Category Archives: Uncategorized

Got A Lot Of Gall: The Four Humours (Part II) By Larry Fyffe That the culture of poetry is filled with the left-over diction of the fuzzy pseudo-science of ‘the four humours’ is demonstrated, on one interpretative level, by the … Continue reading →

By Tony Attwood I was brought up in a small flat (apartment) in post-war north London.  We had a baby grand piano (which was apparently hoisted in through the window when we moved in) which took up most of the … Continue reading →

Bob Dylan’s Got A Lot Of Gall BY Larry Fyffe Embedded in the language of poetry are metaphors that have roots going back to the days of William Shakespeare, and beyond. A naturalistc explanation for human behaviour arises to compete … Continue reading →

By Tony Attwood “Why are you so obsessed with Bob Dylan?” was, I suspect, just a throw away comment when it was made on this site, and not meant to open up a whole debate But it did get me wondering. … Continue reading →

  This article continues on from  Bob Dylan And Literary Allusions By Larry Fyffe Bob Dylan opens up the gates of the music industry, allowing for mature subjects, rooted in traditional folk and blues music, and in the classics of … Continue reading →

by Tony Attwood Updated 3 January 2019 “Cry A While” from Love and Theft sounds to me like Bob Dylan pulling in references to all the blues songs he hasn’t referenced so far in his compositions, and in the end … Continue reading →

Bob Dylan And Literary Allusions By Larry Fyffe Bob Dylan’s receives the Nobel Prize In Literature “for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition.” In his countless allusions to the themes of folk and blues songs … Continue reading →

By Tony Attwood Bob is known to have performed this song twice in 1962, and then left it behind, presumably both because he did not compose the music, and because his talent was evolving at such a rate that the … Continue reading →

Bob Dylan: Threepenny Shelley Continues (Part II) By Larry Fyffe Said it has been that the wealthy create poverty, but can not stand looking at it: We should be high, instead of low But let’s be practical, it isn’t so … Continue reading →

By Tony Attwood In traditional popular music, the central themes are love, lost love and dance.  Dylan is not known to be interested too much in dance, but love and lost love are certainly central to his interest. But the … Continue reading →

Bob Dylan And Percy Shelley By Larry Fyffe That the Utopian egalitarian society envisioned in the imagination of Romantic Percy Shelley is always being torn apart by the poet’s observations of reality much influences the song lyrics of Bob Dylan; … Continue reading →

Dylan: Things Have Changed Or Have They? By Larry Fyffe ‘Things Have Changed’ by Bob Dylan references The Threepenny Opera, a satirical musical on self-interest, about money-hungry capitalists and left-behind poor folks endeavouring to follow the footprints of the golden … Continue reading →

By Tony Attwood Having completed his first collection of new songs in years and years, Bob wrote nothing between January 1997 and July 1999.   It was his only recording of a new song in 1999, but what a song. It … Continue reading →

by Tony Attwood Before I started to gather materials for a review of Bob Dylan’s Po’ Boy I had not appreciated how oft-use the phrase “Po’ Boy” or “Poor Boy” is in American culture.  It doesn’t have the same resonance … Continue reading →

Carl Sandburg And Bob Dylan: Part II By Larry Fyffe Carl Sandburg’s soft socialistic poems mix so-called ‘lowbrow’ folk songs with what is often thought of as ‘highbrow’ poetry to bring themes of democracy back home to the alienated working … Continue reading →

By Tony Attwood It seems to me that in suggesting that something is amiss, because some of Bob Dylan’s Nobel prize lecture was lifted from online critiques of the books Dylan mentions, those correspondents who make such a claim are … Continue reading →

by Tony Attwood The return to songwriting in 1996/7 did not reduce the level of touring that Bob and the band were doing.  But there was a break from the end of November 1996 until February 1997 when the tour … Continue reading →

  By Larry Fyffe ‘Untold’ received a plain brown paper envelope containing the acceptance speech Bob Dylan gave to a s select audience of bird watchers at the headquarters of the National Audubon Society in Manhattan. He had received an … Continue reading →

By Tony Attwood I’m not really too sure why people make a fair bit of fuss about this song; it is very much the format that came about when country met rock met blues in the late 1940s and early … Continue reading →

Villon And Dylan By Larry Fyffe In many of Bob Dylan’s song lyrics he takes on the persona of Francois Villon, a French vagabond poet of the 15th century, an autobiographical poet who turns the courtly values of his day … Continue reading →