Walkin' Into World War

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Department of English

“Walkin’ into World War III”: The Apocalyptic Death Theme in The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan

Roger Ljunggren Bachelor’s degree project Literature Spring, 2020 Supervisor: Maria Zirra

Abstract

The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan was released in 1963, during the Cold War. Nuclear apocalypse was a big fear at the time and the fright deeply influenced the album. Therefore, this essay argues that the record contains a poetic narrative, with the overarching theme of contemporary apocalyptic death. The poetic narrative reveals an allusion to Noah’s Ark and the story of Judas, which is not present if the songs are analyzed independently. The narrative consists of five parts: “Blowin’ in the Wind” deals with the uncertainty of the 1960s; “Masters of War” describes the arming of the younger generation to fight a nuclear war; the actual apocalyptic event is chronicled in “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall”; “Talkin’ World War III Blues” narrates the post- apocalyptic event and the final part is “Corrina, Corrina”, which deals with the reproductive consequences. The material will be analyzed, and the conclusion supported, by recourse to historical contextualization and religious symbolism and allusions. The essay uses Beebee’s analysis of “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” (1991) and Roos’ work on the entire Dylan canon from a thematic perspective (1982) to support the conclusions made, but compared to previous papers on The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan, this essay takes the original mode of music consumption into account and studies the album as a greater whole. Through an analysis of the entire record, allusions are encoded that is not evident if each song is interpreted independently.

Keywords: Bob Dylan; The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan; 1960s; “Blowin’ in the Wind”; “Masters of War”; “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall”; “Talkin’ World War III Blues”; “Corrina, Corrina”; Contemporary apocalyptic death theme

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“And here he is… take him, you know him, he’s yours” said the presenter before Bob Dylan took the stage at a New Port Folk Festival in the 1960s. In a career spanning almost 60 years, Dylan has always seemed uncomfortable belonging to anyone or anything, with an extra disdain for the term “spokesman of a generation”, which the media kept attributing to him (Dylan 2005, 115). Spokesman or not, Dylan’s influence on popular music is incalculable. For his literary contributions, Dylan has been presented with the Nobel Prize in Literature “for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition” (Svenska Akademien 2016). To begin with, it is important to describe Dylan’s political background. When Dylan’s musical journey started, the Korean war had ended, which, according to Dylan “was a cloud over everyone’s head” and “[t]he communist thing was still big and the Civil Rights movement was coming on” (Hillburn 2017, 464). All these topics would feature in Dylan’s writings during the 1960s. Dylan himself believes that the atom bomb fueled the events of the 1960s and the entire world that came after it. The fear of an imminent death made an impression on the world and the generation that grew up in it. The big mushroom cloud showed that indiscriminate mass murder was possible. War changed after the atom bomb. Previously, a direct line of sight was necessary to shoot someone (Wenner 2017, 486). The stakes were raised after the atom bomb, with a completely new level of possible destruction on a shorter timeframe. Radiation, caused by the blast, could make an area uninhabitable for a long period. The change in warfare and the fear of imminent death deeply influenced Dylan. It is therefore not odd that Dylan’s first album Bob Dylan contains a death theme. The album consists of two self-composed songs and eleven covers of old

Ljunggren 2 traditional songs (Dylan 2016, 1). Three of these traditionals deal with death blatantly1 (Roos 1982, 104). After the first album, Dylan started recording his own material because “nobody else was writing what [he] wanted to sing” (Kleinman and Mogull 2017, 331). His efforts resulted in The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan in 1963, which is the subject for this essay; specifically, the contemporary, apocalyptic death theme in the album (Roos 1982, 106). For adequate clarity, it is important to define “contemporary, apocalyptic death theme”. This paper defines it as: death, which is a result of the complete destruction of the world. It is contemporary because apocalyptic fear is closely tied to the 1960s and the prospect of a nuclear war. Another key term is “poetic narrative”, which is defined as poems that chronologically follow a narrative. The poetic narrative appears in sequenced, bounded, poetic units, in this case songs. Finally, the narrative aspect is defined as a “distinct and coherent entity” (Heiden 2014, 269- 270), which contains a logical progression. Poetic narratives are scarcely examined in previous research on Bob Dylan. Beebee has analyzed Dylan’s “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” as an apocalyptic ballad (1991); this will be used to support some conclusions in this paper. Analysis of the larger Dylan canon has also been done. Roos argues that all persistent themes of the Dylan canon can be found on Dylan’s first album.2 These themes can be identified as the three agents of death: women, social prejudice, and the military-industrial establishment. The themes are, according to Roos, prevalent throughout Dylan’s entire career (1982, 103-104). These scholars study the songs as individual snippets when the fact that they belong to a greater whole (i.e. the albums themselves) is an important aspect. I argue that the record influences how each individual song should be interpreted and the interplay between the songs forms a greater narrative. This line of reasoning is connected to the idea of concept albums where the songs hold a larger purpose collectively than they do individually and “each succeeding track mak[es] sense in the larger whole” and provides a unified experience (Decker 2013, 100). If one analyzes The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan, two allusions emerge. One tied to Noah’s Ark and the other connected to the story of Judas; these are not evident if the songs are analyzed independently.

1 The songs are “Fixin’ to Die”, “In My Time of Dying” and “See That My Grave Is Kept Clean”. 2 The canon in this paper spans from Bob Dylan (1962) until the release of Slow Train Coming (1979).

