Beat generation what was it

Those involved were willing to print or publish anything that society did not view appropriate. Of course those topics include the following: sex, drugs, homosexuality, and zen Buddhism. Citizens believed that the Beatniks were ill-mannered and undisciplined however that was soon changed when Kerouac came as host of a talk show. There he explained the reason behind the Beat Generation and helped educated the American Society of their cause.

It was also there that he read "On the Road" for the millions of Americans watching. The impact that the Beat Generation had on America was no way insignificant. It was because of the Beat Generation that people began to question the society they lived in and stepped out of it. You know there is a notion that the Beat Generation was rebellious.

He believed he was beat. His use of the word caught on and came to describe these disaffected writers, artists, bohemians and criminals. These outsiders shared a sense of dissatisfaction with the world, yet strove not to change it, but to carve out their own little space in the face of crushing conformity.

Jack Kerouac was keen to steer the definition away from criminality and towards religiosity. As the unwilling spokesman of the Beat Generation in the late fifties, he found himself tasked with writing various articles about the Beats and answering questions from numerous journalists. Coined by JK. So what was the Beat Generation?

Well, that depends on who you ask. Some would say that it was a movement begun in the s, popularized in the s, and which morphed into the hippies of the s. Others would say that the Beat flag still flies and that anyone writing confessional poetry in the 21st century is as Beat as Ginsberg. Further Reading Allen, Donald M.

The New American Poetry, — New York, Among the first texts to acknowledge Beat as a significant literary movement. Ball, Gordon , ed. Ginsberg essays on other Beat writers, happenings. Bartlett, Lee , ed. The Beats: Essays in Criticism. Jefferson, N. Critical work on all the major Beat writers.

Breslin, James E. From Modern to Contemporary: American Poetry, — Chicago, Some discussion of Beat texts, including a long essay on Howl. Charters, Ann , ed. Detroit, Many excellent essays on almost every figure in this movement, by their biographers, fans, and sometimes by one another. A very good biographical perspective. Charters, Ann. The Portable Beat Reader. Selections by many key figures in the Beat movement, along with Charters's editorial and biographical commentary.

An excellent starting point in the study of the Beat movement. Davidson, Michael. Analysis of historical context, as well as the writings that came out of this literary scene. George-Warren, Holly , ed. The Rolling Stone Book of the Beats. Cultural and biographical essays and retrospectives.

Gifford, Barry , and Lawrence Lee. Jack's Book. Oral history of Kerouac's life. Ginsberg, Allen. Edited by Barry Miles. Interesting background and compositional history of the poem. Goodman, Michael Barry. Metuchen, N. Complete background of the seminal obscenity trial. Hickey, Morgen. Good listing of primary and secondary sources. Holmes, John Clellon. Passionate Opinions. Fayetteville, Ark. Many of Holmes's definitive essays on the Beat Generation, with his later commentary as well.

Johnson, Joyce. Minor Characters. Boston, Memoir by Kerouac's former girlfriend. First definitive statement on women in the Beat Generation. Knight, Brenda , ed. Women of the Beat Generation. Berkeley, Calif. Very good collection of writings on and by Beat women. McClure, Michael. Scratching the Beat Surface. San Francisco, Firsthand account of Six Gallery reading, among other things. Morgan, Ted. Very good biography, including much information on Burroughs's Tangier and Paris years not often noted in other sources on the Beats.

Rexroth, Kenneth. American Poetry in the Twentieth Century. Evaluation of how Beat writers affected development of American poetics. Tonkinson, Carole , ed.

Excerpts from many Beat writers on or inspired by Buddhist thought, along with biographical and critical commentary on the subject. Waldman, Anne , ed. Poetry in the s was under the heavy influence of T. Eliot 's often misinterpreted idea of poetry being an escape from self and the Modernist focus on objectivity. Similar to this, and perhaps an even more pervasive influence, were the ideas of the New Critics , including their conception of a poem as a perfectible object.

The focus of these poets on the formal aspects of poetry and their celebration of the short, ironic lyric led to a rise in formalist poetry and a preference for the short lyric. When the Beat poets came to prominence during this time, they were decried as sloppy libertines, and the Beat movement was characterized as at best only a passing fad which had been largely fueled by media-attention.

This antagonism between literary camps was framed by two rival anthologies. Allen Ginsberg - who was a relentless promoter of the work of his friends and the work of those he admired - believing at the time that the Beat poets would be accepted by the literary establishment, brought Simpson, his old Columbia classmate, a packet of poetry including works by Gary Snyder , Philip Whalen , Robert Duncan , Ed Dorn , Robert Creeley , Philip Lamantia , Denise Levertov , Michael McClure , and Charles Olsen in hopes that these poets would be included in this new anthology.

Simpson rejected every one of them. The introduction for the anthology was written by formalist hero Robert Frost. There is not a strict demarcation here between conservative and avant-garde poetry. The anthology also included a number of English poets who were associated with a movement that, chronologically at least, ran parallel with the Beat Generation, the " Angry Young Men.

However, the anthology did set a trend for who would become poets acceptable to academia and the literary establishment. For example, Robert Lowell and W. Snodgrass would be seminal in the creation of what later became known as confessional poetry , which helped finally overturn the strict focus on objectivity Lowell, according to some accounts, was inspired to write more personal poetry by Ginsberg and the Beats.

Don Allen framed the debate as "Open Form" his anthology vs. Though seeing it as a rivalry is overly simplistic for example, many poets in New Poets of England and America were not strict formalists or have since moved away from formalism , the development of U. Arguably, these poets have had equal impact on literature, and it can be said that Beat literature has changed the establishment so that academia is now more open to more radical forms of literature.

But Jack Kerouac, despite his impact on American culture and his status as an American icon, has only just been included in the 7th Edition of the Norton. Caen's coining of this term appeared to suggest that beatniks were 1 "far out of the mainstream of society" and 2 "possibly pro- Communist ". His column reads as follows: " Look magazine, preparing a picture spread on S.

Beach house for 50 Beatniks, and by the time word got around the sour grapevine, over bearded cats and kits were on hand, slopping up Mike Cowles' free booze. They're only Beat, y'know, when it comes to work An early example of playing up to the "beatnik stereotype" occurred in Vesuvio's a bar in North Beach which employed the artist Wally Hedrick to sit in the window dressed in full beard, turtleneck, and sandals and create improvisational drawings and paintings; by tourists to San Francisco could take bus tours to view the North Beach Beat scene.

The image of the beatnik appeared in many cartoons, movies, and TV shows of the time, perhaps the most famous being Bob Denver 's character Maynard G. While some of the original Beats embraced the beatniks, or at least found the parodies humorous Ginsberg, for example, appreciated the parody in Pogo others criticized the beatniks as inauthentic posers.

Kerouac feared that the spiritual aspect of his message had been lost and that many were using the Beat Generation as an excuse to be senselessly wild. But for many young people, the popular image of the beatnik was their first contact with the subject. As Glenn O'Brien put it, "Maynard was sloppy, lazy, and did not respond to the mainstream of varsity culture.

Maynard was post-romantic, a dreaming realist. I didn't know what a bohemian was, but I knew one when I saw one. As a preteen, I sensed that a beatnik was what I wanted to be. Maynard G. Krebs was a satire on beatniks, but that didn't matter because beatness shone through.