NOT IF I CAN HELP IT!

Since I have not started my cross-country trip I will post a little something. It will have neither the wit nor sparkle that Ron usually gives us, but it will keep RealArt from going dark for too long. Here goes something:

Revisiting Allen Ginsburg's 'Howl' at 50
from NPR (where else)

The resulting rush of violent, desperate words, starting with the well-known opening lines "I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness," created major ripples in the literary world.

Lawrence Ferlinghetti was at the Six Gallery to hear the 29-year-old Allen Ginsberg read "Howl" for the first time. Ferlinghetti owned City Lights, a bookstore and publishing house in San Francisco. He asked Ginsberg if he could publish "Howl," and the first edition appeared in the fall of 1956. "'Howl' knocked the sides out of things," Ferlinghetti later said.

The poem gave voice to an undercurrent of dissatisfaction and alienation in Eisenhower's America. "Howl" became an anthem for the nascent counterculture.

Click here for the rest (and for a lovely listen).

Rereading this today for the first time in a long while was awe-inspiring (I use that term because I can think of nothing else). Ginsburg wasn't much older than I was when he wrote it. It hurts to read it, but it feels so good too. It has some of the same qualities that my favorite songs do-- it confuses my emotions and my reactions. I want to cry and simultaneously scream from the roof tops. It makes me want to howl. It moves, it has rhythm. It is amazing what still stings after 50 years. It makes me wish I had been around to see that first reading-- to feel the room. It got me thinking about modern poetry (and lord knows I have no right to be discussing poetry-- novice is a compliment)... where are the poets who move people? I know they must exist. Why don't they get attention? Where are the artists putting into words and thoughts and pictures our generation's frustration? Does my generation even feel frustration? Yipes! Reread Howl if you haven't in awhile. It'll make you think or not.