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Another side of Bob and more!

You know you can make a name for yourself,
You can hear them tires squeal,
You can be known as the most beautiful woman
Who ever crawled across cut glass to make a deal.

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Who am I and what is this site about?

Short answer: My name is Sean Curnyn and I maintain this website in order to challenge persistent fallacies regarding the Left's ownership of Bob Dylan and his work, in addition to making more general commentary on Dylan's work, and also making commentary at whim on events in the world at large. See below for my more wordy original manifesto.

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No, I am not Bob Dylan. Neither do I speak for Bob Dylan, or represent him in any way, shape or capacity. The references to Dylan on this site, and to his songs, writings and statements, are by way of an attempt to broaden and vary the context in which these words are heard. Hopefully the critical analyses on this site give pause to some and succor to others, and go some way towards demonstrating the degree to which Bob Dylan's work transcends time, place and the politics of any given moment.

I also seek to redress the balance a little bit. Leftists have had it too much to themselves in co-opting this great American songwriter's work for their purposes. Through all the occasions on which Bob has riled and offended them (e.g. when he asserted his artistic independence in 1964; when he declined to write songs about Vietnam at the height of the Vietnam protest era; and worst of all when he sang directly about his love of God), the leftists have always let some time pass, and then posited that Dylan had just gone through a phase of some kind but essentially still belonged to them. Well, I'd suggest that he doesn't belong to anybody on this earth - and that his work belongs to all of us.

All political opinions expressed are my own. I do not attempt to maintain that Bob Dylan shares my views on anything. One of the many reasons I admire Bob Dylan is that he has resisted the temptations and entreaties that have surely swamped him through the years, to throw his weight into a partisan political context. At a gig in Tempe AZ in 1979, he has been quoted as saying from the stage: "I don't think I've ever said anything that's been a lie. Never told you to vote for nobody. Never told you to follow nobody." Correct (if not grammatical), and considerable credit is due to him for that fact.*

I have been listening closely to Bob Dylan's music since I was 16 years old ... and I'm older than that now. His songs seemed intensely relevant then, and have continued to seem so, through a misspent youth that included my working for Greenpeace, and voting for Jesse Jackson in 1988. The prism of the passing years has only sharpened the light that emanates from Dylan's astounding body of work. My own politics began to change for the better when I purchased, as a joke, a bargain-bin copy of a book called The Tempting of America written by Robert Bork. The arguments which I read, in expectancy of laughing at them, turned out to be persuasive, and I found myself instead questioning the critics who had previously formed my opinion of Judge Bork, and who had ruthlessly skewered him in Senate hearings on his nomination to the Supreme Court, with allegations they had to know were disingenuous. I moved on to question the other ways in which I had been misled, and I have found it to be a never-ending process. While I like to think that my outlook was destined to mature in any case, I will always be grateful to that other Bob.

My advice to anyone is to listen to Bob Dylan's songs with an open mind. Be entertained and moved and often surprised.

And never let anyone convince you that Dylan's art promotes an ideology that you cannot abide.

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* Actually it's correct whether you interpret it straightforwardly or even accept the double negative. He has genuinely never told anyone to "vote for nobody," i.e. not to vote at all. (This is why Bob is a genius.)

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Quotes from the works of others are linked to their source or are as otherwise attributed, and are used in accordance with Fair Use guidelines. Contact: rightwingbob(at)gmail.com