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Chronicles
Volume One
by Bob Dylan
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By turns revealing, poetical, passionate and witty, Chronicles: Volume One is a window into Bob Dylan's thoughts and influences. Dylan's voice is distinctively American: generous of spirit, engaged, fanciful and rhythmic. Utilizing his unparalleled gifts of storytelling and the exquisite expressiveness that are the hallmarks of his music, Bob Dylan turns Chronicles: Volume One into a poignant reflection on life, and the people and places that helped shape the man and the art. [Simon & Schuster]
Simon & Schuster, 304 pages
10/05/2004
$24.00
ISBN: 0743228154
Nonfiction
Biographies & Memoirs
All reviews are classified as one of five grades: Outstanding (4 points), Favorable (3), Mixed (2), Unfavorable (1) and Terrible (0). To calculate the Metascore, we divide total points achieved by the total points possible (i.e., 4 x the number of reviews), with the resulting percentage (multiplied by 100) being the Metascore. Learn more...
Boston Globe Carlo Wolff
Chronicles is packed with ruminations on musical theory, sharp and humorous commentary, flashes of poetry -- and facts filtered and colored to flummox, entertain, and illuminate.
Chicago Sun-Times Jim DeRogatis
Far from being the personally revealing look at the "real" Dylan that some reviewers are hailing, Chronicles: Volume One, like many of Dylan's best creations, is a ping-pong game between fiction and fact.
Los Angeles Times Timothy Ferris
Informal and unadorned in tone, it is tersely focused, laconically witty and crammed with information.
Salon Charles Taylor
Does he tell all? No. First, because it's none of our damn business. A man who has been scrutinized the way Dylan has, who has had people literally crawling through his windows and pontificating on what his role should be, knows something about the necessity of keeping at least part of it all to himself.
Daily Telegraph Anthony Quinn
The oracle speaks. In the course of this first volume of autobiography you may find yourself utterly bemused by the experience of reading Bob Dylan in his own words, after so many years of reading other people's accounts of him.
Daily Telegraph John Preston
Despite bumping about in time and place, Dylan's writing never loses its richness, its sense of crystalline observation. He's also unexpectedly frank about his own shortcomings - but not too frank. Throughout, a careful balance has been struck between elusiveness and revelation.
The Globe And Mail [Toronto] Robert Wiersema
An unusual, refreshing and altogether winning memoir. It succeeds in exceeding expectations by foiling expectations at every turn, and is a worthy addition to the Dylan canon, revealing glimpses behind the mask, while not diluting the mystery.
The Guardian Mike Marqusee
Perhaps I'm swayed by the fact that this book is so much better than I feared it might be (as a fan since the 60s, I've got used to disappointments). But with this rich, intermittently preposterous, often tender work, Bob Dylan has delivered more than many of us dared hope for.
The Guardian Robert McCrum
If you are looking for a text that will decode the thrilling enigmas of his songs, this book is not for you. It's a bravura performance with smoke and mirrors. And all the time he is trying to find the literal and creative momentum to write songs.
The New York Times Book Review Tom Carson
Nonetheless, to point out that Chronicles is designed to manipulate our perceptions is simply to affirm that it's genuine Dylan. The book is an act, but a splendid one -- his sense of strategy vis-a-vis his audience hasn't been this keen in 30 years -- and it's a zesty, nugget-filled read.
The New Yorker
If “What is Bob thinking?†is the catechism of Bob Dylan fanatics, this first installment of his memoirs is a kind of Holy Grail—Dylan telling us what he thinks he thought while he did what he did.
The Onion A.V. Club Noel Murray
Dylan remains frank and analytical about what it means to pick up a guitar and think of something to sing. Chronicles pulls triple-duty as a resource, a philosophy text, and an invaluable glimpse into the ever-active consciousness of an American hero.
The Spectator Edward Smith
Bob Dylan's brilliant autobiography Chronicles invites us to share that creative voyage, to listen to his emerging artistic voice. Singing is only a small part of the story. It is much, much bigger than that.
Village Voice Howard Hampton
The book is full of passages where every affinity intersects for the reader, using casual-sounding words that ricochet through the room like chain lightning, a language that means to knock you sideways into Judgment Day but still leave a smile on your face.
Washington Post Richard Harrington
Surprise, surprise: Chronicles: Volume One, a memoir tapped out over three years on a manual typewriter, turns out to be the work of a masterful essayist, a compelling cultural observer and, yes, a poet masquerading as trapeze artist. We knew Dylan could write; we simply didn't know that he could write so well, or that the professional curmudgeon could revisit his back pages with such warmth, compassion and insight.
The Independent Ben Thompson
But this book doesn't just transcend concerns about whether Dylan's version of events can be relied upon, it uses that suspect veracity as the starting point for a fascinating explanation of pretty much every weird and seemingly inexplicable thing he has ever done.
Chicago Tribune Stuart Sherman
A jaw-droppingly original memoir.
New York Review Of Books Luc Sante
expectations. Readers, guessing on the basis of interviews and movies as well as the hydra-headed mythic image that has grown around Dylan over the decades, might have expected his memoir to be variously inscrutable, gnomic, bilious, confused, preening, recriminatory, impersonal, defensive, perfunctory, smug, or even ghost-written. Instead Dylan had to outflank them by exercising candor, warmth, diligence, humor, and vulnerability. If there is ever a second volume, he may have to contradict himself yet again.
The Nation David Yaffe
A book as incomplete, inconclusive and untrustworthy as it is shockingly lucid and brilliantly counterintuitive.
The New York Times Janet Maslin
Gone is the druggy logorrhea of his 1966 novel, ''Tarantula,'' as Mr. Dylan -- a man who says he now owns a bumper sticker reading ''World's Greatest Grandpa'' -- looks back on his life. Yet Chronicles is hardly tame. It is lucid without being linear, swirling through time without losing its strong storytelling thread.
The Independent Andy Gill
While the book does suffer from certain longueurs, there are enough bizarre and entertaining snippets of information sprinkled throughout it to fascinate even the most jaded Dylan obsessive.
Sydney Morning Herald Toby Creswell
Like an old tune, Chronicles is resolved by a return to the original theme - folk music and the early days in New York. Dylan writes of snow-covered streets and heroic folk singers and more than half wishes he was back there when things were simpler. He writes of discovering Rimbaud's phrase "Je est un autre" - "I is someone else". That's been his credo ever since.
Entertainment Weekly Tom Sinclair
A strikingly candid, endlessly fascinating tome, miles removed from the fanciful surrealism of his earlier book, the 1971 ''novel'' Tarantula (reissued by Scribner this month). Chockful of surprising details and vivid recollections, Chronicles is a sheer gift to those Dylan obsessives eager to get at the truth about the great man.
LA Weekly Brendan Bernhard
Would someone who knew next to nothing about Bob Dylan find this memoir compelling? Probably not. The chronological gaps are too cavernous, and vital background information is fleeting at best. This is a book that will resonate only with people who already know Dylan's story and who will appreciate his elliptical improvisations on a shopworn biographical theme.
The Economist
Chronicles, the first volume of Mr Dylan's autobiography, is an attempt to tell how the boy became an artist. It is a humble book, and it demystifies the man.
Boston Globe Caroline Leavitt
I may be the only person on the planet unhappy with the Bob Dylan memoir...The book is maddening and frustrating, a zigzag path through a remarkable life. He skips over the juiciest parts, certainly.
 The average user rating for this book is 9.5 (out of 10) based on 16 User Votes
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