Bob Dylan 'Chronicles Vol 1' (Simon & Schuster)

The idea of Bob Dylan writing an autobiography is quite laughable. This is the man who for over 40 years as a musician has been a true enigma. The man who abandoned his post as the voice of a generation to become a shambling, wandering troubadour, in order to destroy his public persona. To think of him doing a warts and all self-expose is ridiculous.

But here we are with Dylan's self-penned 'Chronicles', the first in a three volume series. Thankfully for those of us who still enjoy a bit of ambiguity about their heroes, 'Chronicles' isn't the most revealing book, at least not in the conventional sense. Dylan, maverick as ever, takes the traditional memoirs format and twists it to suit his own needs and style. This isn't a life story blandly delivered in chronological order but a superb work of literary quality.

Dylan's prose conjures up images and smells and sounds from places in his past, recalling insignificant details, dwelling on irrelevant facts so that the book has more of the feel of a novel. He sets scenes, whether it's Greenwich Village in the early sixties or New Orleans in the late eighties, and uses these places as starting points for the exploration of his past. The effect is to distance his present self from these memories, so that it's not the grizzled veteran musician who is remembering snippets of stories about his childhood, his mother and former girlfriends but some fresh-faced aspiring folk singer from way back in 1960. A stream-of-consciousness style of remembrance is evident in places but it seems like less of a true insight into the inner workings of his mind and more of a device he uses to escape revealing any complete truths.

The book takes place over a number of different periods in his career. It begins with him in New York looking to break into the folk scene, then just when he seems on the point of gaining success, he switches to the late Sixties and discusses the making of his album 'New Morning'. After that he skips to the recording of 'Oh Mercy' in the late Eighties before returning again to the young man attempting to crack the Greenwich Village folk scene. Anyone with any interest in Dylan can tell you that the later albums are not exactly the highest musical points of his career, so it must be significant as to why he chose to cover them.

For Dylan there were important transition periods in his life as a musician and a person. The chapter on 'New Morning' describes his earnest and cynical attempts to break down the myth that grew up around him in the mid-Sixties when he was considered the voice of a generation and leader of the counter-culture. Following his serious motorcycle accident in 1966 when rumours of death or disfigurement abounded, Dylan secluded himself on a farm in Woodstock with his family, and sought to demystify himself and his music. He complains that fame "blew up in my face" and recalls the constant stream of intruders to his home in Woodstock and the demands from demonstrators for him to "come out and lead them somewhere". When he recalls Robbie Robertson, a member of his one-time backing group The Band, asking him "where do you think you're going to take [the music scene] next?", he can barely hide his disgust. So he abandons his creativity in order to devote himself to his family, and admits to feeling no passion for his songs. 'New Morning' is about wearing away people's perceptions of him through ambivalent mediocrity, and he defends himself by maintaining that people weren't actually interested his music, so why should he bother.

With the exception of the highly personal 'Blood on the Tracks' (though in the book he possibly alludes to its being based on Chekhov short stories), most of Dylan's output in the 70s and 80s is sub-standard. In chapter four Dylan is very honest about his creative decline and his own standing. He sees himself as an historical figure and while he achieved his objective of not being a legend, he does appear to miss being relevant. So he sets about recreating his creative energy by replacing spontaneous innovation with technical discipline. He gets the idea for the Never Ending Tour which would see Dylan play hundreds of shows a year for the next decade and more. The regeneration process begins with the recording of 'Oh Mercy' and Dylan offers an interesting insight in the general recording process and his own re-enlightenment, which has reawakened critical interest in his music and earned him an Oscar for Best Song with 'Things Have Changed' from the soundtrack to the film Wonder Boys.

But the focus of the book is on that period as a struggling folk singer in New York. Here the richness of his fanciful prose casts a hazy picture of snowy afternoons, strange characters and musty coffee shops where folk singers played and passed hats for money. He talks of the books he reads, the music he listens to, the plays he sees, all the influences that are crucial to the development of an artist. The discovery of Woody Guthrie is described like an epiphany but the time spent with the aging folk singer by his hospital bed is psychologically wearing; he lauds Hank Williams for defining the rules of structuring songs that Dylan would later go on to break; playwright Bertolt Brecht changes his whole attitude to song writing.

In most cases an autobiography is little more than a series of anecdotes, designed to portray its subject in a certain light. While the other two periods covered here have a degree of an agenda, in the New York chapters Dylan is happy to present himself as a complex, contradictory character. At times he's a wistful drifter, sleeping on whomever's couch is available; at others he's serious and single-minded. The one facet that does shine through the book is his sense of personal destiny. While he refutes any claims of innate talent, always emphasising music as something to be worked at, he is cocksure about his ability to do this, and certain of the eventual flowering of his genius.

Before now, the best insight to the man Bob Dylan is a collection of his lyrics. Not that they ever gave too much away. 'Chronicles' is at times equally obtuse, but, like the charged, surreal poetry of his songs, this book is a lyrical masterpiece and one of the most original memoirs you'll likely to read.

words: Colm Larkin