edge. It also had the ideal chorus for the lyrics." Literary critic Christopher Ricks considers the song to be "one of Dylan's greatest" and the recording on The Times They Are A-Changin' to be "perfect". He devotes an entire chapter to it, analyzing both the meaning as well as the prosody in his book on Dylan's songs as poetry. "But here is a song that could not be written better." Dylan's song ("The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll") contains at least two inaccuracies. Zantzinger was not booked for first degree murder, but for second degree murder. Dylan also misspells and mispronounces Zantzinger's surname as "Zanzinger". Impact on Zantzinger After serving his sentence for manslaughter, Zantzinger returned to running the farm in Charles County and began selling real estate. He moved to more urban Waldorf, Maryland, still within Charles County. Eventually he moved to a home in Port Tobacco, where he lived throughout the 1990s until moving to a new home in St. Mary's County around 2001 in Chaptico, Maryland, called Bachelor's Hope. In addition to federal tax delinquencies, Zantzinger fell more than $18,000 behind on county taxes on properties he owned in two Charles County communities called Patuxent Woods and Indian Head, shanties he leased to poor blacks. In 1986, the same year the IRS ruled against him, Charles County confiscated those properties. Nonetheless, Zantzinger continued to collect rents, raise rents, and even successfully prosecute his putative tenants for back rent. In June 1991, Zantzinger was initially charged with a single count of "deceptive trade practices." After some delay, Zantzinger pleaded guilty to 50 misdemeanor counts of unfair and deceptive trade practices. He was sentenced to 19 months in prison and a $50,000 fine. Some of his prison sentence was served in a work release program. In 2001, Zantzinger discussed the song with Howard Sounes for Down the Highway, the Life of Bob Dylan. He dismissed the song as a "total lie" and claimed "It's actually had no effect upon my life", but expressed scorn for Dylan, saying, "He's a no-account son of a bitch; he's just like a scum of a scum bag of the earth. I should have sued him and put him in jail." William "Billy" Zantzinger died in Charlotte Hall, Maryland, on January 3, 2009, at the age of 69. See also List of Bob Dylan songs based on earlier tunes References Sources Frazier, Ian, "Legacy