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 enlarge | Author: Suze Rotolo
Publisher: Broadway
Category: Book
List Price: $22.95
Buy New: $13.61
You Save: $9.34 (41%)
New (29) from $13.61
Avg. Customer Rating:  22 reviews
Sales Rank: 16525
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 384
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.1
Dimensions (in): 8.4 x 5.8 x 1.5
ISBN: 0767926870
Dewey Decimal Number: 782.42164092
EAN: 9780767926874
ASIN: 0767926870
Publication Date: May 13, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
 Interesting stuff, writing was often flat, still: Recommended July 1, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
This book is for the most part, but not entirely, about the time that Rotolo was lovers with Bob Dylan. She's an interesting person so I was also interested in the stories about her time in Italy, her life as an artist, her upbringing as a working class red diaper baby, her experiences in Greenwich Village, the people she knew in the folksinging world there in the Village. Then, of course, there's Dylan. Interesting stuff. However, her writing was often flat and the ending was disappointing. She skips chunks of time. I would have liked to know more about her evolution as an artist and the ways she may have struggled to keep being a creative person.
I do recommend it to those of you who are interested in that period of time and Greenwich Village.
 An evocative look at the early-to-middle 1960's youth movement in the U.S.that may surprise you. June 25, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
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 Dylan's life at this very crucial stage. So, should the reader continue? I wasn't sure if it would be worth the time investment to hear Suze Rotolo's story. I did continue on and am I glad I did. What we have here is the story of the '60's by a remarkable, sensitive, intelligent,loyal girl who refused to be swallowed up by the cult of celebrity worship so prevalent in our society today. Yes, it was certainly alluring for her to be Dylan's girlfriend--with all of its glamour and power-- but she knew that she would lose her soul and never discover her own self-worth if she were to remain with him, despite being in love with him (and he her).
Rotolo writes in a breezy style with the vernacular of the early sixties. She captures well what is like to be a teen/young adult during any epoch and adds the specifics of the turbulent sixties. A long list of characters(most from the folk and music scene) make an appearance in this story: Dave Van Ronk, Ian and Sylvia, Joan Baez, Trini Lopez, Phil Ochs, John Hammond, Jerry Rubin, Raul and Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, Ramblin Jack Elliott to mention a few.
My favorite anecdote in the book is a short one that reveals a most endearing quality of Rotolo. Speaking to an audience in Cuba just after the Revolution, she tells them that she is alienated with the constant use of the terms the proletariat, blue-collar workers stating that she was the only one among the American speakers who was actually from a blue-collar background. "My father,who had worked in a factory, never referred to himself as 'a proletariat'."
Highly recommended for those who were young during this period, or anyone interested in the genesis and milieu of the young Dylan and his art.
Fabulous! June 24, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Great book! Fabulous! The author really catches the time, the move from a black/white world to one of color and an array of choices. Her own story intertwined with that of Dylan's is well written. Her writting style, vocabulary and personal insight make this a must read.
For Interested Parties Only June 17, 2008
6 out of 8 found this review helpful
I've always had a fascination with the folk movement centered in Greenwich Village in the early 60s, especially the incredible rise of Bob Dylan in that milieu. So, when I heard that Suze Rotolo, Dylan's girlfriend from that era, had written a book about her experiences during that time, I quickly placed my order. My feeling on completing it was that she is too guarded and careful here. She admits she doesn't want to upset Mr. Dylan and I also think that she doesn't wish to reveal too much of herself. Not that I wanted more dirt. I just wanted to know more things like what it felt like to have your famous boyfriend write and record a song lambasting your mother and sister (Ballad in Plain D). Yes, we do learn she had "mixed feelings" about the occurrence but I kinda coulda guessed that. She is too understanding when she hears from a third party about Bob's career-enhancing affair with Joan Baez. Come on Suze, go ahead and call him a two-timing [...]! Ms. Rotollo is careful to focus mostly on her life and not Bob's. Even though she has not achieved anywhere near the kind of things Dylan has, this could have worked if she had bared her soul. She describes some wacky dead ends she's taken (e.g. macrobiotic diet) but she does it with out tying it back to any flaws of her own. Suze seems like a lovely person, reminiscent of many of my best friends over the years. Fanatic that I am, I'm not at all sorry for having read her book and would suggest the same to like-minded folks. Just don't expect too much. Not to compare, but Dylan's own memoir "Chronicles Part I" stands on its own for anyone to read. Suze's book is for interested parties only.
