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Jul 01, 2008

Dennis rated it:

Because Suze Rotolo grew up in a family that supported the Communist party, it has always been assumed that she played an important role in influencing Dylan's social protest material, but there are very few details about this in the book. Rotolo states at one point that the autobiography is an "emotional" rather than a factual recollection of the time. The book does seem to get better when their relationship is troubled and especially after they break up. It takes Rotolo almost 300 pa More...

1 comment like (2 people liked it)

Apr 28, 2011

blue-collar mind rated it:

I grew up in the absent Bob Dylan years, when he largely disappeared from the scene in the 1970s, and also refrained from reading album credits, so grew up not knowing how many of my favorite songs were Dylan's. I was even a Beatle-basher, learned from a brother who was a heavy metal guy (Zeppelin, Thin Lizzy) so we were Stones partisans and words were less important than great guitar work. I even remember reading at the time the Doonesbury cartoon about Jimmy Thudpucker who is outside with his More...

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Jul 24, 2009

Shannon rated it:

I have to admit, I only read this because it was cheap and I wanted to suck what juicy marrow I could about Dylan from it. There were a few anecdotes that brought to light the fullness of the Dylan/Rotolo relationship by filling in the gaps left from all the biographies I've read about him. However, I skimmed through the endless ramblings of Rotolo, who through her own words, seems stuck in the idea of proving to the rest of the world, herself and possibly Dylan, that she was more than his girlf More...

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Feb 04, 2009

Adrienne rated it:

I have mixed feelings about this book but overall I liked it. On the one hand, the writing isn’t stellar and Rotolo bounces all over the place chronologically and thematically. I found myself often having to go back and figure out where we were in the time line (which isn’t a very accurate term because there is no “line” of time involved here). On the other hand, this book is extremely valuable for its insight into Bob Dylan. Rotolo’s is a unique perspective on Dylan’s transformation from an More...

3 comments like (2 people liked it)

Dec 22, 2010

Jenny rated it:

It was difficult deciding whether to assign two stars or three stars. If the stellar assignment was based solely on content, the book deserves three stars. Suze Rotolo led a truly amazing youth, and managed to pack in more experiences before the age of twenty-three than most accomplish in a lifetime. Living on her own from an early age, socializing with journalists and songwriters, taking classes with older students and heading off to Italy to study art in Perugia, Rotolo becomes an adult quickl More...

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Mar 06, 2011

Rick rated it:

Decided to re-read this account of life in the early 60's Greenwich Village after the death this week of the author, Suze Rotolo. Suze was the girl walking with Bon Dylan on the cover of his Freewheelin' album from 1962. She was his girlfriend and muse for much if the music he created in the first several year sof his career.

Good book, told by a real insider from that time. From growing up a "red diaper baby" in a Communist family, to inspiring much f bob's early music, to h More...

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Nov 13, 2011

Nina rated it:

Suze Rotolo’s statement, “He became an elephant in the room of my life,” sums up at the same time that it barely scrapes the surface of her relationship with Bob Dylan. She met and fell in love with Dylan in 1961, when she was 17, and she was the inspiration for many of his songs. Her book is a memoir of an era as much as it is a recollection of the relationship. Rotolo is a native New Yorker, and her love for her city shines brightly through her vivid descriptions of Greenwich Village during th More...

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Jul 29, 2011

Margaret added it

I'm not really a Bob Dylan fan however he has written some really great songs. I am a fan, though of folk music - Peter, Paul and Mary, The Weavers, The Seekers and a few others so I found this book informative and enjoyable. It's not the story of Bob Dylan per se, it's really Suze's life during that creative time. Along with being Bob Dylan's girlfriend, her Communist background and trips to Cuba added some extra spice into her young adulthood. Like most people at that age, there were a lot of More...

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Dec 12, 2009

Tom rated it:

I was struck by the charity of Suze Rotolo's reflections on Bob Dylan. She strips her reminiscence of self-aggrandizement and tabloid-minded sensationalism. While Bob Dylan is still remains a bit of a mystery in the end (he was really that aloof all along), Rotolo remembers the little moments that sheds light on the Artist as a Young Man: the sweet love letters, the nights of cigarettes, coffee and conversation, and his confident, burning ambition.

But this book is more than "Bob More...

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Jul 14, 2011

John rated it:

I enjoyed this book. The title is accurate. Despite the fact that Suze Rotolo was Bob Dylan's girlfriend, its not a Dylan book. It's an understated story about a young woman in a certain place in a certain period of time. This book filled in some of the gaps of my understanding of the sentiments and reactions from the early 60's.

