Bob Dylan Is The Only Person In The World To Hold This Achievement

Bob Dylan has been in the public eye since he recorded his self-titled first album in 1962 at 20-years-old (although it would take a few years for him to become a true hitmaker). In the following 60 years, he was heralded as the voice of his generation, derided as a sell-out, and proclaimed a literary genius. And in this latter category he's got the heavy-hitting accolades to back up that assertion. For many performers, receiving awards from the four biggies in entertainment — Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony (EGOT) — is a coveted achievement, and it's held by less than 30 people thus far.

While the EGOT is indeed an impressive achievement, Dylan has managed to earn a different set of awards putting him in a category all by himself. He's the only person to have received an Oscar, Grammy, Golden Globe, Pulitzer, and the Nobel Prize in literature. Not bad for a kid named Robert Zimmerman whose high-school dream was to be in Little Richard's band (Dylan did eventually get to perform with his rock 'n' roll hero).

Born in Duluth, Minnesota, in 1941, Bob Dylan picked up the guitar as a teenager and became entranced with folk music in college. He was so entranced he quit school, and drifted down to New York City in 1961, where he began performing at various Greenwich Village folk clubs. He changed his name from Robert Zimmerman to Bob Dylan in 1962. Dylan's first album raised his prestige in the folk scene, but it was "Like a Rolling Stone" from his 1965 album "Highway 61 Revisited" that pushed him into the mainstream.

Beginning in the 1970s, Dylan began seeing major recognition in the form of music awards, starting with several Grammy wins. But by the 2000s he had moved into a whole other level with the kind of honors bestowed on such hugely important fellow musicians as Duke Ellington and illustrious writers like Ernest Hemingway. Now in his 80s, Dylan has released more than 50 albums, continues to tour, and will likely continue to rack up even more plaudits.

Bob Dylan was first nominated for a Grammy way back in 1962 for his first album, but didn't have his first win until 1973 for his contribution to the album "The Concert for Bangladesh." The 1971 concerts and subsequent album were the brainchild of former Beatle George Harrison and Indian sitarist Ravi Shankar and raised millions of dollars for impoverished Bengali refugees. Dylan's first solo Grammy didn't come for another six years, when he won for best rock vocal performance, male for "Gotta Serve Somebody" in 1979. He would eventually be nominated more than 30 times over the years and win a total of 10 of the prestigious music awards.

Then, in 2001, Dylan scored two major awards for his original song "Things Have Changed," which was written for and featured in the film "Wonder Boys." "Oh, good God. This is amazing," Dylan said when receiving the Oscar (via the Academy Awards). Dylan must have been especially proud of this honor. At his first concert after receiving the award, in Sydney, Australia, he performed the entire concert with the Oscar sitting atop his piano. That same year Dylan won a Golden Globe for the same song. But his biggest honors were still to come.

In 2008, the Pulitzer Prize Board bestowed a special citation on Bob Dylan for the musicians's "profound impact on popular music and American culture, marked by lyrical compositions of extraordinary poetic power." He joined the ranks of a select few other musical luminaries, including Jazz greats Thelonious Monk, and Duke Ellington, country legend Hank Williams — who received his award posthumously — and soul idol Aretha Franklin.

Eight years after receiving a Pulitzer, Dylan was given what is often considered an even more prestigious honor, the Nobel Prize for literature. It was the first time the Swedish Academy, which gives the award, honored a musician. Previous writers who have been so honored include John Steinbeck, Toni Morrison, and Ernest Hemingway. In Dylan's case it was "for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition" (per the organization).

The singer-songwriter has also received the highest civilian honor in the U.S. In 2012, President Barack Obama awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom. And let's not forget he's been in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame since 1988, one of the organization's earliest inductees. Dylan's reached such a level of acclaim that there isn't even an acronym, like EGOT, for all the awards and honors he's racked up. And he's still going.