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Based on these two allusions that reinforce each other in several songs, I argue that The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan contains a couple of intertwining, poetic narratives. In other words, the album contains two separate story lines that intersect at times. One of the poetic narratives deals with Dylan’s relationship to women and his lifestyle, and the other one, which will be the sole focus of this paper, is apocalyptic death. I argue that several songs on the album contribute to this overarching theme of contemporary apocalyptic death. If read as a poetic narrative, allusions to Noah’s Ark and the biblical story of Judas become visible – a feat which would not be readily observable if the songs are analyzed independently of each other. The analyzed narrative consists of five songs. The first one, “Blowin’ in the Wind” (Dylan 2016, 53)3, shows the uncertainty of the 1960s. The song is a prologue. Questions are posed that the rest of the narrative aims to answer. The second part is the military arming of the younger generation, as depicted in “Masters of War” (L, 55-56). The third part is “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” (L, 59-60), which shows the apocalyptic event that is caused by the previous militarization. The post-apocalypse is the fourth part. It is represented by “Talkin’ World War III Blues” (L, 64-65). The song shows how the narrator will orient himself after the apocalyptic event. The final part is “Corrina, Corrina” (L, 66), which is an epilogue. After the apocalyptic event, human reproduction is negatively affected.

The Uncertain 1960s and “Blowin’ in the Wind” To begin with, the narrative’s prologue is “Blowin’ in the Wind”. The song raises questions that the rest of the narrative aims to answer. It shows the uncertainty of the 1960s, with its looming nuclear war, which, in turn, raises the question of permanence. How long will the world stay the same in a world with nuclear weapons? The 1960s was also an era of radical social transformation with the Civil Rights and Anti-War movements. In reference to this, in the song, Dylan asks how long it will take before oppressed people are free. The song also points out another specifically 1960s thematic, namely that of generational awareness and the generational conflict that is prevalent throughout the narrative. Each verse begins with three questions distributed over six lines. The last two lines provide the answer to the questions – that the “answer is blowin’ in the wind” (L,

3 From this point, to shorten the citation, “Dylan 2016” which refers specifically to The Lyrics: 1961– 2012 will be cited as “L” followed by the page number(s).

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53). There is some debate on what it means. Roos argues that it urges for a move back to nature (1982, 106). He sees the song as aimed at the universal enemies of man’s vitality, such as warmongers and oppressors. These forces can be defeated by listening to the wind and living in harmony with nature. My interpretation, on the other hand is that if one studies the historical context, the threat of nuclear war was looming, which created uncertainty, and no one knew what would happen. “Blowin’ in the wind” would then mean that the answers are out there in the world, but they are elusive. The questions stated in the song had a strong urgency during the 1960s. About 130 million Americans would die, and the entire Soviet Union would be destroyed in a nuclear war, according to estimates (Flamm and Steigerwald 2008, 41). Fear that this calculation would come true affected the generation that grew up during the 1960s. Dylan himself remembers taking cover and hiding when air-raid sirens rang in drills preparing for an eventual Soviet attack. He describes it as living under a cloud of fear, because many adults took the threat seriously and it rubbed off on their kids (Dylan 2005, 29-30). The fact that “the answers are blowin’ in the wind” (L, 53) evokes the uncertainty of the time. The first two lines of the first verse focus on youth, and the borderline between being a boy and a man. The lines are “How many roads must a man walk down/before you call him a man?” (L, 53), which highlights a generational conflict that marked the 1960s. People born between mid-1940 to early 1960s are commonly referred to as baby boomers (Flamm and Steigerwald 2008, 9). What brought them together was that they shared some common socio-historical experiences and attitudes. For example, the constant fear of a nuclear war. The grim prospect of living in a world with nuclear weapons made them feel that the social conditions brought about by earlier generations were dangerous. These experiences made them view previous generations and “the system,” which could be described as the status quo, as the enemy. These attitudes constituted the bedrock of the Civil Rights movement (Braungart and Braungart 1990, 178-183). The two following questions in the song focus on war and the Anti-War Movement with the lines: “how many seas must a white dove sail/before she sleeps in the sand?” (L, 53). The dove in the third line signifies peace. The question Dylan asks is how many times must the dove fly around the world signifying peace, before it rests in the sand? “Dove” is also a term used in foreign policy. A “dovish” foreign policy aims at using diplomacy and aid. The opposite is hawkish, when military intervention

