Dylan's Nobel splits social media reactions

While his oeuvre is colossal, whether Bob Dylan deserves a Nobel for

Literature

has set off a firestorm on social media.
On behalf of the Nobel Committee, the Swedish Academy’s permanent secretary Sara Danius says, “He is a great poet in the English speaking tradition and he is a wonderful sampler, a very original sampler. He embodies the tradition and for 54 years, he has been at it, reinventing himself constantly and creating a new identity.”
“Bob Dylan writes poetry for the ear,” she adds. “But it’s perfectly fine to read his works as poetry.” However, not everyone is impressed with the argument. Authors like Jodi Picoult (My Sister’s Keeper), who joked that she might now be eligible for a Grammy, Irvine Welsh (Trainspotting) and Hari Kunzru (Gods Without Men) and many others refuse to agree with the committee verdict.
“This feels like the lamest Nobel win since they gave it to Obama for not being Bush,” Kunzru tweeted.
I’m a Dylan fan, but this is an ill-conceived nostalgia award wrenched from the rancid prostates of senile, gibbering hippies,” Scottish novelist Irvine Welsh said on Twitter. Referring to President Barack Obama’s congratulatory tweet to Bob Dylan, Welsh tweeted, “Not
as well-deserved as your one for peace, surely though mate?”
New-York-based writer, Morgan Jerkins, said, “I love me some Bob Dylan but I’m kinda
bummed about him winning the Nobel Prize in Literature. (sic)”
The rebuttal brigade, on the other hand, argued that Dylan’s five-decade-old career, including the songs and the

music

, is beyond any debate.
Novelist Salman Rushdie tweeted: “From Orpheus to Faiz, song and poetry have been closely linked. Dylan is the brilliant inheritor of the bardic tradition. Great choice. Nobel.”
Poet and journalist, Pritish Nandy, writes, “Nothing pleases me more than the Nobel for Lit going to Bob Dylan. Some of the world’s greatest songwriters have also been its finest poets.”
Welsh music critic, Simon Price, keyed a powerful tweet, “To everyone scared of the P-word: Bob Dylan was a folk singer. Folk is, by its very definition, people’s music. Popular music.

POP

music.”
Arguments will be in abundance and the answer will blow in the wind. But with this year’s Literature Nobel, we rediscovered a poet who is hardly read and mostly heard.