The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #112264   Message #2374336
Posted By: Nerd
25-Jun-08 - 06:49 PM
Thread Name: Name the trad LP that is Dylan source
Subject: RE: Name the trad LP that is Dylan source
Jim, that lawsuit was hopeless. The words to the two songs don't resemble each other nearly enough to constitute copyright infringement, and Behan didn't write the tune. It's fine to say they didn't try very hard to sue, but the fact is they would almost certainly have lost anyway. The question in a copyright case isn't whether it is obvious that Behan's song influenced Dylan, but whether Dylan took too many specific words, phrases, and original ideas from Behan, and he took almost none. The only specific words that the verse in question shared were:

"My name is"

vs.

"My name it is"

which is much flimsier than other cases I have seen where infringement was not found to have occurred.

Barbara, I agree with everyone else. There is no single LP from which Dylan learned all of these songs, although there may be one that coincidentally includes them all. Was the couple you remember British or American?