Best 715 quotes of Bob Dylan on MyQuotes

Abe said, where do you want this killing done? God said, out on highway 61.

A brilliant 1989 album, Oh Mercy; some career retrospectives; and two albums of American folk songs, with just Bob Dylan and his guitar and harmonica. All that culminated in the Grammy-winning comeback album, Time Out of Mind (1997). Once again, just as Dylan seemed to be out of it, he was back at the top of his game.

Advertising signs: they con you into thinking you're the one That can do what's never been done That can win what's never been won Meantime life outside goes on all around you

After a while you earn that privacy is something you can sell, but you can't buy it back.

After becoming famous once again - a 1976 song, "Hurricane," even marked a return to protest songwriting - [Bob] Dylan got addicted to drugs, found Jesus, left Jesus, and put out a lot of swill.

Ah, current music. What would that be? Ah, really, a lot of it sounds defective to me. It makes me restless.

Ain't it hard when you discover that, he wasn't really where it's at, after he took from you everything he could steal. How does it feel?

Ain't nothing too discreet about the disease of conceit.

Ain't no use jiving, ain't no use joking, everything is broken.

All I can do is be me, whoever that is.

All right, I'll take a chance. I will fall in love with you. If i'm a fool you can have the night, you can have the morning too. Can you cook and sew. make flowers grow. Do you understand my pain? Are you willing to risk it all or is your love in vain?

All that foreign oil controlling American soil.

All the money you made will never buy back your soul.

All these people that I used to know, they're an illusion to me now. Some are mathematicians, some are carpenters' wives.

All the tired horses in the sun How'm I supposed to get any ridin' done? Hmm.

All this talk about equality. The only thing people really have in common is that they are all going to die.

Along with some of the worst music of Bob Dylan's career ("Self-Portrait," 1970), this period produced some gems - including many songs recorded with The Band in '67 but not released until years later.

A lot of people can't stand touring but to me it's like breathing. I do it because I'm driven to do it.

A lot of people don't have much food on their table. But they got a lot of forks 'n knives. And they got to cut somethin'.

A lot of people don't like the road, but it's as natural to me as breathing.

A lot of people from the press want to talk to me, but they never do.

A lot of people say there is no happiness in this life and certainly there's no permanent happiness. But self-sufficiency creates happiness.

A lot of people say there is no happiness in this life, and certainly there's no permanent happiness. But self-sufficiency creates happiness. Happiness is a state of bliss. Just because you're satisfied one moment - saying yes, it's a good meal, makes me happy - well, that's not going to necessarily be true the next hour. Life has its ups and downs, and time has to be your partner. Time is your soul mate. Children are happy. But they haven't really experienced ups and downs yet. I'm not exactly sure what happiness even means. I don't know if I personally could define it.

Although the masters make the rules for the wise men and the fools, I've got nothing, Ma, to live up to.

A mistake is to commit a misunderstanding.

A million faces at my feet but all I see are dark eyes.

An artist has got to be careful never really to arrive at a place where he thinks he's AT somewhere. You always have to realize that you're constantly in a state of becoming. And, as long as you can stay in that realm you'll sort of be alright.

and if anybody asks me is it easy to forget I'll say it is easily done, you just pick anyone, and pretend that you never have met

And I hope that you die And your death'll come soon I will follow your casket In the pale afternoon And I'll watch while you're lowered Down to your deathbed And I'll stand o'er your grave 'Til I'm sure that you're dead

And I’ll tell it and think it and speak it and breathe it And reflect it from the mountain so all souls can see it Then I’ll stand on the ocean until I start sinkin’ But I’ll know my song well before I start singin

And it dawned on me that I might have to change my inner thought patterns... that I would have to start believing in possibilities that I wouldn't have allowed before, that I had been closing my creativity down to a very narrow, controllable scale... that things had become too familiar and I might have to disorientate myself. p.71

And there's no one there to dry your tears. I could hold you for a million years. To make you feel my love.

Anger and jealousy's all that he sells us, he's content when you're under his thumb. Madmen oppose him, but your kindness throws him, to survive it you play deaf and dumb.

A noble truth is a sacred creed.

Any real Bob Dylan fan would sleep with Jonah Lehrer.

A poem is a naked person... Some people say that I am a poet.

A record ... is a statement, it's its own statement, its own entity, rather than being about something else. If I was a painter ... I don't paint the chair, I would paint feelings about the chair.

Aretha with no goals, eternally single & one step soft of heaven/ let it be understood that she owns this melody along with her emotional diplomats & her earth & her musical secrets

Art can lead you to God. I think that's the purpose of everything. If it's not doing that, what's it doing? It's leading you the other way. It's certainly not leading you nowhere.

Art is a never-ending dance of illusions.

Art is the perpetual motion of illusion. The highest purpose of art is to inspire. What else can you do? What else can you do for any one but inspire them?

As I stepped to the stage to pick up my degree, and the locusts sang off in the distance.

As long as you give my friend Jonah Lehrer a free pizza, I'll write a song about your restaurant.

A song is like a dream, and you try to make it come true. They're like strange countries that you have to enter.

Back seat drivers don’t know the feel of the wheel but they sho’ know how to make a fuss" Bob Dylan/Bonnie Raitt, “Let’s Keep It Between Us,” 1982

Basically you have to suppress your own ambitions in order to be who you need to be.

Because Dickens and Dostoyevsky and Woody Guthrie were telling their stories much better than I ever could, I decided to stick to my own mind.

Being singer is different than being an actor, where you call up sources from your own experience that you can apply to whatever Shakespeare drama you're in. But an actor is pretending to be somebody, a singer isn't. And that's the difference. Singers today have to sing songs where there's very little emotion involved. That and the fact that they have to sing hit records from years gone by doesn't leave a lot of room for any kind of intelligent creativity.

Bent out of shape from society's pliers, cares not to come up any higher, but rather get you down in the hole that he's in.

[Bob] Dylan crashed his motorcycle in 1967, and almost died. A few years ago, he referred to the experience as a "transfiguration.