AN OXFORD professor has hailed Bob Dylan the 'Tennyson of our times' after the star is awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

The American singer has become the first musician to be awarded the literature prize and has been praised by literary figures.

University of Oxford chairman of the English faculty Professor Seamus Perry dubbed the 75-year-old 'one of the greats'.

He said: "He is, more than any other, the poet of our times, as Tennyson was of his, representative and yet wholly individual, humane, angry, funny, and tender by turn; really, wholly himself, one of the greats."

English poet Alfred Tennyson was often regarded as the poet representative of the Victorian age.

The singer was given the accolade for "having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition".

The last American to have won the literature prize was author Toni Morrison in 1993.

The decision has not been well-received in all corners, with Trainspotting author Irvine Welsh labelling it an 'ill conceived nostalgia award'.

He tweeted: "I'm a Dylan fan, but this is an ill conceived nostalgia award wrenched from the rancid prostates of senile, gibbering hippies."

The musician was born Robert Zimmerman on May 24, 1941, in Minnesota before he reinvented himself as Bob Dylan.

He is considered one of the greatest lyricists of modern times having penned memorable hits such as Blowin' In The Wind and The Times They Are A-Changin'.

Permanent Secretary at the Swedish Academy, Sara Danius, said: "He is a great poet in the English-speaking tradition, and he is a wonderful sampler, a very original sampler, he embodies the tradition.

"And for 54 years now he's been at it and re-inventing himself constantly, creating a new identity."

The six Nobel prizes will be handed out at a ceremony on December 10, which will mark the 120th anniversary of the death of the founder of the prize, Alfred Nobel, in 1896.