Writer and filmmaker Nora Ephron died in New York City earlier today. She was 71. Ephron is probably best known for her Academy Award nominated screenplays - Silkwood, When Harry Met Sally... and Sleepless in Seattle.
Ephron was born five days before Robert Zimmerman. In 1965, she interviewed Bob Dylan, and the following year broke the news in the United States that he had secretly wed.
Dylan was reportedly interviewed by Ephron and Susan Edmiston in late summer, 1965, at the office of his manager Albert Grossman, soon after Dylan played an electric set at Forest Hills. Here are a few choice quotes:
Q: Some American folk singers--Carolyn Hester, for example--say that what you're now doing, the new sound, "folk rock," is liberating them.
A:Did Carolyn say that? You tell her she can come around and see me any time now that she's liberated.
Q: The definition most often given of folk rock is the combination of the electronic sound of rock and roll with the meaningful lyrics of folk music? Does that sum up what you're doing?
A:Yes. It's very complicated to play with electricity. You play with other people. You're dealing with other people. Most people don't like to work with other people, it's more difficult. It takes a lot. Most people who don't like rock and roll can't relate to other people.
Q: Do you consider yourself primarily a poet?
A:No. We have our ideas about poets. The word doesn't mean any more than the word "house." There are people who write poems and people who write poems. Other people write poems. Everybody who writes poems do you call them a poet? There's a certain kind of rhythm in some kind of way that's visible. You don't necessarily have to write to be a poet. Some people work in gas stations and they're poets. I don't call myself a poet because I don't like the word. I'm a trapeze artist.
It also featured other famous quotes, including "Chaos is a friend of mine. It's like I accept him, does he accept me" and "Queen Jane is a man."
The interview was published in 1972's Bob Dylan: A Retrospective, edited by Craig McGregor, and the exchange has been archived online. It is unclear if the interview was published in 1965.
Dylan married his first wife Sara on November 22, 1965, in a private civil ceremony. According to Robert Shelton in his book No Direction Home, the ceremony was a well kept secret until the British music paper Melody Maker reported the news at the end of the year. Ephron broke the story in the February 9, 1966, issue of the New York Post, with the headline, "HUSH! BOB DYLAN IS WED."
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