Chris, Dylan definitely did things with songwriting that hadn't been done before. But they'd been done before in other areas. Stream-of-consciousness writing was already well established in literature and poetry, so if Dylan hadn't done it then someone else likely would have.

Mind you, if another incredibly talent guitarist from the British tradition had gone touring Europe and North Africa, maybe they would also have come up with the same kind of stuff that Davey Graham would have. But it's doubtful - I think he was as original as Django or anyone like that.

Renbourn is more dubious - although he was talented, arranging old tunes for guitar had been done many times before (and often recorded better - Renbourn's recordings are often pretty ropey). Bert Jansch is another in the Renbourn vein - talented but not unique. Carthy is probably more deserving, in polishing and reconstructing a coherent whole from the enormous "back catalogue" of pre-Victorian English folk, which is a concept that might not necessarily have been done otherwise.

Graham.