Bob Dylan is a renowned American singer-songwriter. Dylan has oftentimes been referenced to as one of the all-time greats of songwriters as a collective, throughout history. He’s been a leading figure in mainstream culture over the course of his 60-year career. Dylan first made a name for himself back in the 1960s, when he released the infamous songs “Blowin in the Wind” (1963) and also “The Times They Are a-Changing” (1964). These songs melded together deeply with the civil rights and antiwar movements of the time. Dylan’s masterful lyrical approach to the folk music genre continued to evolve throughout the early 1960s, as he deepened his capacity for beautifully expressing both classic literature and poetry in his songs. We’ll now take a look at some of the most memorable quotes Bob Dylan has gifted us with to date.
1. On always being open to change
“He who is not busy being born is busy dying.”
2. On not enough people listening to music
“This land is your land and this land is my land, sure, but the world is run by those that never listen to music anyway.”
3. On the value of following your passion
“A person is a success if they get up in the morning and gets to bed at night and in between does what he wants to do.”
4. On creating art for yourself first
“Just because you like my stuff doesn’t mean I owe you anything.”
5. On honesty being hard to come by
“To live outside the law, you must be honest.”
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6. On money only taking you so far
“Don’t matter how much money you got, there’s only two kinds of people. There’s saved people and there’s lost people.”
7. On always being yourself
“All I can do is be me, whoever that is.”
8. On looking after your memories
“Take care of all your memories. For you cannot relive them.”
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9. On having nothing to lose
“When you got nothing, you got nothing to lose.”
10. On being present
“Some people feel the rain. Others just get wet.”
11. On the reality of beauty
“Behind every beautiful thing, there’s some kind of pain.”
12. On avoiding criticism
“Don’t criticize what you can’t understand.”
13. On the perils of love
“You can’t be wise and in love at the same time.”
14. On the nature of money
“Money doesn’t talk, it swears.”
15. On the hidden purpose of art
“The purpose of art is to stop time.”
16. On trusting your gut
“Don’t think twice, it’s alright.”
17. On the stability of endless change
“There is nothing so stable as change.”
18. On creativity
“Creativity has much to do with experience, observation and imagination, and if any one of those key elements is missing, it doesn’t work.”
19. On not predicting the future
“Doesn’t expecting the unexpected make the unexpected expected?”
20. On the power of music
“Music attracts the angels in the universe.”
21. On not defining anything
“I define nothing, not beauty, not patriotism. I take each thing as it is, without prior rules about what it should be.”