Ljunggren 5 is used (Kushner Gadarian 2010, 472). At the time of the recording, President Kennedy expanded American military involvement in south Vietnam (Flamm & Steigerwald 2008, p. 44). The dove also has a religious meaning. After the Flood, Noah used a dove to see whether the Flood was over (Genesis 8). The focalization on war continues in the last question of the first verse (lines 5-6). The cannonballs in line 5 (L, 53) are used to cause destruction from a distance, which ties in with the military tactics used during the Vietnam War. At least three times as many bombs (by weight) were dropped during the Vietnam War than during the entire World War II (Miguel and Roland 2011, 2). The second verse also contains three questions. The first one asks: “How many years can a mountain exist/before it is washed to the sea?” (L, 53). A mountain is a symbol of permanence, which is questioned during this time. As previously mentioned, the Cold War was a highly uncertain period. People feared that the conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union would turn hot, possibly because of the United States move towards a more hawkish foreign policy (Flamm and Steigerwald 2008, 41). In previous wars, people lost their homes and families, but they could return to basically the same environment once the war was over. With the invention of the atom bomb, that changed. A mountain, which might have been the only structure that did not change in a person’s lifetime could now be crushed when hit by an atom bomb. That the mountain “is washed to the sea” (L, 53) refers to the Flood (Genesis 8). The mountains are turned to rubble and nuclear rain is flooding the earth. The importance of the bombing will be expanded in the discussion of “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall”. Another important and uncertain topic at the time was the Civil Rights movement, which ended racial segregation and the disenfranchisement of African Americans in the South. The movement opened economic, political, and cultural venues for blacks across the United States (Newman 2004, 1). Lines 11-12 pose the question: “how many years can some people exist/before they’re allowed to be free?” (L, 53). The question is obviously a reference to the Civil Rights Movement and the struggle against racial segregation. In the song, Dylan asks how many years it will take before some people are free, instead of asking if they will be free. One can interpret this as Dylan knows that the United States will move closer towards equality sooner or later. Dylan also asks, “how many times can a man turn his head/pretending he just doesn’t see?” (L, 53) In other words, people are ignoring the Civil Rights and Anti-War movement, but how long can they do that? They cannot ignore the carnage that is happening both domestically and abroad.

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Lines 17-18 and 21-22 focus on nuclear war. The first question in the third verse is asked inside a fallout shelter. “How many times must a man look up/before he can see the sky?” (L, 53) refers to when people are inside of the fallout shelter. They cannot see the sky. The last question asks how many deaths are enough, with the lines “how many deaths will it take ´til he knows/that too many people have died?” (L, 53), which is a reference to the carnage during the Vietnam War that was previously mentioned. “Blowin’ in the Wind” is the first part of the narrative, displaying the uncertainty of the time when it was composed. The song also poses the questions that the rest of the narrative aims to answer. How much longer will people live their lives in chains? How much longer will humanity last at this current rate of destruction? These questions were often stated during the early 1960s and Bob Dylan voiced those concerns. In that sense, begrudgingly, he truly was the spokesman of a generation. All the big questions are stated in this prologue. The rest of the poetic narrative will be centered on the generational conflict and the consequences of war and social inequality that are identified in “Blowin’ in the Wind”. The wheels are set in motion and the rest of the poetic narrative revolves around the questions posed.

“Masters of War” and Building to Destroy The second part of the narrative is “Masters of War”, which is concerned with the military arming of the younger generation. It is probably Dylan’s most accusatory and vitriolic composition (Decurtis 2013, 47), with lines such as: “I’ll stand o’er your grave/’til I’m sure that you’re dead” (L, 56). It continues the youth theme established in “Blowin’ in the Wind”. The song is a systematic critique of the military-industrial complex and those who profit from war. An allusion to the story of Judas is established in “Masters of War” as well. In “Blowin’ in the Wind”, Dylan voiced the concerns of the time. In “Masters of War”, he points out the cause of the distress and suffering, as well as the horrors of war. The song is a blatant attack on the military-industrial complex and those who pretend to make peace while at the same time stockpiling weapons, tearing communities apart and destroying lives (Gamble 2004, 23). The destruction of the world is caused by people making hypocritical and impersonal decisions, as well as make money on war (Roos 1982, 106). They are not directly affected, because they “hide in their mansions” (L, 55). The song is an indictment of “the beneficiaries of an economic system that makes war profitable” (Decurtis 2013, 47). Dylan is not

Ljunggren 7 necessarily anti-war – he opposes the military-industrial complex that President Eisenhower often referred to (Gilmore 2017, 445). The big issue for him is the economic system that profit on war and urges it. Furthermore, the narrator is an ‘I’. It could be Dylan himself, or the collective voice of youth. If one looks at the sixth verse, the narrator is dismissed on account of his/her age. The sixth verse of “Masters of War” is an answer to the first question posed in “Blowin’ in the Wind”: “How many roads must a man walk down/Before you call him a man?” (L, 53). The answer is that wisdom does not come with age; the younger generation realized that there is no forgiveness for what the masters of war have done and the consequences of their actions will manifest in the next installment of the narrative. The anger and vitriolic tone might stem from the sacrifices that young people are making because of the masters of war. The average age of dead soldiers stated on the Interactive Vietnam Veterans Memorial website is 22.8 (Fold by Ancestry n.d.). The younger generation are armed by the masters of war. The textual evidence can be found in verse two and four with lines such as: “You put a gun in my hand” and “you fasten the triggers/for the others to fire” (L, 55). Young people are making the ultimate sacrifice, which is death. The younger generation in the song are cultural radicals. They attacked institutional authority, from universities to churches. Cultural radicals believed that America “was hung up on sexual repressiveness, social conformity and money grubbing” (Flamm and Steigerwald 2008, 56). The element of cultural radicalism present in the song is the attack on the structures that fuel war and especially the attack on the unseen beneficiaries of the current policy, with the lines: “And I hope that you die/and your death’ll come soon” (L, 56). The solution to global issues, like the ones mentioned in the song is, according to Dylan, that people should instead act from a sense of responsibility and take the bull by the horns. Dylan does not “expect politicians to solve anybody’s problem” (Wenner 2017, 487). Dylan’s reasoning ties in well with another important aspect of cultural radicalism, the idea of personal responsibility. According to cultural radicals, one should act individually from a sense of responsibility to one’s own moral truths. Individuals should put themselves in harm’s way to solve global issues (Lichterman 2010, 184). The idea of personal responsibility and cultural radicalism will be further developed in the discussion of “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” in the next section.

