dc.description | The original title of this paper, as presented at the Caen colloquium, was "Dylanesque Syntax," which was meant as a joke of sorts, the idea being to scare the audience into submission before the first line was even spoken. Of course, there is no such thing as "Dylanesque syntax," in the sense that we are by no means dealing with a language that is separate from (American) English and has a distinct, separate syntax (even though it may be argued to have a distinct, all but separate phonology). What I intend to do is simply apply some of the tools of linguistics, especially corpus linguistics, to the songs recorded by Dylan over the past 44 years, and, in line with the general theme of the colloquium, see if the findings can teach us something about his artistry. I will then leave it to true Dylan scholars to interpret some of the data I am presenting, in the context of their own approaches to Dylan's writing and poetry. I would like to add, in the way of an introduction, that it is indeed the lyrics I will be concerned with, not the music, even though I am aware that the question of music as syntax is of paramount importance to some theorists. | eng |