k-punk said:
The point about literary critics foaming at the mouth over Dylan is what has always puzzled me ... Because he doesn't strike me as very literary at all... unless gibberish (sorry 'surreal lyrics') counts as literary... but of course so much contemporary poetry is equally vacuous.... Can someone quote some of the lyrics that are supposed to be good?
i can't for the life of me recall why . . . . but when i was in law school, somebody there gave a lecture during lunch one day about "jews in rock" -- dissecting the lyrics of a leonard cohen song and, yes, dylan's "all along the watchtower"
evidently the lyrics of "watchtower" recall isaiah 21???
"There must be some way out of here," said the joker to the thief,
"There's too much confusion, I can't get no relief."
"Businessmen, they drink my wine, plowmen dig my earth.
None of them along the line know what any of it is worth."
"No reason to get excited," the thief he kindly spoke,
"There are many here among us who feel that life is but a joke.
"But you and I, we've been through that, and this is not our fate
"So let us not talk falsely now, the hour is getting late."
All along the watchtower, princes kept the view
While all the women came and went, barefoot servants, too.
Outside in the distance a wildcat did growl,
Two riders were approaching, the wind began to howl.