Love Letter to Dylan

At this point there is hardly anything new that can be written about Bob Dylan. The newly 80-year-old songwriter has, according to Goodreads, 98 books written about him, which is a number that continues to increase annually. His influence is plainly incomprehensible, and the many hats he wears from political and cultural critic, to poet, to archivist in love both sweet and bitter, keep him prevalent in a way that transcends any singular title. While this article may not add anything new to the winding scroll of ruminations on Dylan, it will hopefully give insight as to why he is still worth talking about, and listening to, all these years later, as well as celebrate his career that has now entered its seventh decade. 

Dylan tends to reject the mythologizing of his work, and has often chosen to inhabit the aloof, easygoing persona, rather than appear as possessing the complexity that is clear in his songs. In many ways he is an enigma, which is why the investigation of his work continues to be so alluring to fans ever since his first release. Below are a handful of great Dylan songs and why they are worth hearing according to one fan, though they are but a scratch on the surface of the pristine Dylan catalogue. While his voice may be an initial turnoff (and in which case, get over yourself), the words make up for it and then some. For no matter what you are feeling, chances are Dylan has a song for it. 

Visions of Johanna (1966) 

I must use “Visions of Johanna” as the entrypoint of any Dylan conversation I have

because it is my namesake. I will be honest, it is a hard song to live up to and I feel it has plagued me into being a restless, hopeless romantic for the speaker spends the entire song bewitched by ruminations of their vague love interest named Johanna. It is a prime example of Dylan’s hyper-observational, nuanced storytelling, possessing lines like, “Inside the museums, infinity goes up on trial,” “Name me someone that's not a parasite and I'll go out and say a prayer for him,” and perhaps most incredibly, “The ghost of ‘lectricity howls in the bones of her face.” It is a song that pushed the boundary of songwriting, as Dylan rambles across lonely New York settings for seven-and-a-half minutes straight, spitting out beautiful verses as he goes. Dylan was my first introduction to great writing even though I didn’t know it at the time, and this song was an example of something so over my head that I didn’t understand it until years later. I remember being very young and asking my parents about a word that I didn’t recognize while listening to him on a road trip. They essentially told me “If Dylan makes up words, you can too,” mostly because he is a saint-like figure in my secular household, but the sentiment stayed with me nonetheless. He is an artist you grow with, for as his countless biographies and thinkpieces have shown, there is a near endless amount of substance that can be extracted from Dylan’s work. This causes him to become more than just a voice pouring from a speaker, but a comforting force that may come and go, but always remains. And on one last note, to quote Jack Black in “High Fidelity,” “That is perverse! Don’t tell anyone you don’t own fucking Blonde on Blonde!” 

Only a Pawn in Their Game (1964)

The halfway point of the immaculate protest album The Times They Are A-Changin’, “Only a Pawn in Their Game” tells of the weaponization of black bodies and manipulation of lower-class whites for political gain. Dylan frames the song with the death of Medgar Evers, an event that caused him to write the song in the first place and which he would later perform at the March on Washington. Dylan begins the song inhibiting Evers’ killer, attempting to redirect the blame away from the individual and rather towards the true culprits: the political and economic systems that perpetuate and encourage this misplaced racial hatred, as well as those who benefit from and uphold these systems. Unlike many protest songs of the ‘60s, Dylan avoided cliches of optimism and oversimplifications of moral good and evil. Instead he attempted to shine a light on the complexity of oppression, while putting continuous pressure on the ruling class. At times he also points the finger at the American liberal and the tendency to separate humanity from injustice, as well as performative compassion. In “The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll,” later on in the same album, Dylan sings, “But you who philosophize disgrace and criticize all fears,/ Take the rag away from your face./ Now ain’t the time for your tears.” The Times They Are A-Changin’ offers a masterclass in critiquing the American ethos, as well as justice, economic, and social systems through song in just forty-five minutes. Unfortunately, so many of his words and scathing criticisms hold up just as strongly today, making it hard to say if Dylan was really ahead of his time, or if America just remains in a standstill. 

Idiot Wind (1975) 

“Idiot Wind” off Dylan’s Blood on the Tracks shows the brutal, bitter side to the songwriter, who at this point in 1975 was battling fame, divorce, and the fading glory of the sixties. The title is a reference to the infamous “tomorrow” soliloquy from Macbeth, which takes place as Macbeth learns his wife is dead and mourns life’s futility, saying, “It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,/ signifying nothing.” Dylan’s work is littered with illusions both biblical and literary (see “Desolation Row” for both), which is a major part of why his work feels so timeless, combining modern relationships with ancient themes. In “Idiot Wind” the speaker’s anger is palpable as they describe betrayal and the frustration of feeling misunderstood, both by the media and someone once loved, as Dylan sings in the chorus, “Idiot wind/ Blowing every time you open your mouth” and “It’s a wonder that you still know how to breathe.” By the song’s eighth verse the speaker moves towards maturity, saying, “You’ll never know the hurt I suffered/ Nor the pain I rise above/ And I’ll never know the same about you/ Your holiness or your kind of love/ And it makes me feel so sorry,” and includes themself in the scathing chorus, ending the song with, “It’s a wonder we can even feed ourselves.” While “Idiot Wind” as a whole is pretty unforgiving, the acknowledgment of personal fault is key to painting a fuller picture of the speaker and the accused’s dynamic, for despite what a lot of breakup songs portray, a relationship is not one-sided. Dylan is not always this understanding, however, as shown in the diss-track “Don't Think Twice It’s All Right,” where he sings, “I ain't a-sayin' you treated me unkind/ You could have done better but I don't mind/ You just kinda wasted my precious time” without a hint of remorse. 

She Belongs to Me (1965) 

“She Belongs to Me” is at the very top of Bringing it All Back Home, an album that at times is overshadowed by its direct successor Highway 61 Revisited, which marked a shifting point in rock music when Dylan went electric. The song itself is gentle and easily-digestible, describing a woman of agency and self-assuredness who keeps the speaker from ever getting comfortable. The title is ironic in the face of the relationship that Dylan presents, for the woman is somewhat reminiscent of the femme-fatale trope, or maybe more accurately, is a woman that is resistant to a submissive relationship role, causing her to appear cruel rather than justified. The speaker in no way possesses this woman, but is fully aware of this, describing themself as “a walking antique,” and pale in the light of her beauty. Dylan characterizes the woman, writing, “She can take the dark out of the nighttime/ And paint the daytime black” and “She never stumbles/ She’s got no place to fall.” She is in control of every situation, and the speaker is lucky enough just to worship her. The subject of the song has long been speculated, mostly between past lovers of Dylan like Joan Baez, Suzie Rotolo, Nico, and Sara Lowends, and even has additionally been read as a dialogue between a father and daughter. Regardless of who the song is directed to, it displays Dylan’s ability to encapsulate a variety of relationships in several brief stanzas, possessing astute characterizations and captivating details to keep listeners coming back for a lifetime.