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The theme of profit is also prevalent in the third verse, with the line “Like Judas of old/you lie and deceive” (L, 55). Judas, the apostle that betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver, is mentioned (Matthew 26:14-16). After being filled with remorse, Judas throws away the ill-gotten money and hangs himself (Matthew 27:5). A classical reading of Matthew shows that Judas’ suicide excludes him from the salvation promised by Jesus (Sider Hamilton 2018, 419). Exodus also says that “You shall not murder” (20:13) and one could argue that suicide is a kind of murder; that one’s own life is not yours to take, which reinforces the argument that Judas is excluded from salvation. The way the masters of war are currently acting will lead to the demise of humanity, which could be perceived as a collective suicide. The result for humanity, like Judas, is that we are excluded from the salvation promised by Jesus and instead sent to a hell-like existence. This damnation will become evident in the third part of the narrative, the apocalyptic event. In verse seven, the narrator says that their actions are unforgivable. Jesus said: “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34) and Dylan writes “Even Jesus would never/forgive what you do” (L, 56). One can interpret the lines as the antagonists of “Masters of War” are fully aware of what they are doing. As we see in the following verse, the narrator doubts that “all the money you make/will never buy back your soul” (L, 56), once again the story of Judas is invoked. These people will get their 30 pieces of silver, but it will not buy their soul back and they are excluded from the salvation Jesus promised and they are going to bring the rest of humanity with them in a collective suicide. The ones that profit from the war are truly the ones to blame, but the rest of American society is also part of the structure. The religious imagery and Judas allusion are used to display both the original source of what will eventually become a nuclear war, which is greed, but it also portrays the consequence; a collective suicide and a hell-like existence. In the poetic narrative, the song fills the second slot. If one should label it, one could call it “military arming of the younger generation.” The tone is filled with anger at a system that makes money on war. The vitriolic tone also stems from the generational conflict previously mentioned. People are sent off to war, where death will likely occur at a young age. The masters of war make impersonal decisions without much sacrifice for themselves, but the consequences of their decisions and greed will be evident in the next part of the narrative. The Judas allusion will also continue in the next installment, where imagery of collective suicide is significant.

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“A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” and the Apocalypse The third part, namely the song “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” shows the culmination of the contemporary, apocalyptic death theme and the actual apocalyptic event hinted at in the other songs. The song consists of three threads: environment, war, and the Flood. One can also see the beginning of a Noah’s Ark allusion (Genesis 8) and the final part of a Judas allusion (Matthew 26-27). The song was written in approximately the same time as the Cuban missile crisis in October 1962 (Beebee 1991, 23), which was an event where there was a distinct possibility of a nuclear war looming for several days. American surveillance planes photographed the construction of Soviet missile silos in Cuba. President Kennedy made clear that he would not permit the Soviets to place missiles on the island. An attack from Cuba was perceived as a reason to allow a full-scale attack on the Soviet Union. The United States formed a naval blockade to stop Soviet ships to deliver material to Cuba. Diplomatic arrangements de-escalated and solved the conflict at the last minute (Choon Wang and Raschky 2017, 5722-5723). The Cuban Missile Crisis had a deep impact on Dylan. He mentioned in an interview from 2004 that he remembers people listening to radio bulletins in cafés and bars, and what frightened him the most was that cities like Houston and Atlanta would have to be evacuated (Hilburn 2017, 465). He also expressed in an interview from 1963 that he wrote “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” “during the Cuba trouble” and that he “was a little worried” (Terkel 2017, 6). One must keep in mind when interpreting Dylan interviews, that Dylan is notoriously elusive when speaking to journalists. He seldom takes a political stance, but instead speaks through his songs. Most likely because he wants to distance himself from the “spokesperson of a generation”-label, which was applied to him, which he deeply disdains (Dylan 2005, 115). People have looked to Dylan for answers to complex questions and Dylan’s response to that was “if I wasn’t Bob Dylan, I’d probably think that Bob Dylan has a lot of answers myself” (Rosenbaum 2017, 247). Because of Dylan’s relationship to the media, when something concrete is mentioned, one must take it at face-value. No matter the elusive answers, it is obvious that the tense sentiment that culminated in the Cuban Missile Crisis deeply influenced “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall”. Like “Blowin’ in the Wind”, “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” commences with the question of age. The first two lines of every verse refer to youth. “[M]y blue-eyed

