1. Quotes
  2. Authors
  3. Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan Quotes
page 6

Robert Dylan is an American singer, songwriter, musician, painter, and writer. He has been influential in popular music and culture for more than five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s, when he became a reluctant "voice of a generation" with songs such as "Blowin' in the Wind" and "The Times They Are a-Changin'", which became anthems for the Civil Rights Movement and anti-war movement. Leaving behind his initial base in the American folk music revival, his six-minute single "Like a Rolling Stone", recorded in 1965, enlarged the range of popular music.

Dylan's lyrics incorporate a wide range of political, social, philosophical, and literary influences. They defied existing pop music conventions and appealed to the burgeoning counterculture. Initially inspired by the performances of Little Richard and the songwriting of Woody Guthrie, Robert Johnson, and Hank Williams, Dylan has amplified and personalized musical genres. His recording career, spanning more than 50 years, has explored the traditions in American song—from folk, blues, and country to gospel, rock and roll, and rockabilly to English, Scottish, and Irish folk music, embracing even jazz and the Great American Songbook. Dylan performs with guitar, keyboards, and harmonica. Backed by a changing lineup of musicians, he has toured steadily since the late 1980s on what has been dubbed the Never Ending Tour. His accomplishments as a recording artist and performer have been central to his career, but his songwriting is considered his greatest contribution. Since 1994, Dylan has also published seven books of drawings and paintings, and his work has been exhibited in major art galleries.

As a musician, Dylan has sold more than 100 million records, making him one of the best-selling artists of all time. He has also received numerous awards including eleven Grammy Awards, a Golden Globe Award, and an Academy Award. Dylan has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Minnesota Music Hall of Fame, Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame, and Songwriters Hall of Fame. The Pulitzer Prize jury in 2008 awarded him a special citation for "his profound impact on popular music and American culture, marked by lyrical compositions of extraordinary poetic power." In May 2012, Dylan received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama. In 2016, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature "for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition".

✵ 24. May 1941   •   Other names بوب ديلون
Bob Dylan photo
Bob Dylan: 523   quotes 50   likes

Bob Dylan Quotes

“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

Life , Change , Reading

“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)

Cats , Hurt

“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

Way , Time

“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)

Penalty

“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.

Memory

“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

Drink

“I'm gonna spare the defeated—I'm gonna speak to the crowd
I'm gonna spare the defeated, boys, I'm going to speak to the crowd
I am goin' to teach peace to the conquered
I'm gonna tame the proud”

Bob Dylan

Compare: "But yours will be the rulership of nations, / remember Roman, these will be your arts: / to teach the ways of peace to those you conquer, / to spare defeated peoples, tame the proud." The Aeneid of Virgil: A Verse Translation by Allen Mandelbaum, 6.1134–1137.
Song lyrics, Love and Theft (2001), Lonesome Day Blues

Peace , Boy

“You go to Sodom and Gomorrah, but what do you care? Ain't nobody there would want to marry your sister.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Infidels (1983), Jokerman

Sister

“I put one on the turntable and when the needle dropped, I was stunned — didn't know if I was stoned or straight… All these songs together, one after another made my head spin. It made me want to gasp. It was like the land parted.”

Bob Dylan

Referring to the first Woody Guthrie record he ever heard, p. 243
Chronicles: Vol. One (2004)

Parting

“My songs always sound a lot better in person than they do on the record.”

Bob Dylan

The Rolling Stone Interview: Bob Dylan http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/bob-dylan-talks-a-raw-and-extensive-first-rolling-stone-interview-19691129 (29 November 1969)

Personality

“Man is opposed to fair play: he wants it all, and he wants it his way.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Infidels (1983), License to Kill

Way

“But I see through your eyes”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan (1963), Masters of War

“You may call me Bobby; you may call me Zimmy…”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Slow Train Coming (1979), Gotta Serve Somebody

“They'd like to drive me from this town; they don't want me around, 'cause I believe in you.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Slow Train Coming (1979), I Believe in You

“Let me feel your love one more time before I abandon it.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Biograph (1985), Abandoned Love (recorded 1975)

Love , Feeling , Time

“Feel like falling in love with the first woman I meet… Putting her in a wheel barrow and wheeling her down the street.”

Bob Dylan

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

Love , Feeling

“I accept chaos. I am not sure whether it accepts me. I know there are some people terrified of the bomb, but there are others terrified to be seen carrying a Modern Screen magazine. Experience teaches that silence terrifies the most.”

Bob Dylan

As quoted in "Cosmo Listens to Records" http://www.mediafire.com/view/za1l4i1dftotwg9/.png by Nat Hentoff, in Cosmopolitan (November 1965)

People , Silence

“Love is so simple, to quote a phrase; you've known it all the time, I'm learnin' it these days.”

Bob Dylan

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

Love , Quotes , Time

“I am a writer an a singer of the words I write I am no speaker nor any politician an my songs speak for me because I write them in the confinement of my own mind an have t cope with no one except my own self.”

