Enigma
“Political folkie, country farmer, travelling gypsy, born-again Christian, rustic dandy—Dylan has cycled through a series of musical characters as if playing all the parts in a one-man vaudeville act. It’s been thrilling and curious, and also—most of the time, at least—deeply persuasive. Can fans be blamed for coming under one of these spells—for believing that Dylan meant what he sang at the March on Washington, or wasn’t just messing around when he recorded ‘Self Portrait,’ or for preferring one incarnation above the others and lamenting or resenting that version’s demolition by Dylan’s own revisionism?”
– Ian Crouch, The New Yorker