The book is a very easy read, though the narrative is guilty of being bogged down in names in some places, and not being sufficiently grounded in time refer More...

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Sep 30, 2008

Douglas rated it:

A fabulous book illustrating how we should all be grateful to her for radicalising Dylan and demonstrating that she was a feminist before feminism. A page-turner and ends far too soon in her life.

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Jun 06, 2009

Billy rated it:

This was an enjoyable read. It covers much the same territory as Dave Van Ronk's recent memoir. But, of course, this one was written by Dylan's girlfriend of the time. (She's the one on the cover of "The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan.) There's some new insight into Dylan's rise in the early 60s, and insight into his personality, but, in many ways, Rotolo doesn't reveal much that is new. (In her defense, she seems to respect Dylan's privacy, or better said, the privacy of the relationship the More...

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Oct 20, 2009

Karen rated it:

As most people have stated her writing isn't the best, but once you get used to her run-ons and no use on puncuation in some instances it gets better. She also does jump around a lot in timelines.

This book reminded me a lot of "Popism" the book that Andy Warhol and Pat Hackett co-wrote with the amount of name dropping and stories about other people involved in the folk movement during the early 1960's. It took me a little while to get into "A Freewheelin' Time" b More...

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Sep 27, 2011

Noel rated it:

I really enjoyed this book. Suzs Rotolo's memoir of Greenwich Village in the early '60s when she was Dylan's girlfriend and muse. She was a key figure in his political education - both her parents were communists. She is pictured on the cover of his second albumn - The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan - an iconic shot taken on McDougal St in NYC in 1962. She gives a really good account of the characters in the Village at that time, including the Clancy Brothers and the Whitehorse Tavern and Brendan Beha More...

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Jan 01, 2009

Paula rated it:

Suze Rotolo, Bob Dylan's girlfriend in the early 60's, offers an insightful perspective into the music, politics and life of the early 1960's in New York's Greenwich Village. She successfully accomplished her goal of capturing "the emotional truth that defined the experience" as she related her coming of age in the 60's story. We learn of her upbringing as a "red-diaper" baby in Queens, are exposed to intimate details of her years with Bob Dylan, and get a real sense of the V More...

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May 05, 2011

Nick rated it:

Okay, I'm nostalgic about the Sixties. I enjoyed this memoir of Greenwich Village in the early 1960's--despite the cover photo and Rotolo's well-known status as Bob Dylan's girlfriend at the time, she writes about so much more than Dylan. This book covers, among other things, the Red Scare and its effect on left-wing families; the folk revival; experimental theater; the Cuban Revolution and the ban on travel to Cuba; and Rotolo's childhood and early adulthood. It's very engaging, and near the More...

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Jul 23, 2011

David rated it:

This book is a bit disappointing. It was more about the history of folk music in the Village in the 60's and 70's than a book about the author's relationship with Bob Dylan. If you don't know much about folk music, you may get a little lost with all the names mentioned. I wanted more on Dylan and his early career. But it had some positive elements. Hearing about the Village before it was overrun with investment bankers, hipsters and Marc Jacobs makes you realize how much the Village has bee More...

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May 25, 2009

JanOMalleycat rated it:

Don't read this book expecting dish on Bob Dylan. Suze Rotolo rises above that. This book is just what the subtitle purports: a history of a time (the early sixties) and a place (Greenwich Village). Rotolo was more than a "singer's chick" and she provides some interesting insight on that role. Unlike Pattie Boyd in Wonderful Tonight, Rotolo was uncomfortable in the role of muse and unconditional support to her man. She excuses no misbehavior by citing his talent or his demons. Rotolo's More...

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Mar 06, 2011

Tressa rated it:

This was an interesting read, but I felt that Ms. Rotolo was holding back too much. And as other reviewers mention, the writing is somewhat disjointed; there were times I thought the story was moving into the future, and she'd be back in the past telling another anecdote.

I did enjoy learning the story behind some of Dylan's more famous songs, but I wish there had been more about Bob and Suze's life together. I have always been under the impression that Suze was a trust-fund baby, bu More...

3 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jun 02, 2011

Megan rated it:

Although it’s written by one of Bob Dylan’s ex-girlfriends, this book isn’t really about him. It’s more about the author’s life in Greenwich Village in the early 1960’s. Dylan was her first serious boyfriend so he does factor in a lot and it’s very early in his career, which is interesting. They break up once he gets famous, but she’s very dignified about it and never says anything cruel about him. Instead, she describes how she forges her own life as an artist, lives in Italy for a while, and e More...

