Bob Dylan wins Nobel Prize for Literature

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

Gold is eloquent and doesn't need words. I'll take it in coin or bullion or even flakes!

Yep nothing quite like snorting gold dust through rolled up $1000 bills!

[BearMountainBooks]

I'll just mash it all down and spend it...

He's alive and knows he won the Nobel Prize? Or at least his web master or publisher has said something.

Page on his web site, http://bobdylan.com/books/the-lyrics-1961-2012/

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by Hamlet53

He's alive and knows he won the Nobel Prize? Or at least his web master or publisher has said something.

Page on his web site, http://bobdylan.com/books/the-lyrics-1961-2012/

Push that book.

No Ebook though apparently.

Originally Posted by kennyc

Push that book.

No Ebook though apparently.

I'm sure the audio book is better anyway.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by Hamlet53

I'm sure the audio book is better anyway.

Not if it's 'read by the author!'

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Hamlet53

He's alive and knows he won the Nobel Prize? Or at least his web master or publisher has said something.

If he were dead he couldn't have won it. Nobel Prizes can't be awarded posthumously.

[MikeB1972]

Originally Posted by HarryT

If he were dead he couldn't have won it. Nobel Prizes can't be awarded posthumously.

Can't be nominated posthumously, but if they die after nomination they can still get the award if they are dead, happened a few times.

Technically Steinman was nominated posthumously and won the price for medicine in 2011 (Died 3 days before the nomination, although this wasn't known to the committee at the time).

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by MikeB1972

Can't be nominated posthumously, but if they die after nomination they can still get the award if they are dead, happened a few times.

Technically Steinman was nominated posthumously and won the price for medicine in 2011 (Died 3 days before the nomination, although this wasn't known to the committee at the time).

True .

Originally Posted by HarryT

If he were dead he couldn't have won it. Nobel Prizes can't be awarded posthumously.

Yes, I know. It was more a joke over the fact that his response proved that he might be a Howard Hughes type, but he was still living. He is currently on tour so that he could be found on stage any night.

[william z]

Originally Posted by doubleshuffle

But what if the song lyrics happen to be literature? There are serious producers of "proper" literature who consider Dylan a serious poet. Look at what Paul Muldoon has to say on the subject:



http://www.newyorker.com/books/page-...e-dylan-lyrics

Sorry, I do not think song lyrics are literature as such. They may or may not be poetry or "poetic" but I don't know that for sure, not being a fan of or very knowledegable about poetry. But I am very familiar with songs of every genre and song lyrics, from the ones that are nonsense, pap, silly, or banal to the ones that tell a story or express emotions. Some of them capture a sense of a certain place or time. Some are very good, but they are songs, not literature.

If Bob Dylan had published those songs as poetry (assuming he could have found a publisher) I doubt very much if he would have ever had a very big fanbase or following
or ever been considered for a Nobel Prize.

I am very familiar with "folk songs" including the "niche" categories of topical (about a certain event) or protest songs, which are anti-something or other or commentaries on social injustices. When Dylan came along, they said he was carrying on the tradition of Woody Guthrie. I suppose that was true, because Guthrie's songs had a message too, though his lyrics were much more "down to earth" than Dylan's. Also Guthrie never wrote any original melodies, they were all "borrowed" from old folk or cowboy songs or 19th century popular songs.

As we know Dylan abandoned the folk scene and turned to rock music just before the short-lived "folk revival" petered out. I am not familiar with very many of his songs after that time, though I know he has a huge fanbase and a large following, expecially among people who were part of the "counter culture" in the 1960's.

But to me literature is literature - novels or short stories or plays or poetry and songs are songs. If they want to give out a Nobel Prize for songwriting, fine. I also find it interesting that Dylan has not yet called the Nobel Prize Committee to accept his prize and there are rumours that he many not accept it.

[doubleshuffle]

Originally Posted by william z

If Bob Dylan had published those songs as poetry (assuming he could have found a publisher) I doubt very much if he would have ever had a very big fanbase or following
or ever been considered for a Nobel Prize.

Well, but you're lumping together two entirely different things here - aren't being a poet and having a big fanbase mutually exclusive these days? So the fact that Dylan might perhaps only have sold a few hundred copies of his lyrics if he had published them as poetry cannot be a measure of their quality.

I do agree that in modern times there is a difference between poetry written to be read and song lyrics written to be sung, but, firstly, why shouldn't the latter be considered literature if they are well written and have something original to say? I like the Swedish Academy's argument that originally all literature was made for performance.

However, even if one accepts the argument that "proper" poetry must hold up without any accompanying music (and I do see the merits of this argument: there are - and even Dylan has written - lots of lyrics that are an embarrassment if read out loud), I contend that Dylan has written quite a few lyrics that are great poetry and work very well without the music. I read somewhere that Christopher Hitchens and Salman Rushdie used to play a little game of reciting Dylan lyrics to each other as poetry and being surprised how many of them actually worked. Then there's Christopher Ricks' book, which is terribly boring, unfortunately, but isn't nearly all academic analysis of poetry?

I could go on and on. In the end it's all a matter of taste. Personally, I read quite a bit of poetry, and I have read a lot that certainly qualifies less than something like this:

Relationships of ownership
They whisper in the wings
To those condemned to act accordingly
And wait for succeeding kings.
And I try to harmonize with songs
The lonesome sparrow sings.
There are no kings inside the Gates of Eden.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by doubleshuffle

I do agree that in modern times there is a difference between poetry written to be read and song lyrics written to be sung, but, firstly, why shouldn't the latter be considered literature if they are well written and have something original to say? I like the Swedish Academy's argument that originally all literature was made for performance.

The ancient greeks had nine muses for every creative and performance endeavor they knew. Singing was not listed separately. They considered it poetry. Indeed, their term for performers of the great epic poems was "singer".

http://www.greekmyths-greekmythology...eek-mythology/

“Rhapsodes originated in the Ionian district, which has been sometimes regarded as Homer’s birthplace, and were also known as Homeridai, disciples of Homer, or “singers of stitched lays.” ”

“The performance of epic poetry was called in classical Greek rhapsōidia (ῥαψῳδία), and its performer rhapsōidos. The word does not occur in the early epics, which use the word aoidos (ἀοιδός “singer”) for performers in all genres including this one.”

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhapsode

The Academy is on safe ground.

[HarryT]

A member of the Swedish Academy has called Mr Dylan "arrogant and impolite" for not having the courtesy to respond to their attempts to contact him.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by HarryT

A member of the Swedish Academy has called Mr Dylan "arrogant and impolite" for not having the courtesy to respond to their attempts to contact him.

If that person would have watched some of Dylan's old interviews, it would not have come as a surprise.