Course Description

“I’ll let you be in my dream if I can be in yours”
Bob Dylan – Talking World War III Blues 

In 2016 the Swedish Academy took an unprecedented and controversial stance in awarding The Nobel Prize in literature for 2016 to Bob Dylan. In doing so the academy departed from its practice of naming an internationally recognized author of fiction, drama, or poetry for the award. Dylan is the only singer/musician/songwriter to ever receive the award. The Nobel Prize is consequential. The academy recognizes Nobel laureates as having made the highest achievements in their field. Since the inception of the award in 1901 only fourteen Americans have received this award. It places Dylan among the literary giants of the 20^th century. In spite of this (or perhaps because of this), literary critics and others continue to debate the status of Bob Dylan’s work. Is it literature or simply pop music? In awarding Dylan the Nobel Prize, the Swedish Academy’s judgement is plain, Dylan’s work is literature, great literature.

The award challenges us to look at Bob Dylan’s body of work in that light. And that is what we will concern ourselves with in this seminar. We will consider Dylan’s body of work, not only the more than 600 songs from his 36 studio albums (and countless more from his “bootleg” series) but also Dylan’s forays into poetry, film, and ethnomusicology. Similarly, we will consider Dylan’s shifting persona in popular culture. We will examine, for example, the contemporary film biography of Dylan, “A Complete Unknown” (Starring Timothee Chalamet as the young Bob Dylan).

The course will have a research component. The focus will be on the literary merit of Dylan’s work and the historical backdrop of the 20^th and 21^st centuries, but students will be encouraged to research that work using the tools that their disciplinary majors provide. It’s a cliché to note that there is a Dylan quote for every occasion, but it is certainly accurate to note that his work may be approached in seemingly endless ways.  I expect the seminar to be lively and engaging. Much class time (about half) will be devoted to listening to selections from Dylan’s work and discussing them. There will be an online song archive and nearly all of Bob Dylan’s recorded songs will be available to students online. We will also be sampling other creative projects Dylan has taken on from film to poetry to his “Theme Time Radio Hour” archive of 20th century American popular music along with his recently published The Philosophy of Modern Song. 

Texts

• Bob Dylan: The Lyrics 1961-2012 (or the ability to use the lyric section of Bob Dylan’s website to access lyrics)
• Bob Dylan in America – Sean Wilentz
• Chronicles Vol I – Bob Dylan
• Podcast & Website: "A Bob Dylan Primer" - Michael Hacker
• Podcast & Website: “Definitely Dylan” – Laura Tenschert
• Elements of Style: Wm. Strunk and E.B. White (any edition)

• The Philosophy of Modern Song – Bob Dylan
• Bob Dylan: All the Songs – Philip Margolin 
• Why Bob Dylan Matters – Richard F. Thomas
• Dylan’s Visions of Sin – Christopher Ricks
• Behind the Shades Revisited - Clinton Heylin
• Song and Dance Man III – Michael Gray

• Don’t Look Back (1967) by D.A. Pennebaker 
• Masked and Anonymous (2003) by Larry Charles
• No Direction Home (2005) by Martin Scorsese
• I'm Not There (2007) by Todd Haynes
• Rolling Thunder Revue (2019) by Martin Scorsese
• A Complete Unknown (December 2024) by James Mangold

The instructor will provide readings with supplementary assignments on the seminar wiki. These will depend on the research interests of the students

Requirements

• A report on a particular song(s). (10pts)
• A reflection paper on one of the films (10 pts)
• A two-page research project proposal (10pts)
• An oral research progress report with one page synopsis (10pts)
• A final research paper or performance based on research (30pts)
• A presentation based on the paper (10pts).
• Participation: attendance, participation in class activities, and professional demeanor. (20pts).

Grades will be assessed:   A = 88-100 Pts.  Cr. = 65-87 Pts.  Ncr.  = 0-64 Pts.

About the Instructor(s): Michael Thomas

Michael Thomas Ph.D. is an anthropologist (Univ. of Washington) and novelist. He is an Emeritus (retired)  Honors College faculty member who directed many Conexiones study abroad programs in Latin America and has for 55 years avidly followed Bob Dylan’s career.