What Makes a Classic?

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Related Books:


Like a Rolling Stone: Bob Dylan at the Crossroads
(Greil Marcus)

Specimen Days: A Novel
(Michael Cunningham)

Lolita
(Vladimir Nabokov)

Rereadings: Seventeen Writers Revisit Books They Love

Related Films:


Psycho
(Gus Van Sant)

Incidental Music:

Like A Rolling Stone
(Bob Dylan)
Come Una Pietra Scalciata ('Like A Rolling Stone') (Remix 2003)
(Articolo 31)
Psycho (A Narrative for Orchestra)
(London Philharmonic Orchestra, Bernard Herrmann, conductor)
Herrmann
(Arling & Cameron)
The Kiss
(Philip Glass)
Dead Things
(Philip Glass)
A Little Library Music/Going to a Show
(Jon Brion)
Rereadings
11.12.2006
 (was 11.13.2005)

What makes a classic?  Well, for one thing, it’s got to have some staying power.  The Bob Dylan song, “Like A Rolling Stone,” certainly fits the bill. It was recorded forty years ago but it’s still considered by many to be the greatest pop single ever made.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, Greil Marcus tells us what makes “Like A Rolling Stone” a classic.  Also...“Lolita,” “Leaves of Grass” and “Psycho.”

  1. Greil Marcus on "Like a Rolling Stone"

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    Greil Marcus explains why Bob Dylan's "Like a Rolling Stone" was an anthem for the sixties and a critical turning point for Dylan as an artist.

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  2. Doug Gordon on a "Psycho" Remake

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    Doug Gordon reports on Gus Van Sant’s efforts to re-make the classic 1960 Alfred Hitchcock film, “Psycho.”

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  3. Michael Cunningham on "Specimen Days"

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    Michael Cunningham won the Pulitzer Prize for his novel “The Hours,” which re-imagined the life and death of Virginia Woolf. His new novel is called “Specimen Days” and involves Walt Whitman.

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  4. Steve Paulson Reports on "Lolita"

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    Steve Paulson reports on the controversy and continuing influence of Vladimir Nabokov’s scandalous novel “Lolita.”

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  5. Anne Fadiman on "Rereadings"

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    Anne Strainchamps talks with Anne Fadiman about her book “Rereadings: Seventeen Writers Revisit Books They Love.”

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