How a Paul Newman movie inspired one of Bob Dylan’s hits: “You don’t know what love is”
When Bob Dylan discovered Woody Guthrie’s work, he felt compelled to make music of his own. He travelled to New York to visit the dying Guthrie and subsequently started performing and befriending other musicians. Dylan’s divisive voice became instantly recognisable, and while some people found it hard to get used to it, no one could deny the beauty of his compositions or his lyrical talent.
As Dylan started to gain more recognition in Greenwich Village, many other artists would perform – and help to popularise – his songs. One of these singers was Joan Baez, who had already released several albums when she met Dylan. She often brought him out on stage, where they’d duet, helping to make his works more popular. Baez covered many of Dylan’s songs during their time together, such as ‘It Ain’t Me Babe’ and ‘It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue’, clearly in great awe of his work.
In 1968, she also recorded Any Day Now, an album made up of Dylan covers. It contained ‘Love Is Just a Four-Letter Word’, which she first performed before he’d even had a chance to finish writing it. Her version is the only one that exists – he’s never performed it live or even recorded a studio version. According to Baez, Dylan didn’t even remember writing it when he heard the finished version playing on the radio. He turned to Baez and told her, “Hey, that’s a great song!”
Clearly, both Baez and Dylan loved the track, which seems to have helped to popularise the classic phrase. While it’s hard to pinpoint when the first use of ‘love is a four-letter word’ was uttered in popular culture, it’s likely that Dylan heard the phrase in the 1958 film Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, where Paul Newman’s character, Brick Pollitt, says, “You don’t know what love is. To you, it’s just another four-letter word.”
The phrase “four-letter word” is often used to indicate a word that is meant to be rude or offensive due to the fact that many swear words, slang words for bodily functions and slurs are often four letters long. Thus, it’s interesting to consider if Dylan used the phrase with this in mind or if he was similarly suggesting that love isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be – the word can simply be broken down into four meaningless letters. Or perhaps love, as a word, is so overused that all meaning is lost.
This isn’t the only time Dylan has borrowed lyrics from pre-existing sources – he regularly ‘stole’ from other artists. Picasso once said, “Good artists copy, great artists steal,” and whether you believe this idea or not, it’s hard to deny that Dylan’s incorporation of other artists’ lines has often served him well.
Adding lines from films or preexisting songs often reinforces what he’s trying to say, providing extra context for sharp-eared listeners and, thus, in some cases, making us reconsider what the whole piece could mean. He’s previously borrowed lines from movies like The Maltese Falcon, A Streetcar Named Desire, and Bronco Billy, their cultural weight adding emphasis to his own words.
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