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| | Guardian Unlimited Books | By genre | Song and dance |
 | | The rewards are just as one would expect: a bracing attention to artfulness, a wonderful sensitivity to nuance, and a particularly brilliant sympathy with the purpose and effect of Dylan's rhymes. |
 | | The overall structure, too, is appropriately fixed and capacious: realising that "the word 'sin' haunts [Dylan's] songs" Ricks gives seven chapters on the deadly sins themselves, four on the virtues, and three on the heavenly graces. |
 | | Conceding that some songs are what Dylan called "chains of flashing images" and others are more like "novels...I can re-read...in my head a lot", Ricks burrows down through their multiple levels, more concerned to revel in variety than emerge with a single definitive meaning. |
| books.guardian.co.uk /reviews/artsandentertainment/0,6121,1050408,00.html (1363 words) |
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