Ljunggren 10 son” and “my darling young one” (L, 59) are both references to young people. “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” is interesting because the lines within a verse lack coherence. The common denominator is that all lines within a verse contain an answer to the question stated twice in the first two lines of each verse. The first verse is spatial; the youth are asked “where [they] have been” (L, 59). The second verse is visual; the youth are asked what they have seen. The third verse is auditive; the youth are asked what they have heard. The fourth verse focuses on who they have met. All of these elements, the spatial, the visual, the auditive, and the interactions give the song structure and each line has a common denominator, but, as will be evident, there is an interplay between all these elements that also provides structure to the song. The structure exists both chronologically and it intertwines throughout. There are some common threads that run through the song, such as, environment, war, and the Flood of Genesis. The first verse and the spatial element begins with the young people, previously mentioned, “crawl[ing] on six crooked highways” (L, 59). It is interesting, considering that highways are seldom crooked. There are multiple possible interpretations for this line. One could be that the youth have seen a lot of accidents, because people drive fast on highways, but the fact that they walk or crawl slowly, makes it more likely that the young people move cautiously on a treacherous path, meanwhile others drive fast. It is treacherous because it is crooked. One can tie this to the generational conflict that is prevalent in the narrative. The old ones are the ones driving off the road. If one contrasts the “crooked highway” with “a highway of diamonds with nobody on it” in the next line (L, 59). The diamonds are the sparkling that occurs when the sun is reflected on the asphalt. What is interesting is that there is nobody on it. Everyone travels the crooked highway in the previous verse. The highway of diamonds is probably the only non-dystopian image in the entire song, but no one travels that road. Dylan also uses personification to describe the environment, when he writes about “seven sad forests” and in the following line “a dozen dead oceans” (L, 59). Both lines are probably a reference to the environmental consequences of a nuclear war. The sad forest could be that the forest suffers from an ecological perspective or that the forests are sad in the eyes of the beholder. Either way, it is a symbol for decaying nature. The dead oceans are a more obvious reference to the nuclear fallout. The term “hard rain”, could refer to the rain that is a consequence of radioactive fallout (Roos 1982, 106). When the hard rain (nuclear rain) falls and poisons the oceans.

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The second thread of the song is war. The newborn baby surrounded by wild wolves in line 12 (L, 59) is a reference to the Vietnam War; a newborn country is attacked by hungry wolves. Vietnam declared independence from French colonialism in 1945 (Nguyen 2015, 13). The hungry wolves are then tied to the previous song, “Masters of War”; the capitalist country attacks the defenseless newborn Vietnam. Dylan builds on this horrific imagery with “I met a young woman whose body was burning” (L, 59). The image is a reference to the casualties of napalm fire-bombing, which was a very iconic image of the war in Vietnam; highly present in the media (Hariman and Lucaites 2003). “I saw guns and sharp swords in the hands of young children” (L, 59) is another reference to the Vietnam War. As previously mentioned, the average age of dead soldiers in the Vietnam War is 22.8 (Fold by Ancestry n.d.), which means that the Vietnam War was a war where young people sacrificed their lives. Wars are often fought by people in their twenties, but the generational awareness previously mentioned highlighted the sacrifice that the baby boomers made. It continues the story of young people fighting a war depicted in “Masters of War”. If the previous song dealt with the arming aspect, when the Masters of War arms the younger generation, “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” is the practical implementation; the actual war, which will lead to apocalyptic death. The third thread is the Flood of Genesis. I agree with Roos’ view that the “hard rain” could be an allusion to the Flood (1982, 106). In Genesis (6:5-14), the Flood is described as God’s will to eradicate a sinful world. When God saw how much man’s wickedness had grown and that man’s thoughts were only evil. God regretted that he created mankind and therefore decided to release a flood to destroy them all. The implications are that man’s wicked behavior will lead to his own demise, in this case, a nuclear war. During the Flood, rain fell from the sky for 40 days and 40 nights (Genesis 7:12). The symbolic meaning of this song is that this time either the bombs or the nuclear rain will have the same result as the Flood of Genesis. The first possible reference to the Flood is in line 16. The narrator talks about a “white ladder all covered with water” (L, 59). Beebee argues that it refers to Jacob’s ladder in Genesis, which the angels used to travel between earth and heaven (1991, 23). The symbolic meaning of Jacob’s ladder is that it is a bridge between heaven and earth. The fact that it is covered in water signifies that the ladder is slippery and difficult to climb or that climbers will drown whilst climbing. If the ladder between heaven and earth is not operational, it means that earth is no longer connected to heaven.

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This trinity of environment, war and the Flood is all part of the apocalyptic theme in this song. The environment aspect shows how the apocalypse affects the environment and how nature is poisoned. The war is obviously what creates this environmental disaster. The Flood is a metaphor for the “hard rain” which is a consequence of the nuclear war. The apocalyptic nuclear war was self-inflicted. Like Noah’s Ark, humanity brought this nuclear apocalypse upon themselves. The war, which is prepared in “Masters of War” is man’s “wicked behavior” (Genesis 6:5-14) and as punishment, the Flood comes, which could be both atom bombs and nuclear rain. The result is that man’s environment is ruined. The final verse is an exception to the rule. There is coherence between the lines. The question posed is: “what’ll you do now…?” (L, 60). The answer is that before the rain starts falling, before the Flood, they walk to the “depths of the deepest black forest” (L, 60). In the second verse, “a black branch with blood that kept drippin’” (L, 59) is mentioned, which refers to the black forest. The branch is a reference to The Divine Comedy. When the main character, Dante, finds himself in a pathless forest. He breaks a branch – blood comes out of the tree and a voice speaks to him. The voice says that the trees are spirits that commit suicide (Alighieri 2003, 24). This kind of intertextuality evokes a portrayal of a graveyard (possibly the collective suicide mentioned in the “Masters of War”-section). Dylan builds on to this through the line “I’ve been ten thousand miles in the mouth of a graveyard”, which shows the extent of the death. The forest is filled with people who have nothing. They are hungry and their issues are forgotten. The pellets of poison in line 47 (L, 60) refer to the nuclear fallout that is spreading through the wind and the rain, that ruins the water. In the forest, “the executioner’s face is always well hidden” (L, 60). This is a reference back to “Masters of War”. Once again, it is faceless executioners “that hide behind desks” (L, 55) that kill these people. Line 50 to 55 says that people should not hope for a spokesperson but instead “tell it and think it and speak it and breathe it”. People should “reflect it from the mountain so that all souls can see it” (L, 60). People should strive to be their own spokesperson instead of asking Dylan to guide them, or as he himself said in an interview from 1966: “I’m not a shepherd” (Hentoff 2017, 109). It continues the theme of cultural radicalism previously mentioned and that people should act from a sense of responsibility. To conclude the apocalyptic event, the war is the source of the Flood, which then creates an environmental disaster. The song ends with people in a black forest.

