' roll if he doesn't, he is in the rock 'n' roll business. I can still understand it if he says yes. It don't change my perception of him either way, I'm into music and I'm a fan of his songs. McCartney and Jagger said yes to be knighted and Bowie said no. Follow your heart... It's your life. People will say it's wrong and people will say it's right no matter what.

 

Interesting letter in The Guardian. Nobel wad in the arms business. That's where the money originates. Perhaps that's the problem. Or perhaps he just wants to make a name for himself. He doesn't need the money.

 

"Someone had to reach for the risin’ star, I guess it was up to me."

 

Yes, definitely. BTW, I saw Joan Baez last night. Magical. What a voice.

 

Agree -it's not about the money if which Dylan has plentiful . It s about whether Dylan accept being honored with the most prestigious prize a writer can get. Of that we don t know. Don t think Dylan holds dylanogists or professors in that high regard so time will tell. Or not. Sometimes silence speaks more than words.

 

Yes and I'm sure he will. Not 100% sure but pretty sure. Not even 10% sure but I think he will.

 

There's Nobel, so he'll just have to keep knock knock knockin'.*





* Shortlisted for the worst joke of the decade.