Dylan, Dylan and A Simple Desultory Philippic

My last two years in high school I took an art class with Mr. Sebes at BRHS-West. The classroom had a kiln, art supplies of all kinds and a record player. For some reason (probably because they were the most assertive and everyone went along with it) there were a couple of girls who controlled what we listened to, much the same way that some people like to be in charge of the remote when families or friends watch television.

No one seemed to mind, though, because the records they selected to play were always Simon & Garfunkel. Parsley, Sage Rosemary and Thyme; Wednesday Morning, 3AM; Sounds of Silence; Bookends... Without effort we learned the words of nearly every album because I don't believe they ever played anything else.

One of the songs was a spoof on Bob Dylan called "A Simple Desultory Philippic (Or How I Was Robert McNamara'd into Submission)" which appeared on Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme. The song is rather hilarious, especially the talking part in imitation of Dylan's delivery on songs like "I Shall Be Free No. 10."

In November, after reading Bob Dylan and Dylan Thomas: The Two Dylans by Jeff Towns and K.J. Miles, I felt a need to become more acquainted with the life and work of Dylan Thomas. To be honest, I only knew of him but had never read him. To do this I borrowed several books from our library and did a little devouring. One of the books, a massive volume, featured all of his poems. One was a book of literary criticism that included an overview of his life, another a book of essays by other critics, and the fourth a Christmas tale he wrote called A Child's Christmas. His most famous poem is probably "Do not go gentle into that good night."

Much of his poetry struck me as evocative even when you didn't fully grasp what its meanings, vivid imagery throughout. It wouldn't be too far a stretch to compare some of his writing to Finnegan's Wake, or a linguistic hybrid conjoining Jackson Pollock's paint splattering with Dali's hyper-schizophrenic scenes such Soft Construction with Boiled Beans (Premonition of Civil War).

The Welsh poet won many accolades with some critics calling him the greatest living poet. Like other "rock stars" he seems to have lived a life of self-destruction, and indeed died during his 39th year on earth.

All the above flashed through my mind as i thought about the reference to Dylan Thomas in Paul Simon's parody of Dylan. Here are the lyrics, with the Dylan Thomas reference highlighted in bold. 

A Simple Desultory Philippic (Or How I Was Robert McNamara'd into Submission)

I been Norman Mailered, Maxwell Taylored
I been John O'Hara'd, McNamara'd
I been Rolling Stoned and Beatled 'til I'm blind
I been Ayn Randed, nearly branded
Communist, 'cause I'm left-handed
That's the hand I use, well, never mind

I been Phil Spectored, resurrected
I been Lou Adlered, Barry Sadlered
Well, I paid all the dues I want to pay
And I learned the truth from Lenny Bruce
And all my wealth won't buy me health
So I smoke a pint of tea a day

I knew a man, his brain was so small
He couldn't think of nothing at all
Not the same as you and me
He doesn't dig poetry
He's so unhip that when you say Dylan
He thinks you're talking about Dylan Thomas
Whoever he was
The man ain't got no culture
But it's alright, ma, everybody must get stoned

I been Mick Jaggered and silver daggered
Andy Warhol, won't you please come home?
I been mother, father, aunt and uncled
Been Roy Haleed and Art Garfunkeled
I just discovered somebody's tapped my phone

Folk rock
I've lost my harmonica, Albert

Songwriter: Paul Simon

A Simple Desultory Philippic (Or How I Was Robert McNamara’d Into Submission) lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Universal Music Publishing Group

If you're unfamiliar with the tune, check it out here.

Now what's really hilarious is that when I Googled the lyrics for the song, a different version came up, whereupon I learned that Paul Simon originally recorded an England only version on his own before the Parslet, Sage version with Art G.

I was Union Jacked, Kerouac'd
John Birched, stopped and searched
Rolling Stoned and Beatled till I'm blind
I've been Ayn Randed, nearly branded
Communist 'cos I'm lefthanded:
That's the hand they use, well, never mind!

I've been Walt Disneyed, Dis Disleyed
John Lennoned, Krishna Menoned
Walter Brennan punched out Cassius Clay
I've heard the truth from Lenny Bruce
And all my wealth won't buy me health
So I smoke a pint of tea a day

I knew a man his brain so small
He couldn't think of nothin' at all
He's not the same as you and me
He doesn't dig poetry. He's so unhip that
When you say Dylan, he thinks you're talkin' about Dylan Thomas
Whoever he is
The man ain't got no culture
But its alright, Ma
It's just sumpthin' I learned over in England

I've been James Joyced, Rolls Royced
Mick Jaggered, silver daggered
Andy Warhol won't you please come home?
I've been mother, fathered, aunt and uncled
Tom Wilsoned, Art Garfunkled
Barry Kornfeld's mother's on the phone

When in London, do as I do
Find yourself a friendly haiku
Go to sleep for ten or fifteen years

* * * 

Was this version recorded somewhere? The references on both are hilarious. Fwiw, Tom Wilson was Bob Dylan's producer in the early sixties, as well as Simon & Garfunkel's. "It's alright, Ma" is a classic from Bringing It All Back Home. "It's just something I learned over in England" is a variant on I Shall Be Free No. 10

John Updike On Ted Williams

My junior year in high school at BRHS-West I wrote a paper for English class on the theme, "Who was the greatest baseball player of all time." I was passionate about my theme because I was, at the time, passionate myself about the Great American Game. I researched my butt off, wrestling with the problem of establishing criteria for comparing stats of old timers and current players. I likewise had to determine how much weight to give fielding skills, leadership, base running, and pitching.

