Professor’s Poets of Rock and Roll book translated internationally for global market

Professor of Political Philosophy and International Relations, David Boucher is currently enjoying an international renaissance of his book Dylan and Cohen: Poets of Rock and Roll.

The book was first published in 2005, the research for which was funded by the AHRC, and has been continuously in print. However, since the death of Leonard Cohen and the Nobel Prize for literature being awarded to Bob Dylan in 2016, interest in the book has peaked.

The book had previously been translated into Japanese, Chinese, Serbian and Italian and has now been translated into Spanish for the e-book Latin American market, a paperback published in Mexico and a new Polish edition.

When asked what inspired the book, Professor Boucher said, “Both men were iconic figures in my youth and hailed as the greatest poets of their generation, yet their work was very different. I set out to write about how we should understand them in the context of the politics of the 1950s and 1960s, and as exponents of different genres of poetic writing.”

“Their appeal has endured for over five decades because of their immense personal presence, or charisma, and their transformation of the popular song into an elevated art form, appealing to new audiences from generation to generation.”

Professor Boucher’s research of both singers is part of his on-going commitment to the politics of popular culture, the most recent manifestations of which are a number of articles that he written on Bob Dylan, The Beats and Dylan Thomas.

To read more by Professor Boucher on Cohen and Dylan his posts Sincerely L. Cohen and No Reason to Get Excited are available on the British Academy Blog.