Nobel disease or Nobelitis is an informal term for the embrace of strange or scientifically unsound ideas by some Nobel Prize winners, usually later in life. It has been argued that the effect results, in part, from a tendency for Nobel winners to feel empowered by the award to speak on topics outside their specific area of expertise, although it is unknown whether Nobel Prize winners are more prone to this tendency than other individuals. Paul Nurse, co-winner of the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, warned later laureates against "believing you are expert in almost everything, and being prepared to express opinions about most issues with great confidence, sheltering behind the authority that the Nobel Prize can give you". "Nobel disease" has been described as a tongue-in-cheek term.
ok-cleek
Hello, Young Lovers!
Happy new year, cleek!
I was thinking of you just the other day, when I read what Leonard Cohen said about Bob Dylan getting the Nobel prize “Giving Dylan the Nobel prize is like pinning a medal on Mount Everest for being the highest mountain.” I remembered how little you agreed with me in my (and evidently Cohen’s) estimation of Dylan, and it made me smile. I hope all is as well with you as it can be, in this strange dark time we are living through.
Happy new year! I continue to try to get more Dylan into my life. Looking at the albums I have, it seems I like more of him than I think I do. Maybe I’m just bad at him for putting on such a lousy show when I saw him.
Trying to get more Dylan into your life – excellent move! But I do agree about the unsatisfactoriness of his shows for many, many years now. I haven’t gone to see him for decades, for that very reason.
I remember when we had our disagreement about him, I used the example of “Blind Willie McTell” a magnificent song by pretty common consent, that hadn’t even made it on to any of his albums, which to me showed the astonishing number of truly great songs he had written. You said something dismissive about it, while saying you’d never heard it and had no intention of doing so. If you ever feel like revisiting that decision, here is a link to it, and in that case I would be extremely interested to know what you thought about it!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_AIRdU6CPf0
after some study, i’ve decided i have a hard cutoff after Blonde on Blonde. anything before that is good to great. after that, i simply can’t.
i can accept maybe a few off Blood On The Tracks. but i never play the album because i don’t like the rest.
but even that is a pretty good amount of stuff. so, i guess i’m a selective Dylan fan.
Ah well, such is life. And of course, you’re not alone. Reading about the new movie, I see this:
“Some years ago, as the actor Timothée Chalamet was preparing for the role of a lifetime as the enigmatic, poignant, irascible, beloved, brilliant Bob Dylan, he was given some memorable advice. “Someone in Bob’s camp — I’m not going to say who — said, ‘Don’t worry about Dylan fans not liking this. Dylan fans don’t like what Dylan does. They haven’t liked what he has done since 1966.’”
And since Blonde on Blonde was released in 1966, you obviously have plenty of company. But I’m glad to see “Like a Rolling Stone” (one of the all time greats, or the greatest IMO, released 1965) sneaks in under the line!