A Long-Missing Voice Is Finally Heard June 15, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
Unless (like me) you are more than a casual fan of the music of Bob Dylan, the name Suze Rotolo is unlikely to mean anything to you. Yet there she is, striding next to Dylan on a cold winter's day on the cover of his second, brilliant album, The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan, not a model hired by the record company but someone closely connected with Dylan at the time. A native of Queens, Rotolo was only 17 years old when she met Dylan shortly after his arrival in New York City in 1961, but her own recent migration to the neighborhoods of Greenwich Village was the result of a precocious, independent and artistic spirit and a maturity stimulated in no small part by her unusual childhood.
As Rotolo explains in "A Freewheelin' Time: A Memoir of Greenwich Village in the Sixties," she grew up as a "red diaper baby," the daughter of parents who were both active in the Communist Party and the labor movement from the 1930s through the 1950s, when her father died. Rotolo offers fond memories of her father, who did some work as a commercial artist and clearly served as an inspiration to his daughter with his overall commitment to a kind of cultural radicalism (including an affinity for music), even in the darkest days of the postwar Red Scare. The youngest of two daughters, Susan - who adopted the name Suze after migrating to the Village - found her home life increasingly stressful after her father's death as she was subjected to her mother's depressed mood swings and a somewhat bossy older sister. Striking out on her own, Rotolo carried with her an innate and strongly-held commitment to social justice and a proto-feminist consciousness that would grow stronger as time went on.
Until now, most of what we knew about Rotolo was the result of the work of Dylan biographers seeking insights into the nature of their relationship during Dylan's first two years in New York. The most common interpretation has assigned Rotolo the role of Dylan's most important early "muse," a woman who inspired his great political songs through her own passionate commitments to justice and peace and who also frustrated Dylan through her unwillingness to stay with him, a story Dylan told in his bitter "Ballad in Plain D," a song released in 1964. The key missing element in this research, however, was Rotolo's own voice. Until recently a very reluctant interview subject, Rotolo tells us she has always been an intensely private person and also wanted to protect Dylan's privacy, especially as his fame escalated far beyond the neighborhoods of downtown New York and became oppressive to both of them.
Rotolo's narrative takes us through her childhood, her education, her move to New York City and her relationship with Dylan, and her life after splitting with Dylan to the end of the 1960s when she left the Village for Italy. Along the way we learn about her efforts to forge an identity as an artist, working in the areas of illustration, theatre production and jewelry design while supporting herself in more mundane jobs. Once she relocated from Queens to Greenwich Village she adopted a bohemian lifestyle and became fast-acquainted with the people and places that made up the folk music scene, a process much-accelerated after she began her relationship with Dylan in 1961.
Rotolo confronts the "muse" interpretation both directly (by dismissing it) and indirectly, telling several stories about people in the New York folk music scene who viewed her in such terms and who demanded she continue to serve so their increasingly popular goose would continue to lay golden eggs. To her credit, Rotolo does not pretend to understand the mysteries of the songwriting process and refuses to cite herself as an influence on Dylan's songs during his early years. Yet simply by telling the story of their life together from 1961 to 1963 and of her own interests and activities it is clear Rotolo was a critical source for Dylan's work; and by refusing to subordinate herself to Dylan as his fame grew and as pressures to do so increased around her, she emerges as the kind of heroic outsider that Dylan has always tried to be while at the same time rejecting the sexist strictures of her time.
Rotolo is at her best when telling her own story, and she has a real flair for the economical use of detail when describing a scene or an event. Her several accounts of time spent with the musician Dave Van Ronk and his wife Terri Thal are among the most interesting sections of the book, providing new insights into these well-known figures of the Village. As the narrative reaches the dissolution of her relationship with Dylan, she exercises much restraint in recounting a painful time, which included Dylan's open affair with Joan Baez and an unwanted pregnancy that Rotolo ended by abortion. In an effort to provide some context for her story, Rotolo frequently inserts passages to give us a capsule history of the era but these are the weakest parts of the book: cluttered with cliches, they distract from the central narrative.
Without a doubt, "A Freewheelin' Time" is an important contribution to the already massive amount of material on Bob Dylan, having the special advantage of Rotolo's unique firsthand perspective on Dylan's early career. More than that, however, it's a plain-spoken, compelling memoir of a time and place too often obscured by mythology and media hype. It's good to have Suze's story in her own words.
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