Bob Dylan wins historic Nobel prize for Literature
US SINGER-SONGWRITER Bob Dylan has become the first musician ever to win the Nobel prize for Literature.
AMERICAN singer-songwriter Bob Dylan has won the 2016 Nobel prize in literature, a stunning announcement that for the first time bestowed the prestigious award on a musician.
The Swedish Academy cited Dylan for “having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition.”
Reporters and others gathered for the announcement at the academy’s headquarters in Stockholm’s Old Town reacted with a loud cheer as his name was read out.
Dylan had been mentioned in the Nobel speculation for years, but few experts expected the academy to extend the prestigious award to a genre such as popular music.
The academy’s permanent secretary, Sara Danius, said that while Dylan performs his poetry in the form of songs, that’s no different from the Ancient Greeks, whose works were often performed to music.
“Bob Dylan writes poetry for the ear,” she said. “But it’s perfectly fine to read his works as poetry.”
Dylan was born on May 24, 1941, in Duluth, Minnesota. He grew up in a Jewish middle-class family.
He’s the first American winner of the Nobel literature prize since Toni Morrison in 1992.
By his early 20s, he had taken the folk music world by storm. Blowin’ in the Wind and The Times They Are A-Changin became anthems for the anti-war and civil rights movements of the 1960s.
Dylan was also awarded a Pulitzer Prize in 2008 for his contributions to music and American culture.
The literature award was the last of this year’s Nobel prizes to be announced.
The six awards will be handed out on December 10, the anniversary of prize founder Alfred Nobel’s death in 1896.
SOME LYRICS FROM BOB DYLAN SONGS
BLOWIN’ IN THE WIND
How many roads must a man walk down Before you call him a man?
Yes, ‘n’ how many seas must a white dove sail Before she sleeps in the sand?
Yes, ‘n’ how many times must the cannon balls fly Before they’re forever banned?
The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind, The answer is blowin’ in the wind.
THE TIMES THEY ARE A-CHANGING
Come senators, congressmen Please heed the call
Don’t stand in the doorway Don’t block up the hall
For he that gets hurt Will be he who has stalled
There’s a battle outside And it is ragin’.
It’ll soon shake your windows And rattle your walls
For the times they are a-changin’.
LIKE A ROLLING STONE
You never turned around to see the frowns on the jugglers and the clowns When they all come down and did tricks for you
You never understood that it ain’t no good You shouldn’t let other people get your kicks for you You used to ride on the chrome horse with your diplomat
Who carried on his shoulder a Siamese cat
Ain’t it hard when you discover that
He really wasn’t where it’s at
After he took from you everything he could steal.
How does it feel
How does it feel
To be on your own
With no direction home
Like a complete unknown
Like a rolling stone?
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