Talkin' 'Bout The Beat Generation

[opportunem0ment]

That was a reference to "My Generation" by The Who, if you didn't catch that.

So, okay, Jack's my boy, but obviously there were a lot of other poets and writers that were influential and included in what was known as "the beat generation". Ginsberg. Burroughs. Cassady. You get the idea. Anyways, got a quote or a poem or something you want to share? Have a favorite "beat writer" and have some recommendations? Go crazy and embrace the Beat spirit! ;D

[CIA Agente Arenas]

Have you read Naked Lunch? I've tried. Multiple times. My brain exploded during each attempt. I think I'm on chapter 7 now. Burroughs is a mad man. One day, I may read through the whole thing.

*thinks about the Cassady who's currently residing in the bull ring and swoons on the spot* In other news...

I did my Junior essay about the Beat influence on the Merry Pranksters. 17 pages of Beatnik goodness. Mostly Jack and Cassady, Cassady being the bridge between the two eras, but I learned a lot about the beats. And the fact that huaraches are coming back in style for some odd reason, that certainly intrigued me.

[The Nutty Chocolatier]

YES MAN! Burroughs, that beautiful smeeping crackerjack. What a mind. For those of you who are so unfortunate to have not heard of William S. Burroughs... here's some scrambled info: www.levity.com/corduroy/burroughs.htm

He and another poet/artist of the time, Brion Gysin, invented a radical writing technique called the 'cut-up.' The method is to take some scissors and, say, cut a full page of writing into chunks... and then rearrange it. Random goodness. So many great things came out of the Beat generation. ;D

And that's just one example of one guy's genius. I've recently aquired a book entitled, "The Beat Book." It's just full of the most enticing advice from a smeep-load of great minds. Amiri Baraka, Gary Snyder, Gregory Corso, Diane Di Prima, Jack Kerouac, Peter Orlovsky, Joanne Kyger, Philip Whalen, Allen Ginsberg, Neal Cassady, Lew Welch, Michael McClure, Burroughs, and Lawrence Ferlinghetti have all contributed to this truly enlightening book. Pure intellectual madness! Wisdom! Look some of them up, please do. They're just so wondeful and so darn wise! *falls over*

To be strictly PG-13, I'll refrain from posting the more... liberated poems. However! I really love this one, by Jack Kerouac (who tends to be our favorite, I think):

" How to Meditate

---lights out---
fall, hands a-clasped, into instantaneous
ecstasy like a shot of heroin or morphine,
the gland inside of my brain discharging
the good glad fluid (Holy Fuild) as
I hap-down and hold all my body parts
down to a deadstop trance---Healing
all my sicknesses--erasing all--not
even the shred of a "I-hope-you" or a
Loony Balloon left in it, but the mind
blank, serene, thoughtless. When a thought
comes a-springing from afar with its held-
forth figure of image, you spoof it out,
you spuff it off, you fake it, and
it fades, and thought never comes---and
with joy you realize for the first time
"Thinking's just like not thinking--
So I dont have to think
any
more" "

Hurray. ;D

[The Rolling Rooster]

Jack Kerouac and the Beat Generation are in my text book in American History (the only thing I've been interested in up to this point )

But I offered a lot to that class discussion and we even showed a clip from my copy of The Source ;D

[The Nutty Chocolatier]

They're in your text book? Oh my God. I'm in total and complete jealousy. There you are with a school sane enough to include the Beat Generation, where as I'm stuck with... mine... don't get me started.

But maybe I could change the system some day.

And you showed a clip of The Source? I'm in awe. Plainly, everyone, Roo rocks. What a day that must've been for you.

[amp]

The Beats definitely were The Source. Everything else before them was strictly Squaresville.