Bob Dylan Handwritten Signed Lyrics "Like A Rolling Stone", the Most Controversial Dylan Song, and Voted the #1 Song of All Time

Bob Dylan Handwritten & Signed Lyrics to "Like A Rolling Stone'" -- Considered by Dylan to be the "best song he ever wrote", and was voted the #1 song of all time by The Rolling Stone Magazine in 2004. Both the handwritten lyrics and signature have been authenticated by Bob Dylan's manager, Jeff Rosen. Single page measures 8.5" x 11". In fine condition. We sold a similar transcript in our January 23, 2019 auction for $100,000. At that time we thought it was the only one other than the original. Since then we discovered this example which now has the added benefit of having an original certificate signed by Jeff Rosen, the source of these lyrics and the president of Bob Dylan Music Company. He is well known as Dylan's agent.

One of the most widely debated, controversial and elusive of Dylan's songs. Dylan's six-minute masterwork in its richest, fullest context, capturing the heady atmosphere of the recording studio in 1965 as musicians and technicians clustered around the mercurial genius from Minnesota, the young Bob Dylan at the height of his powers.

"Like a Rolling Stone" is rooted in faraway American places and times, drawing on timeless cultural impulses that make the song as challenging, disruptive, and restless today as it ever was. "Like a Rolling Stone" never loses its essential quality, which is directly to challenge the listener: it remains a call to arms and a demand for a better world. Forty years later it is still revolutionary as will and idea, as an attack and an embrace. How Does it Feel?

It could not be summed up as an attack or an act of bravado any more than it could be called a break-up song, or even a song about lost innocence. The lyrics seem to address a woman, once well-to-do and sheltered, who now lives a bohemian lifestyle. She has let go of all her comforts and adopted a new identity, leaving her floating in a philosophical abyss. She's pawning her diamond ring and living on the streets, and Dylan wants to know how she feels about poverty now that she's in it. But even as he destroys innocence with the bitter flavor of the lyrics ("how does it feel?" seems to mock more than empathize), he manages to uplift and romanticize the new world that "Miss Lonely" lives in now. "To be on your own/No direction home" is as romantic as it is miserable and meaningless.

Some believe that the song places personal transition (as opposed to political transition) in sharp focus. Loss of belief, cynicism and alienation—all close to Dylan's immediate personal experience—emanate from every line. Unlike Dylan's wistful political pieces of the past, this song was really about a person whose beliefs, no matter how fiercely held, could not carry them home. "A song that seems to hail the dropout life for those who can take it segues into compassion for those who have dropped out of bourgeois surroundings," wrote Dylan biographer Robert Shelton. "'Rolling Stone' is about the loss of innocence and the harshness of experience. Myths, props, and old beliefs fall away to reveal a very taxing reality."

Another camp of philosophy believes this song portrays the life of an actual person, "Poor Little Rich Girl", one-time debutante Edie Sedgwick, who was part of artist Andy Warhol's crowd. She was the subject of an emotional tug-of-war between the Dylan camp and the Warhol camp. She was a beauty at all the wild parties in New York. With her behavior and ballet dancing to rock and roll music, Edie became one of the most popular socialites at the time with Andy and Edie becoming one of the most iconic, and controversial, creative partnerships in the art world that was extremely popular and intense. However, at the end of 1965, Edie became infatuated with a scruffy, gruff, earthy, politically astute songwriter and singer: Bob Dylan. Whatever the nature of their relationship was is lost in history, but it seems as though Dylan and Sedgwick were quite fond of each other. Dylan was among those artists, including Truman Capote, who never liked Warhol and who considered him a fake, and as the theory goes, When Edie's 15 minutes ("of fame") had come to an end, Warhol moved on.

According to this theory, the song includes some fanged, accusatory lines about Warhol and the way he mistreated the girl:

Ain't it hard when you discover that
He really wasn't where it's at
After he took from you everything he could steal

Writer Mark Polizzotti argues that the song still idealizes losses: "If 'Blowin in the Wind' and 'The Times They Are A-Changin' had elevated collective yearning and youthful impatience to anthemic levels, 'Rolling Stone' did the same for alienation" (Polizzotti 35). Jann Wenner agrees: "Everything has been stripped away. You're on your own, you're free now…You're so helpless, and now you've got nothing left. And you're invisible—you've got no secrets—that's so liberating" (Polizzotti 35).

