Bob Dylan Admits Regret Over Writing This Song
via What's Now / YouTube
Reflecting on a Personal Lyric
Bob Dylan has always been known for his sharp, honest songwriting, but even he admits one song might have gone too far. In a 1985 interview with author and radio host Bill Flanagan for Written in My Soul, Dylan was asked if he had “ever put something in a song that was too personal” or revealed more than he intended.
At first, Dylan mentioned “Idiot Wind,” saying he “came pretty close” but didn’t feel it crossed the line. “I’ve never really said anything where I thought I was giving away too much,” he explained. “I mean, I give it all away, but I’m not really giving away any secrets. I don’t have that many secrets. I don’t find myself in that position.”
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A Song He Wishes He Had Skipped
Flanagan then reminded Dylan of another track, “Ballad in Plain D,” which recounts his breakup with girlfriend Suze Rotolo, the woman pictured beside him on the cover of The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan. Dylan quickly agreed this one was different. “Oh! Yeah. That one…that one I look back and I say, ‘I must have been a real schmuck to write that,’” he admitted. “I look back at that particular one and say, of all the songs I’ve written, maybe I could have left that alone. But if that’s the only one I look back and say maybe I shouldn’t have written, I think that’s a pretty good record. That’s maybe five hundred to one.”
The Story of Suze Rotolo
Suze Rotolo, an Italian-American artist raised in Queens, met Dylan in July 1961 after a folk concert at Riverside Church. Dylan was 20; Rotolo was 17. “He was funny, engaging, intense, and he was persistent,” she later said. “These words completely describe who he was throughout the time we were together; only the order of the words would shift depending on mood or circumstance…As inexperienced as I was in the ways of love, I felt a strong attraction to this character. It was as if we knew each other already; we just needed time to get better acquainted. And so we did over the next four years.”
Understanding the Music
Their relationship eventually ended as Dylan’s fame grew, but Rotolo did not resent the song. “I understood what he was doing,” she told author Victoria Balfour. “It was the end of something and we both were hurt and bitter. His art was his outlet, his exorcism. It was healthy.” Rotolo later became an accomplished artist and passed away in 2011 at the age of 67 after battling lung cancer.