When all was said and done, I wrote what I thought was a stellar paper. Ty Cobb was the greatest. And when all was said and done, Ms. Saltzbart graced that paper with a U and U-. U for research, and U- for the writing itself.

Now for the record, I was an A student. I was in the honors programs, and even in Ms. Saltzbart's class I had almost all Aces throughout the year so that my final grade averaged to be a C in the fourth quarter even with these bad marks, my first C in high school. And like the dutiful "good kid" I was, I accepted my fate... except, I had to ask why this happened. Where had I gone wrong.

When I went to speak with her after class the following day she replied that I failed because, "Joe Dimaggio is the greatest baseball player of all time." That was the sum total of why I failed. She had nothing more to say.

All these years I dismissed her conclusion as wacko. Until today, actually. It may be that all my rambling comparisons of baseball stats missed something important. In Hemingway's Nobel Prize-winning Old Man and the Sea, Santiago took inspiration from DiMaggio, the man who never gave up. The theme song from Oscar-winning The Graduate features this Paul Simon line, "Where have you gone, Joe Dimaggio." The great pop culture status icon Marilyn Monroe even married the guy. In other words, I never factored in the effect Joe DiMaggio had on the broader culture.

Seven player strikes and all the wrangling over contracts, salaries and taxes for stadiums has taken a lot of luster off the Great American Game. There was a time when It Happens Every Spring played on Saturday Night at the Movies the weekend before the season opener. There was a time when everyone knew at least a few of the stars. And literary giants wrote about the men who played it.

One such literary giant of our century past was John Updike, and the player he wrote an incredible baseball essay about was Ted Williams. Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu is a must read if you were ever a fan of baseball. The essay, which begins as follows, appeared in The New Yorker in 1960, back when I was reading Casper the Friendly Ghost comics. The opening is wonderful.

Fenway Park, in Boston, is a lyric little bandbox of a ballpark. Everything is painted green and seems in curiously sharp focus, like the inside of an old-fashioned peeping-type Easter egg. It was built in 1912 and rebuilt in 1934, and offers, as do most Boston artifacts, a compromise between Man's Euclidean determinations and Nature's beguiling irregularities. Its right field is one of the deepest in the American League, while its left field is the shortest; the high left-field wall, three hundred and fifteen feet from home plate along the foul line, virtually thrusts its surface at right-handed hitters. On the afternoon of Wednesday, September 28th, as I took a seat behind third base, a uniformed groundkeeper was treading the top of this wall, picking batting-practice home runs out of the screen, like a mushroom gatherer seen in Wordsworthian perspective on the verge of a cliff. The day was overcast, chill, and uninspirational. The Boston team was the worst in twenty-seven seasons. A jangling medley of incompetent youth and aging competence, the Red Sox were finishing in seventh place only because the Kansas City Athletics had locked them out of the cellar. They were scheduled to play the Baltimore Orioles, a much nimbler blend of May and December, who had been dumped from pennant contention a week before by the insatiable Yankees. I, and 10,453 others, had shown up primarily because this was the Red Sox's last home game of the season, and therefore the last time in all eternity that their regular left fielder, known to the headlines as TED, KID, SPLINTER, THUMPER, TW, and, most cloyingly, MISTER WONDERFUL, would play in Boston. "WHAT WILL WE DO WITHOUT TED? HUB FANS ASK" ran the headline on a newspaper being read by a bulb-nosed cigar smoker a few rows away. Williams' retirement had been announced, doubted (he had been threatening retirement for years), confirmed by Tom Yawkey, the Red Sox owner, and at last widely accepted as the sad but probable truth. He was forty-two and had redeemed his abysmal season of 1959 with a—considering his advanced age—fine one. He had been giving away his gloves and bats and had grudgingly consented to a sentimental ceremony today. This was not necessarily his last game; the Red Sox were scheduled to travel to New York and wind up the season with three games there.

Ted Williams was another of the great ones. It may be that had I read Updike before writing about Ty Cobb I would have produced a better paper. Or if I had taken a typing class freshman year instead of senior year since my handwriting may have been a tad too illegible for a teacher staring at a pile of term papers through eyes befogged by cocktails. ("Objection! Calls for speculation.")

I would strongly encourage you to follow this link and bookmark the Updike piece. It's a masterful work and one of the greater bits of baseball literature ever written.

Trivia: Joe DiMaggio's contract, when making appearances, stipulated that he be introduced as "the greatest baseball player of all time." May we ourselves never be so vain.