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With the help of intertextuality, it could be interpreted as a graveyard for people who commit suicide. This apocalypse is then perceived as a collective suicide, which like Judas has brought humanity to a hell-like existence. This is truly the climax of the contemporary, apocalyptic death theme mentioned previously and humanity is now in the post-apocalyptic phase, which is the topic of the next part.

The Post-Apocalyptic “Talkin’ World War III Blues” The fourth installment is “Talkin’ World War III Blues” (L, 64-65). According to Harvey, Dylan leaves his apocalyptic prophetic persona previously used in “Masters of War” and “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” and begins the song with a humorous tone as he deals with the repercussions of a nuclear war (2001, 103). Its effect is that Dylan can ridicule groups with whom he disagrees such as conservatives. Towards the final verse, the tone becomes more sober. This juxtaposition makes the message more potent: we should strive to see a future of coexistence. Because the song shows a real fear of where America is heading (Bulson 2013, 128-129) and that the country would walk “into World War Three” (L, 64). Dylan himself remembers training to take cover when air- raid sirens blasted. “It was like living under a cloud of fear” (Dylan 2005, 29-30). It is likely that these exercises and this fear had an impact on the generation that came of age during the 1960s. It is a reason for Dylan’s commercial success; namely, that he tapped into something that an entire generation felt. It could also explain the common theme of old versus young that one sees in “Blowin’ in the Wind”, “Masters of War” and “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall”. Dylan’s music became a generational bond, where the music served as a generational identifier (Flamm and Steigerwald 2008, 66). He set the common socio-historical experiences and attitudes mentioned previously (Braungart and Braungart 1990, 183), to music, like the fear people felt during the Cuban missile crisis or people’s experiences of the Vietnam War. The song begins with the narrator telling a doctor about a dream that he “was walkin’ into World War Three” (L, 64). In verse three, “the whole thing starts at three o’clock fast/It was all over by quarter past” (L, 64), which means that World War III will be over in 15 minutes. This ties in well with the uncertainty and questioning of permanence expressed in “Blowin’ in the Wind”. Compared to previous wars, when the combatants on each side of the conflict had to see each other during battle and wars were fought during a long period of time in trenches. The invention of the atom bomb made people question the permanence of the state of the earth and their surroundings.

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The stakes were raised, and an entire world war can be fought in 15 minutes and the amount of destruction that can be caused were greatly leveraged compared to previously. During the bombings, that last 15 minutes, the narrator is in a sewer (L, 64). Considering that this song is written during the 1960s, a possible interpretation is that it is a fallout shelter. The lights are the bombs. The narrator then goes out walking through a lonesome town. He “lit a cigarette on a parking meter”. One can interpret this as the parking meter is on fire. The narrator then sees a man and says: “Howdy friend, I guess there’s just us two”. The stranger then “screamed a bit and away he flew” because he thought the narrator “was a communist” (L, 64). Conservatives during the 1960s viewed communism as the primary threat to America, which is one reason why conservatives opposed the Civil Rights Movement, because civil rights would increase federal power and the movement itself could be infiltrated by communists (Flamm and Steigerwald 2008, 131). Dylan’s relationship to communists is ambivalent. When Dylan grew up in northern Minnesota, communists were not in his immediate vicinity. They were like aliens (Dylan 2005, 270-271), which is a possible reason as to why Dylan deal with communists with such a humorous tone. He probably views the conservatives’ fear of communists to be exaggerated and a good target for ridicule. The person who is afraid of communists is described as hysteric. “He screamed a bit and away he flew” when the narrator just said: “Howdy friend, I guess there’s just us two” (L, 64). The doctor interrupts the narrator in the eleventh verse. He says that he has been having “the same old dreams” (L, 65), but that he was alone and did not see our narrator. This signifies that the fear of being the sole survivor of a nuclear war occupied people’s minds. In the following verse, the narrator says that “everybody’s having them dreams/Everybody sees themselves/walkin’ around with no one else” (L, 65). During the early 1960s, this worry was likely a common view, considering that the threat was imminent. The narrator finishes the verse with: “I’ll let you be in my dreams if I can be in yours” (L, 65). He pleads that we should see a future with each other and that we should not be alone in our dreams. In this part, the fear of being alone is presented in a humorous manner and it is just a dream, but the dream is realized in the next part of the narrative.