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Apr 04, 2011

Carmen rated it:

An interesting snapshot of the emerging folk music and alternative lifestyle scene in lower Manhattan on the cusp of the counter-culture revolution - from the perspective of Bob Dylan's one-time muse and girlfriend. The somewhat stilted narrative jumps around quite a bit, but the author's reflections on her Italian ancestors, her red diaper upbringing, the Village before it became forbiddingly expensive, and her first-hand recollections of the genesis of a lot of influential music make for a som More...

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Jun 09, 2010

Nikkiana rated it:

I didn't really have many expectations when I picked up this book other than I tend to be inexplicably drawn to memoirs and tidbits of history having to do with New York City in the 1960s. I wasn't really expecting to be reading the memoir of Bob Dylan's ex-girlfriend so it was more like a pleasant surprise to me.

As I was perusing some of the other reviews, I was noticing some harsh criticisms of her writing style... which I will give isn't terribly polished, but I liked it that way More...

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Jul 30, 2011

Vannessa rated it:

I bought this book from an old book store in Greenwich Village. I was so estatic to have bought a book from a place I had dreamt of going my whole life. It was my first trip to NYC and it was the best vacation I had ever had (even to this day). I was also excited about visiting Greenwich Village because I'm also an avid music fan and the history there is phenemonal. This book paints a really realistic and poignant times of life in the sixties in Greenwich. I found myself feeling like I was there More...

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Aug 25, 2009

Dana rated it:

It would have been alright if it wasn't full of so much clutter. Sentences were mostly of the run-on variety...and strangely phrased.

Rotolo also tends to riddle her writing with subtle Dylan references that end up sounding corny instead of poetic...like "we were both overly sensitive and needed shelter from the storm" or "Dylan was a painter searching for his palette." Also, how many times can you use "freewheelin'" as an adjective to describe yourself More...

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Jul 26, 2011

Lizzie rated it:

I was interested in this one as a New York book instead of as a Bob Dylan book. I, of course, really like stories about how people lived in the city during a remote time. (A broad definition -- I figure a lot of the ways people are living in it right now are remote, too, without literary intervention.) And uh, I have almost never listened to Bob Dylan, let alone revered his origin legend, so. Suze writing a book about her own life is a good idea by me.

She does a pretty good job of expl More...

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Sep 05, 2008

Amanda rated it:

It's nice for a woman known only as a rock star's girlfriend to have her moment, to tell her side of the story. In this case it's about hearing her voice for the first time. Suze Rotolo appeared with boyfriend Bob Dylan on his second album cover and then became the girl he dumped for Joan Baez.

There's more to her of course: she was the daughter of Italian immigrants who were active Communists for a time. Rotolo became active in art, theater, and activism while growing up in Queens. More...

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Aug 02, 2008

Jenny.p rated it:

Horribly mediocre. If the first rule of writing is "show, not tell", Rotolo ignored this one. She gives a completely flat, and long list of people and places that is meant to stand as a story. Despite the rich subject matter and grand potential nothing really comes alive. The things that speak the loudest are the archival materials that she scatters throughout the text, not her voice. Mostly, it is the tension of wanting to write a memoir about herself and her inability to negotiate More...

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Jul 19, 2008

Cavett rated it:

Suze Rotolo's recently published memoir tells what it felt like to make art and political theater in seminal 60s Greenwich Village when rents were cheap and love was free. Best known as young Bob Dylan's teenaged girlfriend, Rotolo chronicles what it was like to witness Dylan's epic path to fame during New York's progression in the 1960s from beatnik to Beatledom.

When I heard on NPR about this book being thoughtfully written and chivalrous from a feminine perspective rather than More...

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Apr 28, 2009

Robert rated it:

This is a really good read--whether for a look back at the early folk scene in Greenwich Village (starring Bob Dylan, of course) or for a casual history of that still important time that spawned the "youth movement" in the U.S.
The hook to read this book is that it is written by Bob Dylan's girlfriend during his early career. But soon into the book, the reader realizes that it is not going to be a tell-all about the famous singer with anecdote after anecdote exposing More...

1 comment like (1 person liked it)

Jul 05, 2008

Geeta rated it:

I suppose the die hard Dylan fans amongst you will want to read this, but so far I'm finding it kind of dull. I'm still in the early pages, but I'm surprised. I'm a huge fan of Joyce Johnson's Minor Characters, and Hettie Jones' How I Became Hettie Jones, and I was hoping this would be just as good. We'll see.

Update: I didn't finish it. I had to return it to the library, and felt no urgency to finish it by the due date, which I think reflects the lack of urgency in both the writ More...

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