Soical Evolution

Ginsberg and Burroughs grab the attention of their generation. Artists flock to New York, where the writers met. A different set follows the writers to San Francisco. These men however are not the settling kind. They are the modern day gypsies. They travel to where it's happening. This is the excuse used more often than not.

The reality is far less romantic. Burroughs is either outrunning drug charges or being subpoenaed for indecency. Ginsberg falls in love with San Francisco and fights his indecency charges from there. The others in the group are less than impressed by the bay area. A generation starts growing up on their works.

First the new genration encounters the Beatniks. The generation pre-Vietnam war has little identity. The Beatniks like the kids and vice-versa. Since the new generation is hip to the beatnik ways they are referred to as hip people or hipsters. This is shortened to hippy.( DISCovering U.S. History) This generation is not new or different they are merely the second generation of beatniks. The new generation is more optimistic. Instead of sitting in coffee houses talking about change they join groups and fight for social change. They accomplish what the beatniks would not. They make a counterculture.

It is said that the bible of the Hippies is 'On The Road'. The book covers four road trips. Mostly between New York and San Francisco. The offspring of the baby boomer generation see the text as a romantic adventure. Kerouac intends it to be a silly story for he and his friends. This is evidenced by his thin disguising of his fellow luminaries. Himself, Ginsberg, and Burroughs. The book highlights America's fascination with the road and automobile travel. Along the way we encounter hit-and-run romances, bop jazz, liquor, marijuana, all-night diners, and hitchhiking. (St James Press)

Critics blast the work. Going as far as to make Truman Capote quip that Kerouac's fiction was more typing than writing. Kerouac loves promoting the book. He tells stories of a 120 foot roll of teletype parchment, which is the backbone of the novel, typed mostly while high on Benzedrine.

Kerouac is the media darling of the beat movement. He is controversial without being offensive. Unlike his contemporaries he is not cited with indecency. His sexual exploits are tame compared with the sodomy that Burroughs and Ginsberg enjoy. He is revered by beatnik and hippie alike. Burroughs says of him, "Kerouac opened a million coffee bars and sold a million pairs of Levis to both sexes. Woodstock rises from his pages."(Hippy) .

Still he carries the title of both god and devil. While the hippies flock to San Francisco with the aid of his words, his words for them are not sweet. His last interview will be with Willaim F Buckley.


His death in 1969 at the age of 47 due to liver failure would begin the decline of both the beatniks and the hippies.





Source Citation: "Hippies and 1960s Counterculture." DISCovering U.S. History. Gale Research, 1997. Reproduced in History Resource Center. Farmington Hills, MI: Gale. http://ezp.tccd.edu:2055/servlet/HistRC/

Source Citation: "On the Road." St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture. 5 vols. St. James Press, 2000. Reproduced in History Resource Center. Farmington Hills, MI: Gale. http://ezp.tccd.edu:2055/servlet/HistRC/


http://www.hippy.com/hippyquotes.htm

The Beatniks Emerge

When we hear the word beatnik many things come to mind. First is the look. Dark clothes, beret, dark glasses, blue jeans. Throw a beard on the boys or give the girl long stringy hair. They hang out in coffee houses and play bongos while reciting poetry. They snap instead of clapping. Their speech is alien and requires a translator at times. They look like this:
[photobucket]

That is the stereotype I want to shatter. In actuality they looked like this:

[photobucket]

The man in the middle is Allen Ginsberg. In 1954 he moves from New York to San Francisco. There he meets his lifelong love Peter Orlovsky and his mentor William Carlos Williams. He also meets Michael McClure, who gives Ginsberg a reading for the newly-established "6" Gallery. The result is "The '6' Gallery Reading" which takes place on October 7, 1955. The event will be hailed as the birth of the Beat Generation, because it is also the first public reading of Ginsberg's Howl, a poem which will garner world-wide attention for him and the poets he associated with. The beatniks were born. [poets.org]

Everyone knows what a beatnik looks like but nobody takes the time to ask what a beatniks stands for. While it is true that Howl will "ignite a generation of middle-class Polyannas".[Martinez] This generation is actually following in the footsteps of the generations before them. For them however, it is illegal. Drugs, thanks to the FDA and DEA are now frowned upon. Artists and their followers abusing substances to reach beyond the limits of the sober imagination is as timeless as thought.

You are either hip or square. The squares follow the rules and conform to the rigid societal standards of the time. Beatniks stand for everything the squares hate. They believe in liberal ideals, free drug use, and love without rules. All this is centered around popular jazz and stand up poetry readings. According to the beats society is ill. They are years away from having enough people agreeing with them to really create a counter culture.[Cottom]

Works cited:
http://media.photobucket.com/image/beatnik/templestonepilot/beatnik.jpg

http://media.photobucket.com/image/allen%20ginsberg/stuffinjello/beatscorbis460.jpg?o=55

http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/8

http://ezp.tccd.edu:2358/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=19324271&loginpage=Login.asp&site=ehost-live&scope=site

http://ezp.tccd.edu:2358/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=17605539&loginpage=Login.asp&site=ehost-live&scope=site

What is a Beat

When studying American history and it's pop culture there is an obvious shift in the late 1940's. America is coming out of it's worst economic time. The generation that grew up during the great depression are now at the forefront. At this point everything is censored by churches and the people who considered themselves morally righteous enough. All forms of art are inspected for morally questionable content. This society demands conformity and 'decency'. Nothing less would tolerated.

During this time our leaders of the Beat movement meet in New York City. Columbia University to be precise. Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg attend the university along with Neal Cassidy. Lucien Carr introduces William Burroughs to Kerouac and Ginsberg. They begin collaborating. In 1946 Burroughs met Herbert Huncke while trying to sell him a firearm. These men constitute the bulk of the beat writers.

In a magazine interview Kerouac refers to his generation as the beat generation. Beat has nothing to do with music. It is a carny term for someone beaten down, poor, exhausted, at the bottom of the world. Burroughs is being published but could not be published in the United States due to decency laws. Kerouac has not yet found his voice. Ginsberg grabs the attention of the world first with his brilliant poem 'Howl'.



I will cover many events in the next posts that will be the shaping of this generation. Something very important has to happen first. Burroughs is picked up by an American publisher and they decided to release Naked Lunch on an unsuspecting American audience. The book is banned and the author is charged with indecency. The trial that follows will change the art world in America forever. Burroughs ultimate win and citing freedom of speech as his reason will blow the doors off censorship for good.

Source Citations:

Louis Menand. "Drive, He Wrote." New Yorker (Vol. 83, No. 29) Oct. 1 2007: 88-93. SIRS Renaissance. Web. 05 November 2009.

Anslinger, Harry. Statement. Tuesday Apr. 27, 1937. Hearings on H.R. 6385, Taxation of Marijuana, Apr. 27-30 and May 4, 1937. US House of Representatives Ways and Means Committee.