Dylan in America

          Sean Wilentz of Princeton has written a cultural history of the work of Bob Dylan.  Not another biography, Dylan in America is a scholarly review of the threads of American culture which have been picked up, evolved, appropriated and moved forward by the only artist to have both an Oscar (“Things Have Changed” from “The Wonder Boys”)  and a literary Pulitzer awarded in 2008 for his “profound impact on popular music and American culture, marked by lyrical compositions of extraordinary poetic power.”   

Dylan arrived in New York in 1961 looking to meet Woody Guthrie, and that theme is obvious in his work.  Less obvious are the multiple roots and varied media and cultures developed in the background, from the 1840’s Great Awakening music (“Amazing Grace”), blackface minstrel shows, gospel sourced blues from Duncan and Brady to Stagger Lee and Blind Willie McTell, white offshoots of Charlie Chaplin (2005’s “Modern Times” album), Allen Ginsberg and the music of the Popular Front, and the rock descendants of Elvis and the Beatles. Dylan in America criss-crosses the heartland for the currents of American history and mythologies which create our culture and together with exquisite musicianship are reflected in Bob Dylan’s work.         

Wilentz understands the brilliance of Dylan’s work in the 1960’s and 1970’s but explores the artist’s reinvention in the 1990’s and 2000’s as an American agglomerator and musical historian.  Picking up threads from a broad cross-section of American musical styles and schools, Dylan borrows from the Bible, Aeneas, Shakespeare, Ginsberg, Kerouac and different interpretations of blues, jazz and rock to evolve American music, all the while imitating and incorporating other threads which he has taken from Al Jolson, Charlie Chaplin, or Frank Sinatra.  In context Wilentz notes that until 2009 Dylan was the only significant American artist who had not recorded a Christmas album,  and the songs he recorded then notably include 15 which had been recorded by his vocalist idol – Bing Crosby.

For those who thought that Dylan abandoned them in 1966 – he did not.  He just moved on and left them behind.  Wilentz’ book has left me with a lot of music to hear and several more books to read.