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Bob Dylan, acclaimed songwriter and icon of protest for more than 40 years, has finally been embraced by the establishment. For the first time next month his songs will be taught in secondary schools throughout Britain as poetry.
Academics and poets, including the poet laureate Andrew Motion, have welcomed the Dylan education pack, which will be rolled out to mark National Poetry Day. A range of Dylan songs, including I Dreamed I Saw St Augustine, Three Angels and A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall, will be available for pupils studying key stages three and four English.
Children will also be asked to write a Dylan-inspired ballad on the theme of dreams, which is the theme of National Poetry Day.
Andrew Motion, who describes himself as a big Dylan fan, said: "I think it's a wonderful idea. It's an inspired notion."
Dr Richard Brown, a reader in modern literature at Leeds University, who has written on Dylan, added: "Dylan's lyrics are full of interest and life. Whether they are poetry or not is an interesting debate. Poetry means different things. Part of the power of Dylan's work is that it takes poetry back to the oral tradition."
Scottish poet John Burnside agreed. "I think it's great," he said. "Dylan is valued because more than any other song writer he straddles the gap between the oral tradition and what can be described as more academic or high culture. He puts in literary references from Blake to Ginsberg."
Motion said: "He is a poet. That cheesy choice of Keats or Dylan - you don't have to choose. You can have them both. You can think of Dylan as a wonderful poet who sings his poems."
Dylan himself has never been in any doubt about his calling. "I consider myself a poet first and a musician second. I live like a poet and I'll die like a poet," he said.
- Independent
