A collection of love letters written by Bob Dylan have revealed lots of potential stage names that he might have chosen. Choosing a stage name is a difficult job. Every artist with a stage name today has suffered from this ailing circumstance.
Before Bob Dylan became Bob Dylan, seems like he had a bunch of names that he wanted to go by. And according to The Boston Globe, an unparalleled amount of love letters written by teenage Dylan have fetched $670000 USD at an auction.
It is revealed that Dylan wrote the letter when he was just 16 years old. And it was for his school sweetheart Barbara Hewitt. Looks like they shared a history class and Dylan told her his dream of being a musician and selling records.
In his love letter, he revealed his potential nicknames like ‘Stumpy Dick’ and ‘Stubby Johnson’. Also, he’s written about him being ‘Little Willie’. It was on a letter that saw Dylan inviting Hewitt to a Buddy Holly concert. He made a fictional band with the text that read, “‘Little’ Willie, lead singer of the Night Gales.”
The letters were discovered by Hewitt’s daughter. That’s when she decided to put them up for auction at Boston’s RR Auction House and was won by Portuguese bookshop Livraria Lello. The vice president of RR Auction House explained, “Nothing like this exists anywhere.” He also added,
“In several letters, he talks about changing his name. He’s getting rid of Bob Zimmerman. It’s the formative years of Bob Zimmerman transforming into Bob Dylan, the beginning of the Bob Dylan myth. He’s talking about the clothes he’s wearing, making fun of [classmates], talks about doo-wop, about changing his name to ‘Little Willie.’”