"How much can we believe?"
We can believe that whatever self-delusions he might have had in his early days, he was one of the finest singers of folk songs, still capable of persuading people to take pleasure from recordings of his singing some fifty years after they were issued.
We can also believe that he is still capable of drawing out the odd grave-dancer all agog to do Riverdance impersonations on his grave over twenty years after his death.
Jim Carroll