I picked this book up in high school at a local (central Wisconsin) bookstore and it is one of the best I've read on the general subject of Bob Dylan, and it was written within 40 miles of where I grew up/picked up the book. I found it fascinating to learn about Bobby D. nee Robert Zimmerman, not so much because I am particularly interested in what temple he went to or what his neighbors had to say about him as a bratty teenager (although there are some humorous anecdotes) but rather because it posed a significant question to me. Modern popular songwriting is by and large "autobiographical" in that the lyrics seem to be derived from the personal experiences of the author and are generally penned in the first person narrative form. The question is: if this is our perception of songwriters, what challenge does the fluidity of Dylan's identity as Iron Range ingenue cum the snarky guy from the Village who carried a lightbulb around pose to the authenticity of the narrative? People always talk about Madonna as if she created the idea of "reinventing" oneself as an artist (which in her case is mostly just a costume change and a new religion), but is Dylan the ultimate student of Levinas and Heidegger?On second thought, he probably just got tired of everyone making fun of his Fargo accent.
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