That 49-year-old Srinivas Reddy adores Bob Dylan—the enigmatic singer-songwriter who turns 85 this Sunday—does not come as a surprise. Apart from being a scholar and author of several books, Reddy is also an acclaimed musician. Currently teaching at Pune’s Nayanta University, his resume includes past stints at Brown University, UC Berkeley, and IIT Gandhinagar, where he taught South Asian Literature, History, and Culture. He also performs at concerts. He opened for the legendary Joan Baez in 1999.
“My first vivid memory of Dylan is when a classmate performed The Times They Are A-Changin’ in history class at school. I was blown away,” Reddy said. “They were simple words, not necessarily profound, but it was that simple truth which cut right through. He is not a great voice, and he isn’t especially gifted with the guitar. But his music somehow transcends those technical boundaries to an elevation not seen very often. As a musician, I believe that’s possible because, for him, music was just another medium to be.”
But then there’s 25-year-old Aravind, who has just wrapped up a Master’s in Society and Culture from IIT Gandhinagar, and loves Dylan like Reddy (perhaps even more), which could surprise some of us. But then not really.
“The idea that you can commit to something even when the critical mass is against you, while being completely at ease with yourself—that is what Dylan means to me,” Aravind said. “An unflinching commitment to originality, backed by a solid conviction in yourself.”
Because Dylan reinvented himself so many times, he simply cannot become irrelevant. He is adored by the angsty college-goer, the lovesick 20-something-year-old, and the existential fifty-year-old, all at the same time. This cycle repeats itself, generation after generation. As a result, he continues to be, through his work and quite simply through the act of being Bob Dylan, the balm that a perpetually disturbed human condition needs to get by everyday life.
For Gen Z, some qualities have an allure: A certain indifference (or “nonchalance”, as it’s called now). A distorted sense of being Zen, thinly disguised as detachment toward whatever is happening around us. And the art of not giving away too much. Not revealing it all. Holding something back.
This ethos may be in vogue in 2026, and a blueprint that many of us pretend to be prototypes of (and often fail miserably at). But Dylan did it before it was cool. And he did it without the convolutions and the public proclamations. Or the veil of pretense. And he didn’t fail.
“He set the template,” Aravind said. “Dylan has all the attributes to be a Gen Z heartthrob: he is the intelligent, talented, aloof, prophet-rockstar poet, a man full of mystery and charisma—all backed up with an unprecedented body of work.”
The original fandom
Dylan’s refusal to subscribe to the expectations and norms of being for an artist of his stature only adds to his legend. He was pedestalised from the get-go, while simultaneously being the biggest critic of that act. His rejection of the limelight, his very public indifference to the 2016 Nobel Prize for Literature (and the debate that followed) and antics such as going electric on that fateful day in Newport in 1965 – in the face of heavy backlash – all combine to sustain a relevance that simply endures.
“Dylan is a conduit, and his work is an act of looking back and recasting that vision into an emerging form,” says Aravind. An increasingly aware, well-read (or aspiring to be) Gen Z recognises the value in that.
Dylan’s appeal also endures because he, like all of us, is a man of idiosyncrasies. Except he, unlike most of us, wears them with ease. “With his nasal, almost a-melodious voice, he is very easy to caricature. That grants you relevance in pop culture by default,” Aravind said. Of course, in Dylan’s case, that is also married to a very unique talent.
Not many know this, but the active Dylan fan following predates the internet fandom boom. “Jonah Lehrer, who admitted to fabricating Dylan’s quotes for his 2012 book Imagine: How Creativity Works, was immediately pounced upon because Dylan’s fans are obsessed,” Aravind pointed out. “Taylor Swift’s fans today look for easter eggs in every move of hers. But Dylan fans were the pioneers.” It also helps that Dylan is the way he is: abstract, reticent, and way too self-assured to want to prove a point. There is just a perpetual sense that something more is waiting to be revealed, keeping fans permanently hooked.
Incidentally, Reddy, Aravind, and I watched Dylan’s recent biopic, A Complete Unknown, together.
“I’m so glad we went for the movie together,” Reddy said afterward. “That outing captured what Dylan’s work essentially is: the truth, working across time, space, and generations.”
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Every generation gets its own Bob Dylan
For instance, in the 1960’s, when he first shot to prominence, it was primarily because of his exploits in the revolutionary protest music scene of New York City, with the release of The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan (1963). An entire generation was raised on his prophecies, chronicles and a sense of disdain about the state of the world around. The angsty, college-going, fuming youth lapped it up, whose mood it beautifully complemented.
When the same generation grew slightly older, with many going through their first heartbreaks, Dylan dropped Blood on the Tracks (1975). This quintessential heartbreak album takes the listener through the entire gamut of what the heart is capable of, plumbing depths that one didn’t even know existed.
After his much-publicised conversion to Christianity, and in bursts through the 1990s, fans saw yet another avatar of Dylan. With Slow Train Coming (1979) and Time Out of Mind (1997), Dylan dished out some of music’s most profound expressions on existentialism, morality, and the human condition.
Thus, the same generation that discovered him in their late teens and 20s rediscovered him a few years later, and yet again a few years later, each time in a completely new light.
And so, the Reddys of the world continue to jam to Dylan’s hits in the college cafeteria with students, year after year, generation after generation.
The times are always a-changing, but one thing remains constant: Bob Dylan’s irresistible cross-generational appeal.
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