Bob Dylan's Desolation Row

[Gary Childress]

Yes, I received your letter yesterday
About the time the door knob broke
When you asked me how I was doing
Was that some kind of joke ?
All these people that you mention
Yes, I know them, they're quite lame
I had to rearrange their faces
And give them all another name
Right now I can't read too good
Don't send me no more letters no
Not unless you mail them
From Desolation Row.

I sometimes wonder about the lyrics in this song. What does he mean by not being able to read too good and that if this person sends him anymore letters he needs to send them from Desolation Row?

My interpretation is that those on "Desolation Row" speak a kind of different language or see things radically differently perhaps through different lenses so to speak from those outside. So for instance when this person asks Dylan (presumably it's Dylan telling us all these things) how he's doing, Dylan takes it as a kind of offense in a way, when in actuallity it was probably more of a gesture of sympathy toward him. But Dylan catches himself interpreting the remark that way and then thinks twice about it and says don't send me anymore letters unless you send them from where I'm at, where I will understand them clearer.

Desolation Row is a very sobering song to me. It sort of reminds me that there can be a disconnect or something between people of different walks of life who both mean well and yet who at the same time somehow manage to insult each other. The disconnect being in the way words and gestures are interpreted. It's almost like mother nature doesn't want the have and have nots to get along. She wants them to fight and squabble and therefore gives us a formidable communication barrier to overcome.

 

[Camikaze]

Moderator Action: Moved to A&E.

 

[Gary Childress]

Sorry Camikaze, I didn't think at first of this being an A&E type topic. I was hoping to start a kind of debate on the topic of miscommunication as it occurs among different people in different walks of life in how they interpret each other and was trying to use the Dylan song as a starting point for the topic, but since I didn't make that very clear in the OP I apologize. In any case it probably belongs in A&E as much as anywhere else.

What are other people's reactions to the Dylan song "Desolation Row", especially to the last part.

I'll give another example: When I was very young I was a "loner". I didn't socialize well with the other kids. Later in high school I tried to become part of the "in-crowd" by attempting to get to know the "cool kids". One evening I was driving around looking for a party and came across one of the "cool kids" who asked me if there were any parties around that I knew of. I originally took the comment as a kind of instance of poking fun at me because it seemed out of place to me. Why would one of the cool kids be asking me of all people where there were any parties. Later in life I look back and realize that he was probably being generous to me and trying to help me fit into my new guise. But I spent most of my early life thinking this kid was taunting me in a way.

Ah, if only I could go back in time and relive my life, knowing then what I know now.

 

[holy king]

disconnect between people?

yeah, probably that too, but what it mainly is is a hymn to all the losers and bastards crowding desolate city quarters.