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“Corrina, Corrina” and Reproductive Behavior The final installment of the narrative is “Corrina, Corrina”, which is a song originally recorded by Bo Carter in 1928 (Carter 1982). Dylan rearranged the song and added a few lines from three Robert Johnson songs (Johnson 1990). Possibly because it is a song arranged by Dylan and not written by him, it is an ignored composition. According to Dylan’s own website,4 there is only one known live performance of the song. Due to its obscure nature, there is not much research done on this tune. Therefore, this analysis of “Corrina, Corrina” is solely based on historical context and interpretation, and not previous literary scholarship. Even though it is a neglected song, it is very significant within the poetic narrative. The song could be characterized as an epilogue. In the song, the narrator waits for a girl’s return. He does not know where she is, and it makes him blue (L, 66). The Flood is constantly used as an allusion in “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” and one can argue that this allusion is extended into “Corrina, Corrina”, but Dylan also modifies or modernizes the allusion at several, crucial points. The song displays the narrator’s survival of the apocalypse and the permanent consequences of it, such as an ecological disaster and the negative effect on human reproduction caused by the nuclear war. The song is set during the final stages of the Flood. According to Genesis 8, after it had rained on earth for 40 days and 40 nights, the Lord closed the floodgates of Heaven. Noah opened a window and sent out a dove to see if the water had receded from the earth. When the dove returned the second time, it had a freshly plucked olive leaf in its beak. The olive leaf was a sign that the water had receded. When Noah sent out the dove a third time, it did not return, which meant that the dove had found a place to set its feet. Eventually, Noah could return to dry land with his family and the animals (Genesis 8). One can argue that the narrator in “Corrina, Corrina” (L, 66) is in the same position as Noah. If one follows the chronology of the record, the narrator survived the apocalyptic events described in “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall”. A reference to surviving the apocalyptic flood is mentioned in “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” where the narrator “met a young girl” and “she gave [him] a rainbow” (L, 59). The line signifies that the narrator will see the closing of the floodgates of the heaven and the end of the apocalypse. After the rain, a rainbow will manifest itself, which means that

4 http://www.bobdylan.com/songs/corrina-corrina/

Ljunggren 16 the narrator survived the climactic event of “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall”. “Corrina, Corrina” is then set after the rain has stopped. In Noah’s case, the rain was the water that God released upon the earth, and in the poetic narrative of the record, the “hard rain” is atom bombs being dropped from the sky or nuclear rain. Another similarity with Noah is that the narrator also has a bird, which is mentioned in the second verse. The narrator says: “I got a bird that whistles/I got a bird that sings” (L, 66). The bird continues the allusion to the story of Noah’s Ark. The bird carries the hope of an earth that can return to its pre-apocalyptic state. What is interesting is when Dylan modifies the plot of Noah’s Ark. He does it at several, crucial points. The first one is the location of the bird. Noah’s dove did not return, which meant that the earth returned to its original state. The narrator still has his bird, which could signify either of two things. Either that the narrator still waits for the earth to return to the pre-apocalyptic state and will eventually release the bird, or that the bird has been released and keeps returning. A reason for this state could be the consequences of a nuclear war. The radiation from the bomb makes an area uninhabitable for a long time. If “Corrina, Corrina” is an allusion to Noah’s Ark and if the bird keeps returning, it cannot find anywhere to place its feet, which means it cannot find a safe spot. Another modification of the Noah’s Ark allusion is that after the Flood, Noah’s descendants fill the earth and the various species of animals once again inhabit the earth. This does not happen to the narrator in “Corrina, Corrina” (L, 66). The narrator is stuck in his “ark” with the bird that possibly keeps returning. The location of the narrator is not mentioned, and one can only infer where the narrator might be. If one applies the Noah’s ark allusion to the location as well, the narrator is then based in a place where he is protected from the apocalyptic event. It could be that this song is set within a nuclear fallout shelter as implied by “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall”. Just like Noah, the narrator builds a fallout shelter to be prepared for an apocalyptic event. This conclusion is supported by the poetic narrative and how the songs reinforce each other, which creates a logical extension of the Noah’s Ark allusion. Dylan also updates the Noah’s Ark allusion with a contemporary ecological perspective. Because the environmental aspect of “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” continues in “Corrina, Corrina”. Noah brings a set of every animal with him on the ark (Genesis 7:1-10) to secure and invigorate a rich wildlife after the apocalypse has ended. “Corrina, Corrina” on the other hand, only mentions one animal, the bird. A possible

