Quote:
Originally Posted by Claudia Gary
For whatever it's worth, here's a comment I made during a poetry and song panel that I chaired at the WCU poetry conference a few years ago: if Dylan hadn't set his words to music, I doubt many of us ever would have heard of him.
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This doesn't mean diddley. It means, in fact, fractionally less than diddley. If Jaufré Rudel and Bernart de Ventadorn hadn't set their words to music, history would've forgotten their existence (instead of transforming them into objects of romantic fantasy, as it has done.) And I suspect you will cast about in vain seeking a soul with a single hoot to give that this is the case.
If
All Along The Watchtower had never been set to music, it would still be a brilliant poem. Though the music adds to it considerably. The fact that it wouldn't be as famous as it is doesn't really make this less the case.