Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
The Schmooze

Don’t Feel Bad, Jonah Lehrer. Dylan Lied Too.

Well, the verdict is already in on Jonah Lehrer, the New Yorker writer who has admitted to making up Bob Dylan quotes for his book Imagine. The sentence has been meted out too, actually by Lehrer himself in the form of his resignation from the magazine. But inventing Dylan quotes seems to be far from the worst crime a journalist could commit, and if Lehrer’s ever looking for an advocate, he might find a good one in Dylan himself, hardly the world’s greatest spokesman for truth. Some words on Mr. Lehrer’s behalf courtesy of Mr. Dylan.

“Life is more or less a lie, but then again that’s exactly the way we want it to be.” (Chronicles, Volume 1)

“What did I owe the rest of the world? Nothing. Not a damn thing. The press? I figured you lie to it.” (Chronicles, Vol. 1)

“All the truth in the world adds up to one big lie.” (Things Have Changed)

The truth is far from you, so you know you got to lie” (Trouble in Mind)

“Don’t trust me to tell you the truth when the truth may only be ashes and dust.” (Trust Yourself)

“The truth is only fiction, and fiction’s only a lie.” (Stormy Season)

Actually, we made up that last one, but it sure sounds like something Bob would say. Making up Dylan quotes turns out to be surprisingly tempting.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

With your support, we’ll be ready for whatever 2025 brings.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.