Below is an excerpt from the book “John Prine: In Spite of Himself” by Eddie Huffman (published in 2015). The excerpt relates to an event that was held at the Coolidge Auditorium in the U.S. Library of Congress in March 2005 that featured Prine and U.S. poet laureate Ted Kooser. At the event, Kooser asked Prine about which singer-songwriters Prine was listening to and liking particularly:
“He [Prine] also talked to Kooser about his favorite songwriters, naming Dylan, Van Morrison, Kristofferson and Gordon Lightfoot: “I been listening to a lot of Gordon Lightfoot lately. I always knew Gordon Lightfoot was a really great songwriter, but his stuff sounds better and better and better all the time. It’s just really so good; some of it sounds like that’s what should be in a dictionary next to a really good contemporary folk song, is a Gordon Lightfoot song.””
Here is a link to an 87-minute video of the event ("A Literary Evening with John Prine and Ted Kooser" - Library of Congress - March 9, 2005):
https://www.loc.gov/item/webcast-3677/. At 52:15, Kooser asks Prine about which singer-songwriters Prine was listening to and liking particularly. Prine talks about Lightfoot from 52:43 to 53:10.