The irony of Bob Dylan.
By Paul J Cella Posted in Barry Goldwater | Bob Dylan | conservatism | Culture | J. H. Kunstler — Comments (15) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
Whaddya say we talk about something unrelated to the primaries? I say we try it. Anyone with me, clear your minds of all that compelling tomfoolery and read on.
Mr. J. H. Kunstler, of Peak Oil fame, reviewed Bob Dylan’s first volume of memoirs some time ago. Dylan fans (of whom I doubt this website has in great abundance) will find in it some insight and interest, though I only link to it reluctantly — not least because of Kunstler’s penchant for profanity. If you don’t know or like Dylan, or are repelled by the deliberate if rare use of oaths or vulgarity in critical writing, the essay will probably just fatigue you: so I’ll offer just a couple summary points for your notice.
(a) Kunstler concludes with a statement that I endorse, with two caveats: “The great records of the great years endure. The body of Dylan’s songwriting work is every bit as formidable as the novels of Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald. I have no doubt that Dylan will go down as the most important artist of my generation.” Now the natural reaction to a statement like that about the Sixties generation is a terse “that aint saying much, brother,” muttered under the breath. That is my first caveat. The second is, of course, that Dylan is not “of my generation” but the preceding one. Nevertheless, in my view Dylan’s stature is assured. Whether the genre of rock n’ rock, which he pioneered, mastered, expanded, and bewildered, will secure a similar stature in the tableau of human art, is another question altogether: one on which I must confess my own agnosticism.
Now Kunstler, while clearly a connoisseur of exaggerated polemic (take a gander at his headline blog, the title of which I will not reproduce here, if you doubt that), is not a writer particularly given to exaggerated encomia. He is not a writer given to the instrument of flattery. Though I deny and censure the Liberalism that underlies it, I do admire his honesty.
All that is merely by way of restating that his bold conclusion on Dylan is probably not just another instance of Boomer enthusiasm and self-absorption. Which brings me to my second point:
(b) Kunstler confirms what was only a rumor to me before: that Dylan records in this volume of memoirs that his favorite politician in the Sixties was none other than Mr. Conservative himself, Barry Goldwater. Let that sink in.
It is hardly a revelation to learn that Dylan has rebuffed most attempts to award him the title Spokesman of a Generation; or that he has generally resisted granting his “protest” songs over to Leftist iconography. But it does come with some surprise to discover that his actual political tendencies in the 1960s were toward a politician like Goldwater. Kunstler certainly does not neglect to emphasize his astonishment, and he is plainly a man of the Left.
(c) With all this is mind, I am prepared to offer a qualified Conservative endorsement of Dylan:
Given that the counterculture of the Sixties, which tried to set up Dylan as its spokesman or poet-laureate, has conquered and is even now solidifying its preeminence in our society, there is a special and marvelous irony to note.
All the sneering revolt that churns through the great anthems of Dylan’s best work, “Like a Rolling Stone” being perhaps the most well-known exemplar; all the defiance, the fury of impudence; all the challenge thrown vaguely at some contemptible oppressor —
You used to be so amused
At Napoleon in rags and the language that he used
Go to him now, he calls you, you can't refuse
When you got nothing, you got nothing to lose
You're invisible now, you got no secrets to conceal.
How does it feel?
How does it feel
To be on your own
With no direction home
Like a complete unknown
Like a rolling stone?
— all this may be justly hurled with equal passion against the generation, now leading our country toward ruin, which wanted it as its slogan, and which unjustly hurled it against the basically sound social order preceding it.
And Bob Dylan himself may have even meant it that way.
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Let me also take a moment to point you to a website called Right Wing Bob, whose proprietor recently interviewed J. Bottum, editor of First Things, on the subject of Bob Dylan. Ben Stein was another interviewee some time back.
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The irony of Bob Dylan. 15 Comments (0 topical, 15 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
many of his lyrics sounded just as good as other poetry I have read. I think this is an excellent diary, I guess I can see the Goldwater in Dylan. I am no Dylan fan, at best a casual observer, but many people believe in freedom, the more individual they are, the more it makes sense. Certainly Dylan marches to his own drummer.
I like that he does not seek out publicity and bash America like so many musicians and Hollywood types. He may be a lefty, but he certainly does not go out of his way to make a point of it. Anyway, he sang one of my favorite songs, with my favorite singer, so he can't be all that bad.
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Molon Labe!
It's Fred-mourning, McCain-pimping Sunday.
Kill the terrorists
Protect the borders
Punch the hippies -- Frank J
Ever. I have an entire bookmarks folder full of them. I read every single one of them, even if I don't comment.
My favorite Dylan album is Slow Train Coming, right after he converted to Christianity.
It's not the most-remembered Dylan album or the most critically-acclaimed or the most easily accessed to pop culture, but I like it more than any of his others.
