Bob Dylan fans remain split on whether the songwriter’s recent Patreon post is artificially generated, plagiarism, or from the hands of the man himself.
The 84-year-old musician confirmed the launch of a Patreon where he would post paywalled stories under the title Lectures from The Dead. For $5 a month, subscribers can receive short stories, one of which is titled Bull Rider, as well as essays and lectures on Mark Twain, Wild Bill, and Aaron Burr. Dylan’s fans are confused as to the nature of the Patreon page and even allege the veteran performer is plagiarising other works, or even artificially generating writings to post to the new Patreon page.
A snippet of Fred Bals’ A Sense of Wonder: Bob Dylan on Patreon essay made the rounds on X, with fans wondering whether Dylan had plagiarised the works of others, or had merely fed an idea into a chatbot. Bals wrote: “The Bull Rider short story opens with a reference to The Sea-Wolf by Jack London — an author whose prose Dylan appropriated dozens of times throughout Chronicles: Volume One, sometimes line for line. While the voice might be AI, the hand belongs to the man who gave us Chronicles.”
Some are unconvinced by Bals’ claim, though others believe the Bull Rider story could be a sincere effort from Dylan, who noted London’s passages and work in Chronicles: Volume One several times. Fans argued over the intent of these passages, with one writing: “Oh so he’s just a plagiarist? That’s so much better! It’s Bob Dylan. He is not bound by human standards.”
Another fan replied: “A reference to another work isn’t plaigirism. Every serious writer does it.” But the original poster was unconvinced by this defence, and suggested Dylan had a habit of ripping, covering, and rewording the works of others.
He wrote: “Quoting another work line for line without attribution is textbook plagiarism. Dylan has been caught red-handed doing this several times, although I doubt it was ever conscious. I mean his first album features an arrangement of House of the Rising Sun directly ripped off from his buddy Dave Van Ronk. This isn’t a new phenomenon with him. And who cares one way or the other? It’s Bob Dylan.”
Another suggested the writings had to be Dylan himself, as it “reads like a Tempest-era Dylan music video.”
While some tried to assess whether the posted stories so far were artificially generated or written by Dylan and his team, others believe it should be no surprise to see the Mr. Tambourine Man songwriter trial a new medium for his work. Some were not surprised to hear Dylan may have plagiarised the works, too.
One fan took to X and wrote: “It’s really funny how Bruce Springsteen sang an original protest song on the same bill as Joan Baez in front of 100,000 people in Bob Dylan’s home state and the very next day Bob announced a baffling patreon for his AI written short stories about cowboys or whatever.”
Another added: “Dylan’s prose has always been surreal. Tarantula. Chronicles. AI cowboy stories? Entirely on brand.” A third wrote: “Bob hasn’t written a protest song in 50 yrs, he has no shame and collects cheques while still making amazing art, he doesn’t pander and has no enemies.”
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