Song of the North Country: A Midwest Framework to the Songs of Bob Dylan - Softcover

Pichaske, David

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1441197664 ISBN 13: 9781441197665

Publisher: Continuum, 2010

Synopsis

A remarkably fresh piece of Dylan scholarship, focusing on the profound impact that his Midwestern roots have had on his songs, politics, and prophetic character.

About this title

About the Author:

David Pichaske is Professor of English at Southwest Minnesota State University. He is the author of many books, several related to rural literature and themes, including Rooted: Six Midwest Writers of Place. He has published on a range of subjects from rock music and American culture to T.S. Eliot and Chaucer. A three-time Fulbright Lecturer to Central Europe and Outer Mongolia, Pichaske is the author of Poland in Transition: 1989-1991. As editor of Spoon River Poetry Press, Pichaske has published Leo Dangel, Bill Holm, Norbert Blei, Linda Hasselstrom, Bill Kloefkorn, and Dave Etter, among significant rural writers. He first published on Dylan in 1972.

Review:

In this modern age of critical literary theory, Pichaske asks some more traditional or humanist questions about the influence of home and background on an artist such as Dylan. . . . Informed by a wealth of historical, social, political and cultural background material about the Midwest, Song of the North Country is a major work about the roots of Dylan's genius. It also casts a fresh and telling light on many Dylan songs, which often feel newly-minted in a series of illuminating readings. This is a serious work of Dylan scholarship and is not to be missed. —The Bridge

"Pichaske (English, Southwest Minnesota State Univ.) offers an interesting exploration of how Dylan's early years in Minnesota influenced his songs and writings. [...] The author is steeped in Dylan's voluminous compositions and other writings, and in the literary legacies of the Midwest, and he uses all this material to good effect. Adding a significant title to the corpus of Dylan studies is not an easy task, but Pichaske succeeds. Including helpful notes and an extensive but far from inclusive bibliography, this book fits into the literature of both popular music and literary studies."
-R.D. Cohen, CHOICE, September 2010

'Pichaske manages to keep the action keen for the less-than-devout students of Dylanology, his lively writing suggesting the playful professor' Word Magazine, August 2010

'Pichaske offers and understandably more scholarly view of Dylan's relation to his home town and its environs...gems include a chapter on Dylan's Midwestern pronunciation which is, oddly, quite compelling.' (Record Collector)

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'From wordplay and pronunciation in the chapter ''And the Language That He Used,'' to the influence of education, politics, religion and the judicial system upon Dylan in 'Bob Dylan's Prairie Populism,' it might be said there's something for everyone amid these 303 pages.' (http://davidmarxbookreviews.wordpress.com)

'Pichaske offers and understandably more scholarly view of Dylan's relation to his home town and its environs...gems include a chapter on Dylan's Midwestern pronunciation which is, oddly, quite compelling.' (Sanford Lakoff)

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About this edition

• Publisher: Continuum
• Publication date: 2010
• ISBN 10: 1441197664
• ISBN 13: 9781441197665
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 384