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The last episode was Bob Dylan and Thomas Hardy part XVI
By Larry Fyffe
As well as a novel placed in the time of Napoleon Bonaparte, Thomas Hardy pens a long play about the Napoleonic Wars:
A horrible dream has gripped me - horrible
(Thomas Hardy: The Dynasts, Act VII, sc. vi)
Bob Dylan writes songs about the later American Civil War:
I dreamt a monstrous dream
(Bob Dylan: ‘Cross The Green Mountain)
Prior to the Civil War, a number of slaves escape to Canada by means of the ‘underground railroad’ – giving rise to the song below:
No more auction block for me No more, no more No more auction block for me Many thousands gone
(Bob Dylan: No More Auction Block ~ traditional)
Elsewhere, the singer/songwriter mentions the Napoleonic Wars – The United States sides with Napoleon, and attacks Canada (British North America); Britain retailiates by setting the White House in Washington aflame – the American endeavour to conquer all of North America fails:
Ever since the British burned the White House down There's been a bleeding wound in the heart of town (Bob Dylan: Narrow Way)
The above image akin to the bloody image depicted beneath:
The oblong white ceiling with this scarlet blot in the midst had the appearance of a gigantic Ace of Hearts (Thomas Hardy: Tess Of The d'Urbervilles, Chapter LVI)
As the following lyrics indicate, the despotic French general becomes an archetype in regards to love affairs:
You used to be amused At Napoleon in rags, and the language that he used Go to him now he calls you, you can't refuse (Bob Dylan: Like A Rolling Stone)
On the subject of love and love, the singer/songwriter, like Hardy in his day, draws upon writers living at the time:
Idiot wind, blowing through the dust upon our shelves We're idiots, babe It's a wonder that we can even feed ourselves (Bob Dylan: Idiot Wind)
A tribute paid to the author of the following prose:
Strange, how we manage to feed the world, and not learn to feed ourselves (Henry Miller: The Air-Conditioned Nightmare)
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