Dylan Smiles !

Dylan Smiles !

In this photo from video supplied by CBS, Bob Dylan smiles during an interview on Nov. 19, 2004, in Northampton, Mass., to be aired

Sunday Dec.5, 2004, on CBS's '60 Minutes'
magazine television show.(AP Photo/CBS)
Fri Dec 3, 2:35 PM ET Yahoo! News

Bob Dylan Says He's Not a Prophet

Bob Dylan's songs may have spoken for a generation
in the 1960s, but he never saw himself as more than
a singer-songwriter. "`You're the prophet.
You're the savior.' I never wanted to be a prophet or
a savior," Dylan tells Ed Bradley on CBS' "60 Minutes."

"Elvis maybe. I could see myself becoming him,"
Dylan says. "But prophet? No."

The idea of such a perception made him feel like
an "impostor," he says. "It was like being in an
Edgar Allan Poe story and you're just not that
person everybody thinks you are, though they
call you that all the time."

He added, "If you examine the songs I don't believe
you're going to find anything in there that says that
I'm a spokesman for anybody or anything, really."

One of Dylan's songs, "Like a Rolling Stone,"
was recently named the top song of all-time
by Rolling Stone magazine.

"No other pop song has so thoroughly challenged
and transformed the commercial laws and artistic
conventions of its time, for all-time," wrote senior
editor David Fricke.

But it's an honor Dylan downplays.

"You know, the list, they change names....
quite frequently, really. I don't pay much attention
to that," says the 63-year-old singer, who recently
published his memoir, "Chronicles: Volume One."

The interview is Dylan's first TV
interview in 19 years, CBS said.
Sunday Dec.5, 2004, on CBS's '60 Minutes'