Ljunggren 17 interpretation is that the animals did not survive the apocalypse. The idea of previous tales of the apocalypse, like Noah’s Ark, is that the world can be rebuilt, but this time biodiversity is ruined beyond repair. The final modification of the Noah’s Ark allusion is the matter of company. Noah brought his family to save them from apocalyptic death, and for reproductive purposes. The narrator, on the other hand, is all alone and in both the first and the third verse, he misses a girl badly with lines such as: “Gal, where have you been so long?/I been worr’in’ ‘bout you, baby/Baby, please come home” (L, 66). “Corrina, Corrina” is then the realization of the dream that “Everybody sees themselves/Walkin’ around with no one else” from “Talkin’ World War III Blues” (L, 65). A possible interpretation is that the narrator was the only survivor of the apocalypse. The fear in “Talkin’ World War III Blues” was that of being all alone in a post-apocalyptic world, and that is precisely what happened in “Corrina, Corrina”. The fact that the narrator misses a girl is significant if one sees “Corrina, Corrina” as an extension of the Noah’s Ark allusion from “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall”. Reproduction is an important theme in Noah’s Ark, but it does not exist in “Corrina, Corrina”. Reproduction is important because after an apocalypse, the world needs to be repopulated. The lack of reproduction in “Corrina, Corrina” signifies that human reproduction would be permanently affected after a nuclear war. Studies on US reproductive behavior have been conducted in relation to the Cuban Missile Crisis mentioned earlier. The fertility decreased for people living far away from Cuba, who faced the threat of living in a post-nuclear world (Choon Wang and Raschky 2017, 5727). Dylan who had spent most of the early 1960s in New York (Dylan 2005, 30), had decreased reproduction on his mind. In “Masters of War”, he writes: “You’ve thrown the worst fear/that can ever be hurled/Fear to bring children/into the world” (L, 55). More subtle references to non-reproduction occur in “Talkin’ World War III Blues”. The narrator is rejected by a girl in the seventh verse: “Well, I spied a girl and before she could leave/‘Let’s go and play Adam and Eve’/…/When she said, ‘Hey man, you crazy or sumpin’/You see what happened last time they started’” (L, 64). “[P]lay Adam and Eve” refers to sex, but invoking the story of Adam and Eve creates an additional effect. They populated the earth and according to Genesis, all humans are their descendants (3:20-23). The fact that the narrator is rejected when referring to himself and the girl as “Adam and Eve” once again signify that reproduction is not desired in this post-apocalyptic world. “Masters of War” then

Ljunggren 18 display the fear that people feel about reproducing in case of a nuclear war; “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” is the apocalyptic event. “Talkin’ World War III Blues” and especially “Corrina, Corrina” are the parts when the decreased reproduction is realized. The additional effect of invoking Adam and Eve is that they ate the forbidden fruit from the tree of knowledge, got this forbidden knowledge, defying the Lord’s will. As punishment they were banished from the Garden of Eden (Genesis 2-3). Considering that the atom bomb is prevalent in the poetic narrative, one can argue that the forbidden knowledge that humanity has gained is indeed the bomb. Because humanity gained this new knowledge, like Adam and Eve, man is banned from our Garden of Eden, which is the pre-apocalyptic state. Humanity is now sentenced to the post-apocalyptic world described in “Talkin’ World War III Blues” (L, 64-65) and “Corrina, Corrina” (L, 66), a world ruined by radioactive contamination. People have died during the war, accompanied by an enormous ecological disaster and the end of human reproduction. This poetic narrative displays how an apocalyptic event, fueled by nuclear weapons, will affect the earth and humanity in ways that either can never fully recover from.

“So I’ll Just Say Fare Thee Well”5 To conclude, the poetic narrative has an overarching theme of contemporary apocalyptic death because it consists of an apocalyptic event. It is contemporary because the narrative is connected to the events and the fears of the 1960s. The poetic narrative commences with “Blowin’ in the Wind”, which poses questions that the rest of the narrative aims to answer. Two allusions are then prevalent throughout the narrative. Both are established in “Masters of War”. The first one is an allusion to the story of Noah’s Ark. Man’s wicked behavior described in “Masters of War” causes the apocalyptic event in “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall”, which then creates a post- apocalyptic world that is described in “Talkin’ World War III Blues” and “Corrina, Corrina”. Dylan also modifies or modernizes the Noah’s Ark narrative to display an ecological disaster and how a nuclear war would put a strain on human reproduction. The second allusion is the story of Judas, which is also established in “Masters of War”. The allusion shows how mankind’s fate is connected to the fate of Judas and that humanity is excluded from the salvation that Jesus promised. Humanity is sent to a hell- like existence, like Judas, which is the postapocalyptic world. It is described towards

5 L, 61

Ljunggren 19 the end of “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” and then persists throughout “Talkin’ World War III Blues” and “Corrina, Corrina”. Both allusions become apparent through the narrative structure that the songs form. The meaning of a song like “Corrina, Corrina” is transformed when it is analyzed as part of a narrative. Therefore, when analyzing Bob Dylan, one can begin to analyze individual songs as Beebee’s analysis of “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” (1991), but in order to encode additional meaning, it is important to analyze the songs as parts of a bigger whole to see if they contain more literary devices such as the two allusions described in this paper. An ignored composition such as, for example, “Corrina Corrina” might not contain much literary worth when it is analyzed independently, but as a part of the poetic narrative it is vital to display the Noah’s Ark allusion. In a contemporary context, a poetic narrative might also be overlooked due to the way modern music is consumed today. From a material standpoint, the original Dylan records were supposed to be enjoyed on a record player. The needle was meant to travel from the edge to the center of the disc, which creates an uninterrupted whole. How the songs are consumed could, therefore, directly affect interpretation. The invention of the shuffle button, which makes the record play the songs in a randomized order, tears the poetic narrative apart (Decker 2013, 99-100), which could make it even more difficult to spot poetic narratives when analyzing Dylan through modern technology. Considering that Dylan in 2016 became a Nobel laureate, the scholarly interest in his work might increase. To analyze the songs as part of a bigger unit will then provide further depth to the Bob Dylan canon.

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