I always knew that sooner or later there would come somebody like Woody Guthrie who could make a great song every week. Dylan certainly had a social agenda, but he was such a good poet that most of his attempts were head and shoulders above things that I and others were trying to do. ... If I had an address, I'd send him a birthday card saying, 'keep on going.'

Like most teachers, I'm just another sower of seeds.

Some may find them merely diverting melodies. Others may find them incitements to Red revolution. And who will say if either or both is wrong? Not I.

Any idiot can be complicated. It takes a genius to be simple.

You'd be surprised how many stupid mistakes I've made. I make stupid mistakes all the time, and some of them have been very big stupid mistakes.

But if by some freak of history communism had caught up with this country, I would have been one of the first people thrown in jail.

If there is a world here in a hundred years, it's going to be saved by tens of millions of little things.