Bob Dylan

Letter sent to the ECLC after Dylan received the Tom Paine Award at the Bill of Rights dinner on December 13, 1963, as reported in "Mr. Dylan Regrets" http://www.hotpress.com/Bob-Dylan/music/interviews/Mr-Dylan-Regrets/2836632.html by Niall Stokes, Hot Press (11 November 2005)

“I couldn’t see when it started snowin’
Your voice was all that I heard”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Blonde on Blonde (1966), One Of Us Must Know (Sooner Or Later)

“I know where I can find you — in somebody's room. It's the price I have to pay, you're a big girl all the way.”

Bob Dylan

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

Way , Girl

“Louise she's all right she's just near'
She's delicate and seems like veneer'
But she just makes it all too concise and too clear'
That Johanna's not here”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Blonde on Blonde (1966), Visions of Johanna

“Nobody sees through him — no, not even the chief of police.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Infidels (1983), Man of Peace

“If your memory serves you well, I was gonna confiscate your lace and wrap it up in a sailor's knot and hide it in your case.
And if I knew for sure that it was yours, it was oh so hard to tell, and you know that we shall meet again, if your memory serves you well.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, The Basement Tapes (1975), This Wheel's on Fire (recorded in 1967)

Memory

“Now there's spiritual warfare, flesh and blood breaking down. You either got faith or you got unbelief, and there ain't no neutral ground.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Slow Train Coming (1979), Precious Angel

Faith

“But I’ll know my song well before I start singin’.”

Bob Dylan

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

“I have dined with kings, I've been offered wings
And I've never been too impressed”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Street-Legal (1978), Is Your Love In Vain?

“Early one mornin' the sun was shinin',
I was layin' in bed
Wond'rin'if she'd changed at all
If her hair was still red.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Blood on the Tracks (1975), Tangled Up In Blue

Change , Sun

“What looks large from a distance, close up ain't never that big.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Empire Burlesque (1985), Tight Connection to My Heart (Has Anybody Seen My Love)

“Politician's got on his jogging shoes, he must be running for office, got no time to lose”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Love and Theft (2001), Summer Days

Shoe , Time

“I feel pretty good, but that ain't saying much — I could feel a whole lot better, if you were just here by my side to show me how.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Knocked Out Loaded (1986), Brownsville Girl (with Sam Shepard)

Feeling

“Hey, hey, Woody Guthrie, I wrote you a song,
'Bout a funny ol' world that's a-comin' along
Seems sick an' it's hungry, it's tired an' it's torn
It looks like it's a-dyin' an' it's hardly been born”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Bob Dylan (1962), Song to Woody

World

“It’s a hard rain’s a-gonna fall.”

Bob Dylan

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

“You used to laugh about
Everybody that was hangin’ out
Now you don’t talk so loud
Now you don’t seem so proud
About having to be scrounging for your next meal”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Highway 61 Revisited (1965), Like a Rolling Stone

“Sad-eyed lady of the lowlands,
Where the sad-eyed prophet says that no man comes,
My warehouse eyes, my Arabian drums,
Should I leave them by your gate,
Or, sad-eyed lady, should I wait?”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Blonde on Blonde (1966), Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands

Sadness , Waiting

“If I catch my opponents ever sleepin', I'll just slaughter 'em where they lie.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Modern Times (2006), Ain't Talkin

Lie

“do Not create anything, it will be
misinterpreted. it will not change.
it will follow you the rest of your life.”

Bob Dylan

"Advice for Geraldine on Her Miscellaneous" (1964)

Life , Change

“I'm listening to Billy Joe Shaver
And I'm reading James Joyce
Some people they tell me
I've got the blood of the land in my voice”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Together Through Life (2009), I Feel A Change Coming On

People , Reading

“I'd throw all the guns and the tanks in the sea, for they are mistakes of a past history.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, The Bootleg Series Volumes 1-3 (Rare & Unreleased) 1961-1991 (1991), Let Me Die In My Footsteps (recorded 1962)

History , Past , Sea

“Come in", she said, "I'll give you shelter from the storm.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Blood on the Tracks (1975), Shelter from the Storm

“Stay, lady, stay. Stay while the night is still ahead.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Nashville Skyline (1969), Lay Lady Lay

Night

“Here's the thing with me and the religious thing. This is the flat-out truth: I find the religiosity and philosophy in the music. I don't find it anywhere else.”

Bob Dylan

Dylan Revisited http://europe.newsweek.com/dylan-revisited-174056?rm=eu, Newsweek (1997)

Truth , Music

“I know she ain't you, but she's here, and she's got that dark rhythm in her soul.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Knocked Out Loaded (1986), Brownsville Girl (with Sam Shepard)

Soul

“I ain't gonna work on Maggie's farm no more.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Bringing It All Back Home (1965), Maggie's Farm

“And something is happening here, but you don't know what it is, do you Mr. Jones?”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Highway 61 Revisited (1965), Ballad of a Thin Man

“If the Bible is right the world will explode”

Bob Dylan

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

World

“Half-wracked prejudice leaped forth
"Rip down all hate," I screamed
Lies that life is black and white
Spoke from my skull.”

Bob Dylan

Song lyrics, Another Side of Bob Dylan (1964), My Back Pages

Life , Hate

“An artist has gotta be careful never really to arrive at a place where he thinks he's at somewhere. You always have to realize that you're constantly in a state of becoming.”

Bob Dylan

No Direction Home (2005)

Thinking