As Heylin writes, "[Dylan's] belief in the imminence of the End was reflected in almost all of the songs he now found himself writing." Dylan would later say in an interview taken in 1984, "The songs that I wrote for the Slow Train album [frightened me]...I didn't plan to write them...I didn't like writing them. I didn't want to write them."
"Precious Angel," "Gonna Change My Way of Thinking," "When You Gonna Wake Up?" and "When He Returns" all "drew heavily and directly upon the Book of Revelation," notes Heylin. "In the early months of 1979, Dylan was writing his most message-driven album in sixteen years. This time, though, the pursuit of the millennium had overtaken more sociopolitical concerns."
So Dylan was for BaAuH20, so was Hillary.
Hillary married into liberalism, same as Theresa Heinz. Some people care more about ambition than political philosophy.
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Molon Labe!
a different outlook on life. Your neighbor could save your life, so you had better be nice, and most importantly, polite. Selfishness in a Northwoods winter can kill you in fifteen minutes, or less if you're wet. It's a nanny state now but the old hands are the same as they used to be, chat over coffee at breakfast and you're invited for dinner before you know it. The deeper in the Midwest and further North you go (rural mostly), the more polite and generous the locals are. It is soo refreshing.
Not a big Bobby Zimmerman fan, but I do know where he came from and respect his accomplishments.
"Hand me a flish" - Chico Marx
I love his wordsmanship and his music. I've never really cared all that much about the deeper meaning, what he has to say, etc. (although I've long realized that "what he has to say" has always been kinda the point...Dylan being more poet than musician).
But consider his great tune "My Back Pages" -- which is a protest song against protest songs...a swipe at songwriters (very much including himself) who take themselves too seriously and preach too much.
In my narrow view growing up at the end of the boomer generation I viewed Bob Dylan as one of "them", the radicals. Now, with a Daughter who has come to worship the songs and life of Bob Dylan, attempting to be involved I took the time LEARN about Bob Dylan, his life and his songs. He was a great song writer, he was not the protest song writer or the radical song writer he was just a song writer who was having fun, no hidden meanings or internal messages he was having fun and enjoying the times. Simple!, like conspriacy theorys or equating meaning to the meaningless sometimes it's nothing more than Simple Fun!
Not many people heard Dylan qua Dylan, they heard him through The Byrds. The first three chords of "Turn, Turn, Turn" resonates for a whole generation without regard to any particular individual's politics.
Most of the "children of the sixties" weren't children of the sixties at all; they were children of the fifties and of men in gray flannel suits. They had their dalliance with anarchy and went on. They couldn't escape the changes in sexual mores brought on by the Pill and no-fault divorce. They couldn't escape the "easy livin'" brought on by unprecedented affluence. But not many of them appeared on the balcony watching the May Day Parade; that was for another and earlier generation. A few went another way.
The reason that I viscerally hate the Clintons is that I knew so many of them; smoking dope in a college dorm room, quoting Marx, and Mao, and Nietchze, feeling superior, and planning to rule the World. Most went on to normal spouse, kids, and mortgage lives. Some went into government, academia, and non-profits and kept the same dumbass ideas they had smoking dope in college dorms in '69.
Can't blame it on Dylan, he's a complex person and his music means pretty much what the listener wants to hear in it. It was the time, and the times, they were a'changin'
In Vino Veritas
that you may have more problems than those of those you disparage (ie. the 50-60's teens). Makes me want to grab you by the collar and slap you for your overbearing ignorance! Seems that some are still trying to place individuals into groups to their liking....
Formally known as Deagle... "Golf is a way of life..."
"... grab [you]me by the collar and slap [you]me..." I'd come armed if I were you.
In Vino Veritas
on the forum... Love Dylan and have most of his songs. Of course, it helps if your past 60 or so... Nice break from politics, thanks...
Formally known as Deagle... "Golf is a way of life..."
of my generation. Simon & Garfunkel, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Crosby, Still, Nash, and Young. Okay, I've given away my age..
Formally known as Deagle... "Golf is a way of life..."
I'll give Dylan the words, but in terms of overall songs - the mix of words and music - from that group there is none greater than Sir James Paul McCartney. What is it with me and Mc names, anyway?
John S. McCain III
We've come a long, long way together/Through the hard times and the good
I have to celebrate you, baby/I have to praise you like I should
Do not know anything at all about the man. Your post is intriguing. Reminds me of the source for Turn, Turn, Turn.
His songs were all about the words for me. That and the rebellion...I ain't gonna work on Maggie's farm no more, for example, was an anthem for me while I lived with my mother whose name was Maggie.
Maybe liking Dylan was the first thing that made me realize I wasn't main stream. Nothing since has changed my mind.
GO FRED!
www.fred08.com
Redneck Hippie