Whether you like Dylan or not, and whether or not you felt included among the multitudes who hung on his every word, you cannot deny that he opened the enterprise of songwriting to a completely new level of seriousness and expanded the variety of topics and concerns that a songwriter might explore.

John and Paul may or may not have been "better" songwriters than Bob in some final evaluation, but it's undeniable that they not only acknowleged his influence, but that -- at a certain point in time, anyway -- they looked up to him and explicitly stated their desire to emulate him.

There's a quite obvious difference between the Beatle's work before and after Dylan's emergence from the US folk-music "ghetto" into the worldwide rock-pop scene and after the Beatles and Bob had had their historic meeting.