From the 1960's-1990's

Now, a very great man once said that some people rob you with a fountain pen. It didnt take too long to find out just what he was talkin about. (Talking New York, 1962)

It makes me think that Im not being heard yet above all the mumble jumble and rave praises ... there is no guidance at all exept from ones own natural senses... ("A Messege", Dylans open letter to Emergency Civil Liberties Committee after his speech to them, autumn 1963.)

I still say that some of the biggest criminals are those that turn their heads when they see wrong and know its wrong. (The Freewheelin Bob Dylan, 1963)

What good are fans? You cant eat applause for breakfast. You cant sleep with it. (Autumn 1963, From "No Direction Home" by Robert Shelton)

I didnt want to see the atomic bathrooms and electronic bedrooms and souped-up can-openers; I wanted to watch and feel the people and the dust and the ditches and the fields and fences. (Daily Mirror, September 12, 1963)

The times cry for the truth ..... and people want to hear the truth and thats just what theyre hearing in good folk music today. (N.Y. Daily New, October 20, 1963)

I dont think when I write, I just react and put it on paper. Im serious about everything I write ..... What comes out in my music is a call for action. (National Guardian, August 22, 1963)

Aint nobody can say anything honest in the United States.
Every place you look is cluttered with phoneys and lies. (National Guardian, August 22, 1963)

I am my words. (Newsweek 1963)

There is nothing so stable as change. (Dylan, 1963, From "No Direction Home" by Robert Shelton)

I wanted just a song to sing, and there came a point where I couldnt sing anything. I had to write what I wanted to sing because what I wanted to sing, nobody else was writing. (Bob Dylan, 1964)

The teachers in school taught me everything was fine. That was the accepted thing to think. It was all in the books. But it aint fine man. There are so many lies that have been told, so many things that are kept back. Kids have a feeling like me, but they aint hearing it no place. Theyre scared to step up. But I aint scared to do it, man. (Dylan 1964. From "No Direction Home" by Robert Shelton)

I hate debts, especially moral debts. Theyre worse than money debts. (New Yorker profile by Nat Hentoff, October 4, 1964)

Being noticed can be a burden. Jesus got himself crucified because he got himself noticed. So I disappear a lot. (Melody Maker, November 1970)

A lot of time, you just have to go down many roads to get where you are going.......The important thing is to keep moving. (Dylan, 1971. From "No Direction Home" by Robert Shelton)

Being on tour is like being in limbo. Its like going from nowhere to nowhere.( Bob Dylan 1974)

Ive transcended the pain of material things. Id be doing what Im doing if I was a millionaire or not, whether I was getting paid for it or not. (Newsweek, 1974)

I didnt consciously pursue the Bob Dylan myth. It was given to me, by God. (People, November 10, 1975)

We have to be able to hear that voice. Im through listening to other people tell me how to live my life ... Im just doing now what I feel is right for me, for my own self. (People, November 10, 1975)

I pray we realize soon we are all of one soul. (With Ginsberg and Eliot, Newport November 5, 1976)

Shit, man, Im only me. You know, thats who I am. We are all the same. No one is on any higher level than anybody else. Weve all got it within us, for whatever we want to grasp for. (People, 1976)


I can see God in a daisy ... in the wind and rain. I see creation just about everywhere. The highest form of song is prayer. (TV Guide, September 1976)

There arent really any mistakes in life. They might seem to knock you out of proportion at the time, but if you have the courage and the ability and the confidence to go on, well, then ... you cant look at it as a failure, you just have to look at it as a blessing in a way. (Dylan 1976, From "No Direction Home" by Robert Shelton)

A saint is a person who gives of himself totally and freely, without strings. He is neither deaf nor blind. And yet he's both. Hes the master of his own reality, the voice of simplicity. The trick is to stay away from mirror images. The only true mirrors are puddles of water. (Playboy March 1978)

I consider myself a poet first and a musician second. I live like a poet and I'll die like a poet. (Bob Dylan 1978)

If you try to be anyone but yourself, you will fail; if you are not true to your own heart, you will fail. Then again, there's no success like failure. (Playboy March 1978)

Dont matter how much money you got, theres only two kinds of people: theres saved people and theres lost people. (On stage, 26 Nov. 1979, in Tempe, Arizona)