I do believe some of you will find this article from The New Yorker of interest. (Personally I think Dylan is merely okay but my colleague Jeffrey Schwartz knows the words of all the popular Dylan songs by heart.) Excerpt from "Another Side of Dylan":
Among the empty-handed painters and seasick sailors who will be going to see Bob Dylan perform this week at Madison Square Garden is a fifty-six-year-old New York Law School professor named Michael Perlin, who has written a dozen books and more than a hundred and fifty articles on mental-disability law. For the past six years, he has named almost all of his articles after Dylan lyrics—see " 'What's Good Is Bad, What's Bad Is Good, You'll Find Out When You Reach the Top, You're on the Bottom': Are the Americans with Disabilities Act (and Olmstead v. L.C.) Anything More than 'Idiot Wind'?" (University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform, Fall 2001-Winter 2002). Perlin believes that Dylan has had a lot to say about the law over the years, and that Dylan's songs lay out an entire system of legal philosophy—a jurisprudence of Bob Dylan,
if you will—which Perlin has set out to decipher and, of course, publish one day in a reputable journal.
Other academics have taken on similar projects over the years: there is a jurisprudence of William Shakespeare, of "Billy Budd," and of Yogi Berra. Such exercises tend to depend on sophistry and showmanship, but Perlin is serious. "It's not a goof," he said the other day, in his office on Worth Street. "It's scholarship I enjoy doing." Perlin has gray hair and a neat gray beard and a very messy office, the door to which is covered with printouts of memorable Dylan set lists. In conversation, he regularly cites Dylan lyrics as if they were case law. ...
Other academics have taken on similar projects over the years: there is a jurisprudence of William Shakespeare, of "Billy Budd," and of Yogi Berra. Such exercises tend to depend on sophistry and showmanship, but Perlin is serious. "It's not a goof," he said the other day, in his office on Worth Street. "It's scholarship I enjoy doing." Perlin has gray hair and a neat gray beard and a very messy office, the door to which is covered with printouts of memorable Dylan set lists. In conversation, he regularly cites Dylan lyrics as if they were case law. ...
Thanks for sharing! I've read Michael Perlin's work before and was not aware of the Bob Dylan connection.
-RFW
http://scaccesstojustice.wordpress.com
Posted by: RFW | October 24, 2008 at 02:40 PM