by Larry Fyffe
Who among us can resist munching on a pun? A sure food it is to shore up lyrics, according to singer/songwriter Bob Dylan. There’s more double-entendre word play in Dylan’s song lyrics than there are grains of sand fluttering on the branches of a beech tree.
Nod a ‘howdy’ to Buddy the Kid:
(Bob Dylan: Bob Dylan’s Blues)
Or try to measure up to Santa Claus, and the size of his bag of treats:
(Bob Dylan: On The Road Again)
Drop a line in; see whether or not the Fisherman’s Daughter bites:
Visit the House across the road, and say ‘Hi’ to Heidi the Whore:
(Bob Dylan et al: Hidee Hidee Ho)
Metonymy is a trope that that substitutes an adjunct for the whole:
(Bob Dylan: Ballad Of A Thin Man)
Bob Dylan’s pen is punishing everybody:
Apparently, size matters:
Time to invite Our Lady of the Lay over for lunch:
Or, perhaps, take ol’ Mother Goose horseback riding in the park:
Seriously, Dylan’s song lyrics are all messed up, and confused; the songster simply oughta say what he’s talkin’ about. For example, I have no idea what ‘country pie’ in the above song actually means.
Maybe some of our ‘Untold’ readers can help us out.
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The less said about this one the better…
She was here yesterday but she’s gone today
And when she left she took my fur slippers away.
🙂
* showed it to this rake
Good point! ….the less said about this the better …., I refrained from mentioning the ‘fur slippers’ as I, like you, Aaron, did not want to attract the ire of animal right groups .
Those baby seals are cute, ain’t they?
Somebody snatched his country pie and his fur slippers.
**showed it to this drake
is likely an earlier version that Dylan later uses in Gave Names To All The Animals as previously pointed out by the two intrepid interpretors of Dylan lyrics.
I can’t be the one to tell you what that ‘country pie’ really really means, Larry. To add to the mystery, we have this from much later: ‘I got the pork chop, she’s got the pie/she ain’t no saint but neither am I.’ Maybe it’s the same pie. (hint hint)
And what about those ‘spice buns in bed’ (Foot of Pride) Spicy puns?
Sound like they’re getting ready for the feast…
Ah, yes, – no doubt – a witch’s brew featuring a
‘pork chop’, and ‘foot of pride’ to put in her pie.
I think we’re finally getting somewhere as to what these songs actually mean …. so many readers have their minds in the gutter and misinterpret the lyrics….they confuse things when Dylan’s simply talking about a cockbook. .. I mean a cookbook …. excuse the spelling error.
Yes, wonderful to feel we’re finally getting somewhere in penetrating, as it were, the hierarchies of symbolism in the Master’s songs. Most Dylan interpretations are of the pie-in-the-sky variety, y’ know, muckraking Dylan’s life. Consider the following exalted lines:
‘I bit into the root
of the forbidden fruit
with the juice running down my leg’ (Where Are you…)
Looks like we’re gonna have to add roots and fruits to pork chops and pies and feet and re do that cockbook (Oops, it catching..) before we nail the curtains for the feast, Larry…