Who will be the next American to win the Nobel Prize for Literature?

Clive James.

(not really, but he might have)

the spark notes plagiarism is hilarious and terrifying. it's either a lighthearted way to revisit an old contention of his, that there is no authorship just re-contextualization, or a blackhearted gesture asserting nothing matters

Or maybe he just needed to write a speech in a hurry and his memory of certain books he wanted to talk about was a bit fuzzy?

Think the cited lifts were lines re Moby Dick only, and worked into his own rolling Dylanism, as happens in the songs sometimes; his takes on All Quiet On The Western Front and The Odyssey sounded Dylan-y as hell too, in a good way.

For those who think he's undeserving or just plain shit anyway, what difference would a purely original speech make.

Well, it would show that as a writer he could write his own words

Also, he got the sparksnotes thing wrong, and invented a quote that doesn't appear in the novel. I don't know, but a critical reading based on things that aren't in the novel? That's an F.

ha you don't get Dylan either do you

Well, it would show that as a writer he could write his own words

― Mince Pramthwart (James Morrison), Tuesday, June 20, 2017

makes you think

I think it was an intentional "easter egg" thing. He mixed the sparknotes lines into his own language pretty seamlessly, as he did the borrowed unattributed lines in chronicles. I am just confused about what it means that he keeps doing it.

That seems much less likely than that he keeps sloppy notes and forgets what belongs to him. That's how a lot of plagiarism happens.

If any Nobel Prize winner other than Dylan did this, they would be scorched as a charlatan. Copying fucking sparksnotes, and even getting it wrong, resulting in false quotes from the novel you're trying to detail. Come on, this is pathetic. But with Dylan, it's always an 'easter egg', it's something he was 'meant to do', something the rest of us 'don't get'. Of course, his fans don't 'get it' as well, they just pretend that there must be something deeper going on, just as Dylan must have had something intelligent to say about the sinking of the Titanic, or about minstrelsy, or about the old American songs he is covering, or about any of the other stuff he has taken on and done fuck all with the last few decades...

Hm

The emperor hasn't really had any clothes on for a loooong time, but it's getting absolutely embarrassing now.

It's got to be Paul Auster.

I think the frequent overt plagiarism it's an intentional artistic statement of some kind, i don't think it's necessarily a profound one. I do like Dylan though.

My stance towards Dylan is very ambivalent. He has always been stealing from others but somehow he made something original out of it. I am still a fan of his mid 60s stuff, after that the quality of his output became pretty erratic. when i listened to him reading his nobel speech - before even knowing that he plagiarized - i found it boring as hell. a nobel prize speech where the laureate basically retells the plot of books by other people, how dud is that?

I like singer/songwriter Nobel literature speeches that DON'T plagiarize Sparknotes

ps Fred B is the plague

I think basically he has floundered as a songwriting / album-making artist since the mid-seventies. Which is ok, I think at heart he has always been a folk-artist in the old tradition, retelling and redoing other peoples work in a more communal setting. Which is why his artistic work the last many many years has been his never ending tour. Not saying he hasn't released anything of value since then - I really like Time Out of Mind, but more as a weird soundscape - but honestly I think most of his releases has been done because that what you do, that's what he was supposed to do to stay in the cultural marketplace, and the shortcuts taken wrt plagiarism mostly relates to that.

The Bobness cultural industry is just stuck in a rut because he once shouted about Mr Jones and nobody knew who that was but it seemed really significant and it's really important to old guys that other old guys still are seen as being relevant.

But ymmv.

fred on dylan is like je55e and roundabouts, just a joy to read, dylan deserves this prize purely for enabling that IMO

Should've been shared with Stet & Keith in that case. Just saying.

https://media.makeameme.org/created/knowledge-is-knowing.jpg

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5522ccefe4b023edbe76f185/t/552914fbe4b0719b1e02e0f2/1428755709937/norman-wisdom-exhibition-1422980008_20141003-1740-Norman-Wisdom-1.jpg

johnny joey dee dee

Sadly no longer eligible but good suggestions.

Ken Nordine is still alive though.

... and Tom Lehrer.

xxps - from day 1 Dylan has appropriated without attribution, mixed the elements together and presented that shell to the outside world, like a virus mixing and matching the proteins on its surface to blend in with the host. The esteem in which he's held isn't his fault, nor is it a shell game by someone in a position of advantage. He's popular and lauded because he does it so well, like some kind of ur-folk-artist who refracts the mythology underpinning our culture into fascinating patterns. When the culture needs a winsome yokel troubadour, here he is. Socially conscious protest singer, check, back to the roots in a basement, yep, confessional self-lacerating introvert, man of faith, etc etc and on up to a catalyst for unifying "base" popular culture with highbrow academia via the most prestigious high-culture prize. Which he salts with the lowbrow everyman readings of the canon, as imposed on schoolchildren.
It's not an original thesis I know, but I honestly don't get the outrage at Dylan being absolutely consistent, and consistently brilliant, at cultural appropriation and distillation. It's what he does, it's what he has done from day 1. For me it's an incredible achievement, and in a sly backhanded way absolutely deserves the Nobel.

Dude...

You write as if Dylan invented appropriation.

Or stealing from sparknotes.

Yeah I agree with all of that.

n.b. I work at an independent bookstore, and the people there are pretty serious about working at an independent bookstore, and they mostly think Dylan should have his Nobel taken away for the plagiarism.

I mean I agree with MatthewK

Not Mr B

The main (fanatical) Dylan fan I know was all lolwot? when he heard about him getting the Nobel Prize.

... before Fred tars all Dylan fans with the same brush.

The best part of Dylan is that he is *both* a cultural shapeshifter/postmodern trickster spitting Americana back at us in refracted, magical forms, *and* a genuinely brilliant, empathetic writer and songwriter whose words have meant as much to me as anyone else's. I am slightly weirded out by the plagiarism stuff, but I can't deny that Chronicles was an incredible reading experience. There was an immediacy and presence in the narration that seemed stunning to me in 2005 when I read it, having known Dylan previously through his cryptic songwriting. The fact that this voice, this vivid, present, humane and human voice was a collage of plagiarism is just... whoa.

Like, the chronicles plagiarism was, if nothing else, fucking weird. The narrative seemed so seamless and genuine.

I get the same thing from The Waste Land, and the best parts of the Cantos, so I know the feeling.

I don't think that the Sparknotes plagiarism is some kind of "easter egg". It's just Dylan being Dylan - someone's who's never been afraid to steal from high and low and any place in between - and most likely not someone overly concerned about scholarly standards for attribution. I thought it was an okay speech before the Sparknotes thing broke, and I think it's an okay speech now. I thought his Musicares speech at the Grammy's a couple years ago was better. Is it a better speech than I could do? Hell yeah. But judging Dylan based on the quality of a speech is almost as weird as, I dunno, giving him a prize for literature?

Frederik, never claimed originality, in fact quite the opposite would be the obvious conclusion to draw! I think the T. S. Eliot comparison is useful except for Dylan's vivid human qualities which I think TSE kept at arm's length.

And Treeship OTM - anyway we are all just a collage of culture and reference, it's not like we invented the words we speak.

Where were you guys when melania trump needed you?

lol

dang

I'd believe a "blackhearted gesture asserting nothing matters" coming from the Trump campaign.

URL doesn't seem to work but the piece from New Republic was a nice kinda funny round-up. We can safely assume no Americans will win. Or should we etc.

Sergo Pitol would be my favourite from the very obscure list. He's great.

https://68.media.tumblr.com/avatar_b6d87f043c25_128.png

The next American winner of the Nobel *heart emoji*