The contemporary broader society also weighs in with their philosophical musing on their own interpretation into this Dylan song, often pouring over the song line by line:

"Miss Lonely" was laughing at the bums, the same ones she was giving dimes. She had a lack of concern for those who were down on their luck, and didn’t see any possible way she could end up in their position."

"The song represent the “haves” within American culture who supported the prevailing political establishment at the time. In the song, her heedless fall from grace might also suggest a coming cultural revolution that deposes the wealthy from their previously high stations."

"Dylan is “calling out” his audience of middle class white anti-establishment college-student types. He sees their carelessness and dedication to people less fortunate as superficial (i.e., threw the bums a dime), while mommy and daddy paid their way. He saw them as totally unprepared to face reality or make their own way in the world."

"Dylan displays little compassion for the girl who has gone from riches to rags. With four simple words, he relentlessly stabs her with the reality that she has become the very person she laughed at. She is a living example of “What goes around, comes around”, a victim of "Instant Karma"."

"She was smart enough, or rich enough, to get into a good school, but she didn’t make use of any education she could have received in the classroom. She wasted her time partying and drinking."

"This is a stunning metaphor for the tired emptiness that is often reflected in the eyes of the strung-out and the homeless."

"It is said that the eyes are the windows to the soul. If the mystery tramp is the devil, then the line may signify that he is coercing Ms. Lonely to sell him her soul in exchange for what she believes she needs"

"Finally, this could refer to the time when she had money and was used to the good life, while those below her were working for her and kissing her butt. Everyone was pleasing her to get by, but she treated them with disrespect or even contempt."

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Each critic has an argument to make, but one of the most persistent truths about "Like A Rolling Stone" is that its truth, its "message," never becomes completely clear. No one is completely sure what it means, and that's part of what keeps it interesting. "Confused—and justified, exultant, free from history with a world to win—is exactly where the song means to leave you". In a way, it's an anti-message anthem with an anti-message message. But regardless of what you believe, beyond a reasonable doubt this song is clearly the most discussed and philosophized song by Bob Dylan -- which is the ultimate beauty of art.

Read the lyrics and have a go at them ….

LIKE A ROLLING STONE

"Once upon a time you dressed so fine

Threw the bums a dime in your prime, didn't you?

People call say 'beware doll, you're bound to fall'

You thought they were all kidding you

You used to laugh about

Everybody that was hanging out

Now you don't talk so loud

Now you don't seem so proud

About having to be scrounging your next meal

How does it feel, how does it feel?

To be without a home

Like a complete unknown, like a rolling stone

Ahh you've gone to the finest schools, alright Miss Lonely

But you know you only used to get juiced in it

Nobody's ever taught you how to live out on the street

And now you're gonna have to get used to it

You say you never compromise

With the mystery tramp, but now you realize

He's not selling any alibis

As you stare into the vacuum of his eyes

And say do you want to make a deal?

How does it feel, how does it feel?

To be on your own, with no direction home

A complete unknown, like a rolling stone

Ah you never turned around to see the frowns

On the jugglers and the clowns when they all did tricks for you

You never understood that it ain't no good

You shouldn't let other people get your kicks for you

You used to ride on a chrome horse with your diplomat

Who carried on his shoulder a Siamese cat

Ain't it hard when you discovered that

He really wasn't where it's at

After he took from you everything he could steal

How does it feel, how does it feel?

To have on your own, with no direction home

Like a complete unknown, like a rolling stone

Ahh princess on a steeple and all the pretty people

They're all drinking, thinking that they've got it made

Exchanging all precious gifts

But you better take your diamond ring, you better pawn it babe

You used to be so amused

At Napoleon in rags and the language that he used

Go to him he calls you, you can't refuse

When you ain't got nothing, you got nothing to lose

You're invisible now, you've got no secrets to conceal

How does it feel, ah how does it feel?

To be on your own, with no direction home

Like a complete unknown, like a rolling stone"

'Rolling Stone' s the best song I wrote," Dylan said flatly at the end of 1965.

VOTED THE MOST IMPORTANT SONG OF ALL TIME BY ROLLING STONE MAGAZINE, DECEMBER 2004

Our consigner purchased them directly from Dylan's manager, Jeff Rosen.

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

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