Interview http://www.interferenza.com/bcs/interw/84-jul30.htm with Bert Kleinman (30 July 1984). Cf. C. S. Lewis: "People won't write the books I want, so I have to do it for myself."

“I heard the roar of a wave that could drown the whole world.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan (1963), A Hard Rain's a-Gonna Fall

“The words fill my head, and fall to the floor, that if God's on our side, he'll stop the next war.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, The Times They Are A-Changin' (1964), With God On Our Side

“My sense of rhyme used to be more involved in my songwriting than it is… Still staying in the unconscious frame of mind, you can pull yourself out and throw up two rhymes first and work it back. You get the rhymes first and work it back and then see if you can make it make sense in another kind of way. You can still stay in the unconscious frame of mind to pull it off, which is the state of mind you have to be in anyway.”

Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan: The Song Talk Interview http://www.interferenza.com/bcs/interw/1991zollo.htm by Paul Zollo (1991)

“I’m going out of my mind, oh, oh; with a pain that stops and starts; like a corkscrew to my heart; Ever since we’ve been apart”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Blood on the Tracks (1975), You're a Big Girl Now

“Greed and lust I can understand, but I can't understand the values of definition and confinement. Definition destroys. Besides, there's nothing definite in this world.”

Bob Dylan

Neil Hickey TV Guide interview http://www.punkhart.com/dylan/interviews/sep_1976.html (11 September 1976)

“Down the highway, down the tracks, down the road to ecstacy,
I followed you beneath the stars, hounded by your memory and all your ragin' glory”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Blood on the Tracks (1975), Idiot Wind

“I read On the Road in maybe 1959. It changed my life like it changed everyone else's.”

Bob Dylan

On the influence of Jack Kerouac on him, as quoted Grasping for the Wind : The Search for Meaning in the 20th Century (2001) by John W. Whitehead

“For man has invented his doom; first step was touching the moon.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Infidels (1983), License to Kill

“You can't win with a losing hand”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, The Essential Bob Dylan (2000), Things Have Changed (recorded 1999)

“A cat's meow and a cow's moo,
I can recite 'em all,
just tell me where it hurts you, honey,
and I'll tell you who to call.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Self Portrait (1970), Quinn The Eskimo (The Mighty Quinn)

“If she's passing back this way I'm not that hard to find
Tell her she can look me up if she's got the time.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Blood on the Tracks (1975), If You See Her, Say Hello

“When you bite off more than you can chew, you pay the penalty, somebody's got to tell the tale, I guess it must be up to me.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Biograph (1985), Up to Me (recorded 1974)

“Take care of all your memories. said my friend Mick, For you cannot relive them.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, The Basement Tapes (1975), Open the Door, Homer (recorded 1967)
Variant: Take care of all your memories. For you cannot relive them.

“I'll eat when I'm hungry, drink when I'm dry”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Time Out of Mind (1997), Standing In The Doorway