Talk:Tarantula (poetry collection)

How to read it
Can someone put in the article a little bit more information regarding how to go about reading this? Anyone who can't read between the lines won't know how to read it or anything. Plus, surely we have more information on Dylan's only novel(la). Aaрон Кинни (t) 06:10, 25 December 2006 (UTC) How to read it? Where to begin? If the reader is unfamiliar with Beat poetry, such as "Howl" by Alan Ginsberg, there are many sources that influence this style of writing.Zen koens, spiritual talking in tongues, "white noise", jazz music, and more. Breaking the boundaries so that ideas share equal place without a beginning, middle and end, this, in my worthless opinion, is part of the style. As the question is about the substance of the book, but not the wikipedia entry, it is difficult to see a way of adding my "original research" into article. NPOV needed for verification etc. Good luck if you read Tarantula. It's a wild ride with a loon at the wheel. Ern Malleyscrub (talk) 02:42, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Well worth doing.

Glissendorf is an important concept to include if someone does add this how to.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1043970968

"Like most teenagers, Bobby associated with people who shared his interests. In A&E's Biography program, school friend John Bucklen recalls that Dylan's friends focused on image. To join the group, you had to appreciate the blues, the emerging rock and roll movement, and the celluloid biker attitude- and do it all in a secretive fashion (talk about a lifelong trait!). When the youngster began to join bands, the plan was not to go around boasting of your intentions; to the contrary, Bobby devised secret schemes that he would spring on unsuspecting audiences. It was all so calculating.

The biographers were thorough in their interviews with Dylan's teenage friends (e.g. Bucklen, Larry Fabbro, Echo Helstrom, and Leroy Hoikkala) and their findings are instructive. Although the details occasionally differ, that research suggests that Bob was an imaginative young man with a penchant for wild storytelling. He would lie about anything. In Scorsese's film, a high school friend (Dick Kangas) recalls Bob playing a "Bobby Vee" record and claiming that it was him on vocals. Other biographers cite example after example of the same prank. This thoroughly perplexed Dylan's friends, as Helstrom related to Howard Sounes: "It was always a game. He likes to play games and make a mystery out of things that don't need to be done. " Echo proved her point when she told Spitz about Bob's "game" with the local record store in which he requested records he knew they didn't have just to frustrate the proprietor. Young Bobby was one mischievous Iron Ranger.

Yet, perhaps these statements weren't lies, maybe they were a form of dialogue. Maybe like his photo shoots with David - Bobby was unconsciously rehearsing for the fake biographies, imagined friendships and acquaintances, and fantastic stories that were to come. The Look needed a Script and Dylan was working on his. His ability to recast the popular songs of the day (Hoikkala remembered Bob's lyrical revisions of current songs), his capacity to weave tall tales (Helstrom recalled a particular concoction about a large, threatening snake wrapped around a tree), and his propensity for word games offer concrete evidence of a wordsmith in the making. The artist was stocking his toolbox.

One of those tools involved a telling word game, "Glissendorf." Sounes and Heylin independently describe the "mind game" (Sounes) or "word game" (Heylin) Bob played at the expense of his audience. The game sounds a lot like the famous Abbott & Costello act, "Who's on First. " Heylin provides an example of a Glissendorf exchange between Dylan and Bucklen: "I see it's raining. / It isn't raining. / You say it isn't? Okay, if you wanna be difficult, it isn't. So let's move on. What's the next first thing to come to your mind? / The what? / The what? Just what I thought. I won! You won! / I don't understand. / That's exactly right. You don't understand. You don't understand. " The game's purpose was to confuse the observer or, as Sounes concludes, "it left the other person wondering if they had missed something. Sources report there were occasions when a Glissendorf victim became angry or hurt by the game--a response that concerned John and delighted Bob. The youthful experiences involved in creative revisions of existing songs, (occasionally, off-the-wall) storytelling, and word games designed to confuse/exclude their "victims" represent the creative foundation of a personality that would one day apply those traits in other contexts."

Smith, Larry David. Writing Dylan: The Songs of a Lonesome Traveler. 2019, 9781440861581, pages 15-16.

2A00:23C5:B381:B401:10B8:BD6B:63DE:7D04 (talk) 20:29, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:BobDylan Taratula.jpg
Image:BobDylan Taratula.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in Wikipedia articles constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

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It's a novel?
I've read this book and I think it's great, but it's not a novel - Is it? 76.119.135.114 (talk) 23:13, 21 July 2008 (UTC)sean


 * Indeed. Prose poetry collection seems a more accurate description. It's also referenced in the prose poetry article. External reference included. --StephenDaedalus (talk) 19:41, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Original research
Removed WP:Opinion from article, but put here in case any other editors thought it interesting

Tarantula is not stream of conscious as every one thinks - Dylan simply doesn't function like that. Every word is selective and absolutely nailed to the floor; the book has themes of bodily organs/mouths/hunger/thirst/sickness and ailments, music (sound of sound), fertility symbols (hair, blood etc.) the regenerative and destructive symbols of water and rain. The Christ/Fisher King motif runs through it just as Eliot uses it in the Wasteland. The chapter Chug A Lug Chug A Lug Hear Me Hollar HGi De Ho, for example, features a failed Christ-type figure stuck in a tree. In parts of the New Testament it is said that he was crucified on a tree. Check out Robin Witting's writings; he actually specialises in Tarantula because - as he says - No else seems to be doing it. The book is celebration and reflection of chaos.

A rich and complex book. User:Screaming Ghost

--Richhoncho (talk) 13:06, 6 December 2009 (UTC)

Removed further WP:Opinion.

"Perhaps to cash in on the success of Dylan's much more highly-praised second book Chronicles: Volume One."

--StephenDaedalus (talk) 19:42, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Translations?
Translations?

Citation needed?

French (11) Spanish (8) Undetermined (4) Danish (2) Croatian (2) Italian (2) Swedish (2) Dutch (1) German (1) Portuguese (1) Russian (1) Turkish (1)

https://www.worldcat.org/title/tarantula/oclc/137778/editions?cookie=&start_edition=1&sd=desc&se=yr&referer=br&qt=show_more_ln%3A&editionsView=true&fq=&fc=ln%3A_25

EDLIS Café 22:51, 30 August 2015 (UTC)