'Oh, the streets of Rome are filled with rubble..."

The beautiful images of Europe in Bob Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece" are just some of the most iconic and direct images ever created in a Bob Dylan song, in my opinion.

You may or may not know that that I adore the song “When I Paint My Masterpiece” and the scenes of Europe in the song are not just beautiful, but it is a very descriptive song. When you think about it, not a lot of stuff actually happens to the narrator themselves, they are an observer. When he opens the song, he does not actually physically do anything. Instead, he just describes the scene to us, as if speaking straight to us in the second person referral he uses to address us. It is as if Bob Dylan is setting the scene, but he will not stick around long before the action actually kicks in.

“Oh, the streets of Rome are filled with rubble

Ancient footprints are everywhere

You can almost think that you're seein' double

On a cold, dark night on the Spanish Stairs…”

When the action does start, it seems like he is either on these ‘Spanish Stairs’ or he is somewhere else because he has to return to his hotel room. Note: he does not actually do this, it is told to us that it is going to happen. The only action than the narrator commits to doing is in perspective, it does not actually happen there and then because the description is written in present tense and it would not have been possible to do so without the narrator explaining the change in where he is:

“Got to hurry on back to my hotel room

Where I've got me a date with Botticelli's niece

She promised that she'd be right there with me

When I paint my masterpiece…”

Then, the tense changes again. We go from present to future to past. When the narrator discusses ‘dodging lions and wasting time’ he sees that the past things that he has done does not gain warrant to talk about for too long. Instead, he covers the fact that he cannot stand to see the ‘lions’. This suggests conflict but again, nothing is actually happening:

“Oh, the hours I've spent inside the Coliseum

Dodging lions and wastin' time

Oh, those mighty kings of the jungle, I could hardly stand to see 'em

Yes, it sure has been a long, hard climb…”

And then, again it goes back to the present tense as if everything in the previous verse was like a dream narrative in which the narrator is actually just lying down on his ben, in his hotel room, thinking about this. “As the daylight hours do retreat…” suggests that this is happening at night-time and again, suggests that the narrator is actually dreaming up the previous verse.

“Train wheels runnin' through the back of my memory

As the daylight hours do retreat

Someday, everything is gonna be smooth like a rhapsody

When I paint my masterpiece…”

This is where the volta is now, because we go from talking about Rome to talking about Brussels. But then again, we have a past tense narrative which suggests something about the previous present tense paragraphs - either this is a story, or he is actually somewhere else entirely. “Nobody tried to hide…” suggests that we are about to get some sporadic characters which in Rome, we do not get at all. In Rome, he is all alone except for the perspective niece of Botticelli.

“I left Rome and landed in Brussels

With a picture of a tall oak tree by my side

Clergymen in uniform and young girls pullin' muscles

Everyone was there but nobody tried to hide…”

But, this is kind of a sad song as well because we get the feeling that the narrator has travelled the continent of Europe and yet still has not ‘painted his masterpiece’. He has not gained the inspiration to do so yet even though he has been everywhere and seen everything.

“Newspapermen eating candy

Had to be held down by big police

Someday, everything is gonna be different

When I paint my masterpiece…”

This is basically showing us that the narrator has seen and experienced all of these things in a short space of time and even though, he has a picture of a tree with him for inspiration as well, he still cannot think of something to do for his masterpiece.

All in all, the song is a brilliant reference to inspiration and how travel can and cannot inspire the artistic senses. Bob Dylan again, is a genius.