The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #160763   Message #3816514
Posted By: Jeri
25-Oct-16 - 05:21 PM
Thread Name: Bob Dylan: Nobel laureate
Subject: RE: Bob Dylan: Nobel laureate
I'm not going to go into particulars.
If I explain (I'm saying this again, but maybe it will be clearer this time), I'll be explaining what it means to ME, and it won't make sense to you a it won't be relevant.
The poems/songs are (in my opinion) intended to evoke feelings. One of my favorite songs really doesn't make any sense if you try to analyze it. I first heard it on the radio while driving. The words came fast enough to register, but they only evoked images, and were gone, and it wasn't possible to linger long enough to nail down concrete meanings. You had no choice but to let the words wash over you and just feel.

So when I say someone "doesn't get it", what I mean isn't that they don't understand the words or their meaning, but they don't understand how to listen to that provocative vagueness and make sense of it. Usually that happens because the person simply doesn't like it. They may like things that have only one single indisputable meaning. I'm guessing that's what Dick prefers, maybe Jim and other folks who don't like Dylan. Maybe they resent having to interpret, to fill in the blanks. I like the blanks.

If you want me to explain how my brain works, and why Dylan's songs have meaning for me when they don't have any for you, well, I'm not stupid enough to try.