Bob Dylan’s bizarre star-studded silent dinner party: “It was just surreal”
Without wanting to disparage the man, it can’t be denied that Bob Dylan has always been a peculiar individual. So much is supposedly known about his life, and yet, at the same time, he remains a man of complete mystery, often eschewing publicising details of his personal goings-on in favour of constructing his own mythology.
While some people have reported stories about Dylan that have turned out to be untrue, many of these mistruths are ones that have been spread by him in the first instance. Constantly contradicting himself and compulsively lying about aspects of his past and present, nobody can really ever be certain as to where the public persona of Bob Dylan ends and the real-life Robert Zimmerman begins. Dylan was not a runaway child as he once famously reported, and he never spent six years with a travelling circus – he had, by the accounts of others who knew him, a pretty trouble-free adolescence.
Dylan even went as far as to ensure that the recent James Mangold-directed biopic about his early life and career, A Complete Unknown, had some of its own falsities present within the narrative. Speaking to Rolling Stone, actor Edward Norton, who plays Pete Seeger in the film, said of Dylan that he takes “an obvious pleasure in obfuscation and distortion” before adding, “He’s such a troublemaker.”
However, we’re able to know when something about Dylan is, in fact, true based on who it is who has told the story, and if we’re getting a first-hand account of a meeting between the folk legend and another individual, then your interest ought to pique when the latter person has details they wish to reveal. If there’s any way of getting to know a genuine fact about Dylan, it’s not going to be from him.
In a 2015 interview with the San Francisco Gate, Irish singer-songwriter Glen Hansard was quizzed about a dinner encounter that he once had with Bob Dylan, new wave icon Elvis Costello and fellow countryman Van Morrison. While the notion of four acclaimed musicians having a meal together isn’t exactly unusual, it was the nature of their rendezvous that surprised Hansard the most. As the foursome tucked into their supper, something unusual struck Hansard that he couldn’t shake from his mind.
“It was just surreal,” Hansard recalled of his date with the stars. “It was at a Dylan show in Dublin, and I was standing in a spot where Van grabbed me and we all went to dinner. I don’t know how these guys’ brains work. I don’t know if it’s Asperger’s or autism. But the whole meal was silent. No one said anything.”
While there would have been plenty that the four parties would be able to discuss at length, it’s such a peculiar thing for none of them to have dared to disturb the peace and strike up a conversation. While the others may have been stuck for something to say, it says a lot about Dylan that his unique way of regaling his dinner guests is by giving them the silent treatment.
Never Miss A Tale
The Far Out Bob Dylan Newsletter
All the latest stories about Bob Dylan from the independent voice of culture.
Straight to your inbox.