Bob Dylan won vandaag de Nobelprijs voor de Literatuur.  Waarom dat wat mij betreft volkomen terecht is, kan ik het beste laten zien aan de hand van zijn eigen teksten. Een greep uit zijn veelzijdige werk van de afgelopen 50 jaar.

 

Maar eerst wat Dylan in 2015 zei over zijn werk bij het in ontvangst nemen van de MusiCares Award

“I’m glad for my songs to be honored like this. But you know, they didn’t get here by themselves. It’s been a long road and it’s taken a lot of doing. These songs of mine, I think of as mystery plays, the kind that Shakespeare saw when he was growing up. I think you could trace what I do back that far. They were on the fringes then, and I think they’re on the fringes now. And they sound like they’ve been traveling on hard ground.”

(voor de volledige tekst, zie: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/read-bob-dylans-complete-riveting-musicares-speech-20150209#ixzz40q0lur2O)

 

Mijn (haastige) keus van vandaag:

 

POËTISCH

Inside the museums, Infinity goes up on trial

Voices echo this is what salvation must be like after a while

But Mona Lisa musta had the highway blues
You can tell by the way she smiles
See the primitive wallflower freeze
When the jelly-faced women all sneeze
Hear the one with the mustache say, “Jeeze
I can’t find my knees”
Oh, jewels and binoculars hang from the head of the mule
But these visions of Johanna, they make it all seem so cruel

(Vision of Johanna; 1966)

 

 

RELIGIEUS

In the time of my confession, in the hour of my deepest need
When the pool of tears beneath my feet flood every newborn seed
There’s a dyin’ voice within me reaching out somewhere
Toiling in the danger and in the morals of despair

Don’t have the inclination to look back on any mistake
Like Cain, I now behold this chain of events that I must break
In the fury of the moment I can see the Master’s hand
In every leaf that trembles, in every grain of sand

(Every grain of sand; 1981)

 

 

VERLEIDER

Lay, lady, lay, lay across my big brass bed
Lay, lady, lay, lay across my big brass bed
Whatever colors you have in your mind
I’ll show them to you and you’ll see them shine

(Lay, Lady, Lay; 1969)

 

 

TAALKUNST (rap avant la lettre)

Johnny’s in the basement
Mixing up the medicine
I’m on the pavement
Thinking about the government
The man in the trench coat
Badge out, laid off
Says he’s got a bad cough
Wants to get it paid off
Look out kid
It’s somethin’ you did
God knows when
But you’re doin’ it again
You better duck down the alley way
Lookin’ for a new friend
The man in the coon-skin cap
By the big pen
Wants eleven dollar bills
You only got ten

(Subterranean Homesick Blues; 1965)

 

 

HARTZEER

If you see her, say hello, she might be in Tangier
She left here last early Spring, is livin’ there, I hear
Say for me that I’m all right though things get kind of slow
She might think that I’ve forgotten her, don’t tell her it isn’t so

(If you see here, Say Hello; 1975)

 

 

TOEN EN NU

They’re peddlers and they’re meddlers
They buy and they sell
They destroyed your city
They’ll destroy you as well
They’re lecherous and treacherous
Hell-bent for leather
Each of ‘em bigger
Than all men put together

Sluggers and muggers
Wearing fancy gold rings
All the women goin’ crazy
For the early Roman kings

(Early Roman Kings, 2012)

 

 

TRIBUTE TO ROOTS

Seen the arrow on the doorpost
Saing, “This land is condemned
All the way from New Orleans
To Jerusalem”
I traveled through East Texas
Where many martyrs fell
And I know no one can sing the blues
Like Blind Willie McTell

(Blind Willie McTell, 1993)

 

 

BEWOGEN

I woke up this mornin’
There were tears in my bed
They killed a man I really loved
Shot him through the head
Lord, Lord
They cut George Jackson down
Lord, Lord
They laid him in the ground

(George Jackson; 1971)

 

 

HET EINDE NADERT

Shadows are falling and I’ve been here all day
It’s too hot to sleep, time is running away
Feel like my soul has turned into steel
I’ve still got the scars that the sun didn’t heal
There’s not even room enough to be anywhere
It’s not dark yet, but it’s getting there

(Not dark yet; 1997)

 

Tot zo ver mijn selectie.

Voor wie niet genoeg van Dylan kan krijgen, is er net in Nederland een prachtig boek verschenen: