There is no artist who so inspires a sense of personal identification, who so enters the lives and imaginations of his followers, as Bob Dylan. Is there a single Dylan fan who has not dreamed of meeting his or her hero, thought about what to say, spun a fantasy of “real” connection? It is as if the imaginative canvas Dylan’s music creates is so seductive and the figure behind it so compelling that all those affected feel drawn to go even further towards him than the music takes us (and how could that possibly be?)
No wonder then that there is an enduring appetite for the stories of those who have made it through - or even almost done so and been thwarted. The most substantial are from fellow artists who describe working collaborations, or journalists who have hit the interview jackpot; the least from fans, often composed of fleeting moments and snatched sightings in a restaurant or hotel corridor.
Perhaps the most entertaining are those encounters from outside the circle of aficionados: the policewoman who detained Dylan as he was walking in a New Jersey seaside town (near the family home of the young Bruce Springsteen), the similarly unwitting fellow tourists on a visit to John Lennon’s childhood-home-turned-cultural-site in Liverpool (is there a pattern here?), the bemused resident of the north London district of Crouch End welcoming and making tea for the unfamiliar visitor who had come to the door asking for “Dave” (which happened to be her husband’s name) in the mistaken belief that this was the home of the musician-producer Dave Stewart.
