Highway 61 Revisited: Bob Dylan's Road from Minnesota to the World [Paperback]

Colleen J. Sheehy (Editor), Thomas Swiss (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 15, 2009

The young man from Hibbing released Highway 61 Revisited in 1965, and the rest, as they say, is history. Or is it? From his roots in Hibbing, to his rise as a cultural icon in New York, to his prominence on the worldwide stage, Colleen J. Sheehy and Thomas Swiss bring together the most eminent Dylan scholars at work today—as well as people from such far-reaching fields as labor history, African American studies, and Japanese studies—to assess Dylan’s career, influences, and his global impact on music and culture.

The Dylan effect has extended far beyond the United States in recent decades, and the essays here analyze his effect on the people and cultures of the United Kingdom, Italy, and Japan. With a special focus on his Minnesota roots, including Greil Marcus’s spectacular tour of Dylan’s hometown, contributors also take into account his most recent work and Martin Scorsese’s documentary No Direction Home.

The first cultural and historical geography of his dramatic rise, storied career, and unmatched iconic status, Highway 61 Revisited maps the terrain of Bob Dylan’s music in the world.

Contributors: John Barner, U of Minnesota; Daphne Brooks, Princeton U; Court Carney, Stephen F. Austin State U; Alessandro Carrera, U of Houston; Michael Cherlin, U of Minnesota; Marilyn J. Chiat; Susan Clayton; Mick Cochrane, Canisius College; Thomas Crow, New York U; Kevin J. H. Dettmar, Southern Illinois U, Carbondale; Sumanth Gopinath, U of Minnesota; Charles Hughes; C. P. Lee, U of Salford, Manchester, England; Alex Lubet, U of Minnesota; Greil Marcus, U of California, Berkeley; Aldon Lynn Nielsen, Pennsylvania State U; Roberto Polito, The New School; Robert Reginio, Frostburg State U; Heather Stur; Mikiko Tachi, Chiba U, Japan; Gayle Wald, George Washington U; Anne Waldman, Naropa U; David Yaffe, Syracuse U.

Editorial Reviews

Review

From Library Journal
This new collection of scholarly articles on Bob Dylan proves that there are new angles from which to approach his life, his artistic evolution, and his unmatched influence on music and culture. Dylan is inarguably one of the most dissected and discussed artists, musical or otherwise, of the last half-century, and these 20 distinctive, thoughtful, and erudite essays by, e.g., Greil Marcus and international academics from a variety of disciplines such as linguistics, music theory, and African American studies are all welcome additions. As Sheehy (director & CEO, Plains Art Museum) and Swiss (coeditor, New Media Poetics) explain, the articles here do not attempt to solve the myriad puzzles surrounding Dylan; rather, the book poses familiar questions in a fresh manner. Contributions about how Bobby Zimmerman from rural Minnesota became international cultural icon Bob Dylan, what influences his songwriting, and how his songs are having a global impact will be of strong interest to scholars and fans alike. —Douglas King, Univ. of South Carolina Lib., Columbia

Book Description

The young man from Hibbing released Highway 61 Revisited in 1965, and the rest, as they say, is history. Or is it? From his roots in Hibbing, to his rise as a cultural icon in New York, to his prominence on the worldwide stage, Colleen J. Sheehy and Thomas Swiss bring together the most eminent Dylan scholars at work today—as well as people from such far-reaching fields as labor history, African American studies, and Japanese studies—to assess Dylan’s career, influences, and his global impact on music and culture.

The Dylan effect has extended far beyond the United States in recent decades, and the essays here analyze his effect on the people and cultures of the United Kingdom, Italy, and Japan. With a special focus on his Minnesota roots, including Greil Marcus’s spectacular tour of Dylan’s hometown, contributors also take into account his most recent work and Martin Scorsese’s documentary No Direction Home.

The first cultural and historical geography of his dramatic rise, storied career, and unmatched iconic status, Highway 61 Revisited maps the terrain of Bob Dylan’s music in the world.

Contributors: John Barner, U of Minnesota; Daphne Brooks, Princeton U; Court Carney, Stephen F. Austin State U; Alessandro Carrera, U of Houston; Michael Cherlin, U of Minnesota; Marilyn J. Chiat; Susan Clayton; Mick Cochrane, Canisius College; Thomas Crow, New York U; Kevin J. H. Dettmar, Southern Illinois U, Carbondale; Sumanth Gopinath, U of Minnesota; Charles Hughes; C. P. Lee, U of Salford, Manchester, England; Alex Lubet, U of Minnesota; Greil Marcus, U of California, Berkeley; Aldon Lynn Nielsen, Pennsylvania State U; Roberto Polito, The New School; Robert Reginio, Frostburg State U; Heather Stur; Mikiko Tachi, Chiba U, Japan; Gayle Wald, George Washington U; Anne Waldman, Naropa U; David Yaffe, Syracuse U.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 312 pages
• Publisher: Univ Of Minnesota Press (May 15, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0816661006
• ISBN-13: 978-0816661008
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 7.7 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,065,401 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #95 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > People, A-Z > ( D ) > Dylan, Bob

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Scholarly Addition to the Dylan Literature, August 18, 2009

By 

Rodney J. Moss - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

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This review is from: Highway 61 Revisited: Bob Dylan's Road from Minnesota to the World (Paperback)

Excellent reading for the devotee, this set of essays is in the same league as,'You've Been with The Professors', which I'd also commend. The erudition and literary quality is such, that, like the aforementioned, the pertinence to their primary source may occasionally seem stretched. Whatever, these are well meditated pieces that offer a varied slant on the master manouverer, his sources, his influence and his expression. The pace is set by Greil Marcus's exploration of the significance of Hibbing High on the adolescent Bob, with especial attribution to his English teacher, Boniface Rolfzen. I was particularly attracted to Mick Cochrane's essay on Theme time radio, Alex Lubert's musings on,'Disabling', C P Lee's on the infamous '66 UK tour, the Thomas Crow investigation of the Andy Warhol connexions, and David Yaffe's tracing of the mature Bob which whets my appetite for his forthcoming tome, The Many Roads of Bob Dylan.

5.0 out of 5 stars Great read, September 20, 2011

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Roadman67 - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Highway 61 Revisited: Bob Dylan's Road from Minnesota to the World (Paperback)

Excellent and full of details and perspectives not found in other treatises about Dylan. The chapter about Hibbing and the Iron Range is especially poignant as are the fascinating analyses of Dylan's poetry and ever evolving relationship with his times and contemporaries. Highly recommended for those of us who grew up to a Dylan soundtrack.

1.0 out of 5 stars Academics, August 28, 2011

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D. Macdonald (Upstate New York, USA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Highway 61 Revisited: Bob Dylan's Road from Minnesota to the World (Paperback)

I read this in the Kindle edition, and with a few exceptions I found it to be over-intellectualized nonsense, making questionable interpretations of Bob Dylan's music and presenting them as authoritative. Some of the writing was literally painful to wade through, and there were some major errors (e.g., in the intro: Woodstock was in 1967?) Moreover, some of the essays - such as Griel Marcus's were mildly informative, but very short and never really made their analytical points satisfactorily. And defending Dylan's recent and flagrant plagiarism is indefensible. The "old folks home in the college" indeed! Post-modernist twaddle. Skip it.