Bob Dylan wins the Nobel Prize in Literature

How old was Dylan when he wrote, "Blowin' in the Wind" and "The Times They are A-Changing" ? Twenty one? Pretty amazing.

Who can argue that he wrote great songs as far apart in time from '63 "Blowin' in the Wind" to '97 "Not Dark Yet" to "Things Have Changed" in 2006!

Leonard Cohen and Townes Van Zandt were great song writers, but they only wrote 10 to 20 really great songs. Dylan must have written well over 50.

Probably the best song writer ever, with one of the worst voices ever. People don't realize how many songs that they like (albeit they are performed by other artists) that were written by him. He is credited with 522 songs. He is one of the greatest poets of modern times. But his voice makes me cringe.

"Mr. Tambourine Man" alone is enough to give this man the Nobel.

"take me disappearing through the smoke rings of my mind"

Someone told me today that he took a literature course some years ago, and the prof pointed out some authors and poets that Dylan borrowed from, to be kind. Word for word passages. Anyone know anything about it?

For the record, I feel Dylan is great, although a writer should have won the award.

continuing bigtooI05's post:

"Then take me disappearin' through the smoke rings of my mind,

Down the foggy ruins of time, far past the frozen leaves,

The haunted, frightened trees, out to the windy beach,

Far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow.

Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free,

Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands,

With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves,

Let me forget about today until tomorrow.

Hey! Mr, Tambourine Man, play a song for me,

I'm not sleepy and there is no place I'm going to..."

The Tambourine Man was obviously his pusher.

These lines read like a collaboration between Leonard Cohen, Townes Van Zandt and Edgar Allan Poe. It doesn't get much better than this.

All of you clowns who have been putting down Dylan for years can now turn your negativity (which can't pull you through) towards the Nobel Prize selectors. I'm sure you're a lot more qualified to judge great writing than they are..

Not to mention President Obama and Al Gore.

Bob "Dylan" Zimmerman has stolen full lines and passages word-for-word from many, many greater writers than himself (a low bar), and he always passes the material off as his own--no source acknowledgement whatsoever. This award is indeed a mistake. Let's just put it this way: He ain't no Dylan Thomas. (Yeah, he stole his name from a real poet, too.)

The name change had more to do with the bigotry he was up against.

As for the writing, he's deserved the prize since 1975 at least.

Someone told me Bob Dylan wrote a ton of songs for the Rolling Stones too what a freaking awesome artist Mr Dylan is.

I'm guessing that you're not aware of the many plagiarism cases. They'd disqualify anyone from getting literary awards, I'd say.

The Scot wrote:

calculo wrote:

i'd offer some slight kudos for jagger naming band after part of one of his lyric

Hard to tell if you are serious or not. The Rolling Stones predate the song by several years and were named after a Muddy Waters song.

Thank you, 1962 for the band and 1965 for the song.

My brother, who hates rock-and-roll and folk, and who never had a good word to say about Dylan, to include his voice and his politics, tells me he's been surprised how much he loves Dylan's take on Frank Sinatra standards. Who would have thought?

dsrunner wrote:

The name change had more to do with the bigotry he was up against.

As for the writing, he's deserved the prize since 1975 at least.

Yes. Being Jewish in the record and/or publishing business in the 1960s was such a disadvantage.

It's only logical that Bob Dylan should follow Elfriede Jelineks lead.

She videotaped a message.

Bod Dylan should do the same thing and claim, environmental savings,

frugality, and ask the check be sent courier to his agent, and do

forget to ask if the proceeds are tax exempt.