ANOTHER LOOK AT WHO'S NOT THERE
There's an overly-long but often acute piece in the Village Voice of November 20 by J. Hoberman, drawn to my attention by British film person Mick Gold. The piece is partly about Todd Haynes' I'm Not There but also about Murray Lerner's The Other Side Of The Mirror and about Dylan's own films and films he's been influenced by. It's here.
And here's a provocative quote from the last page of the 4-page article:
"Certain cultural figures have a particular inevitability. Charles Chaplin and Elvis Presley rode technological waves, surfing to superstardom on powerful socio-economic currents. Had Chaplin never come to America, another slapstick comic would have emerged to reign over the nation's nickelodeons; Elvis might never have been born, but someone else would surely have brought the world rock 'n' roll.
No such logic accounts for Bob Dylan. No iron law of history demanded that a would-be Elvis from Hibbing, Minnesota, would swerve through the Greenwich Village folk revival to become the world's first and greatest rock 'n' roll beatnik bard and then—having achieved fame and adoration beyond reckoning—vanish into a folk tradition of his own making."
It interests me too that Hoberman is particularly confident and specific in asserting that Jeff Rosen has "brilliantly orchestrated" Dylan's "ongoing revival".
It's a topic I tried to touch on in The Bob Dylan Encyclopedia (Rosen was a reluctant entrant), but it remains curiously under-discussed, at least in print, by Dylan afficionados. I don't know why.
And here's a provocative quote from the last page of the 4-page article:
"Certain cultural figures have a particular inevitability. Charles Chaplin and Elvis Presley rode technological waves, surfing to superstardom on powerful socio-economic currents. Had Chaplin never come to America, another slapstick comic would have emerged to reign over the nation's nickelodeons; Elvis might never have been born, but someone else would surely have brought the world rock 'n' roll.
No such logic accounts for Bob Dylan. No iron law of history demanded that a would-be Elvis from Hibbing, Minnesota, would swerve through the Greenwich Village folk revival to become the world's first and greatest rock 'n' roll beatnik bard and then—having achieved fame and adoration beyond reckoning—vanish into a folk tradition of his own making."
It interests me too that Hoberman is particularly confident and specific in asserting that Jeff Rosen has "brilliantly orchestrated" Dylan's "ongoing revival".
It's a topic I tried to touch on in The Bob Dylan Encyclopedia (Rosen was a reluctant entrant), but it remains curiously under-discussed, at least in print, by Dylan afficionados. I don't know why.
posted by Michael Gray | 1:49 pm
2 Comments:
What if Elvis had been the twin that died and Jesse Garon had lived? Would he have been the harbinger of rock'n'roll? Imponderable, but an interesting thought.
"Had Chaplin never come to America, another slapstick comic would have emerged to reign over the nation's nickelodeons; Elvis might never have been born, but someone else would surely have brought the world rock 'n' roll."
what a bullshit...
chaplin and elvis were such personal, unique figure... maybe rock'n'roll would happened the same, but not quite the same without elvis
not the same at all
Post a Comment
<< Home