Rotolo recognised Dylan in Picasso: revealing interview

Thanks to Martin Cowan for alerting me to a revealing interview of Suze Rotolo by Richard Williams for The Guardian newspaper. Highly recommended.

A couple of tasters:

* “While in Umbria she read Françoise Gilot's Life with Picasso and felt a shock of recognition. "I felt I was reading a book of revelations, lessons, warnings," she writes. "Even though Picasso was a much older man than Bob and had experienced a lot more, their personalities were so similar that it was astounding."

* “Nowadays she doesn't care to listen to the songs of parting and loss he wrote while she was away - "Don't Think Twice", "One Too Many Mornings", "Tomorrow is a Long Time" - even though, like their composer, she firmly resists literal interpretations. "People ask, 'Was this song written for you?' Well, I could say this and that. I could make a list. But if you really listen to those songs, they're somewhat like fiction - he's written something coming from his life, but he sets it in a fiction, maybe using another character's voice.”

Excellent article: read it in full here:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2008/aug/16/biography.bobdylan


Gerry Smith