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ALLEN GINSBERG: the Beat bard
Allen Ginsberg
Biographical infos
Ginsberg [E2] [ES1] [F1] was the major poet of the so-called Beat Generation: he
was born in Newark, New Jersey in 1926. His father was a Jewish
Socialist, a poet and a teacher, and suffered from depression; his
mother's health, wasn't good,either, she had frequent nervous
breakdowns and was later committed to a mental hospital. Since
high-school, Ginsberg developed a deep interest in poetry and read the
works of Walt Whitman [F1] ; but despite his literary inclinations, he
studied Law at Columbia University. Among his fellow students
were Jack Kerouac, Neal Cassady, William Burroughs, who were
obsessed with drugs, crime, sex and literature.
In 1948, Allen began to hear the
voice of William Blake [ES1] while he was reading some of his poems: so he
decided to become a poet. Then, he moved to San Francisco, where he
felt freer to express his homosexuality.
In 1955, he attracted public
attention by reading aloud his poem Howl
(the Manifesto of the Beat Generation)at the legendary Six
Gallery; in 1956 the collection Howl and Other Poems was published by Ferlinghetti's
publishing house City Lights Books, but was brought up on obscenity
charges. In 1959, Kaddish and Other
Poems followed, a
sentimental elegy in memory of the poet's mother.
Ginsberg was very active in
antiwar protest and supported the civil rights movement in the 1960s.
He traveled the world, on the trail of his beloved Buddhist philosophy,
which helped him overcome drug addiction. He showed interest for all
arts including pop music, and often took part in public readings and
multicultural gatherings until his death in 1997.
A supermarket in California
A Supermarket in California
In this poem, written in 1955, Ginsberg
imagines to meet Walt Whitman's ghost as he wanders through an
all-night supermarket: the poet is perplexed by present day excesses
and meditates on the anaesthetized consumer paradise America has
become. The initial landscape (night, trees and moon) seems to evoke
Whitman, the singer of nature. But in the XX century the only place a
poet can go "to shop for images" is the supermarket, where people go on
buying all night under the artificial neon light.Whitman and Garcia
Lorca are there, though. The end of the poem is an aknowledgment of the
way history moves on and forgets. Ginsberg notes how Whitman's own
vision of America - the lost America of love - has been forgotten
and can only with great difficulty be imagined back into existence.
Mingling a lyric and a comic strain, the poem is a good example of the
author's use of long lines: in each line ("ideally a breath unit"), written to be read aloud,
unexpected images and associations are kept together by their rhythm.
Poetry to Ginsberg was communication,
needing direct contact with an audience: that is the reason for
his choice of strong, violent images (as in Howl) and for the use of simple and
colloquial language. The repetition of words and sentences make his
poetry a kind of collective ritual. As a stylistic note, for example,
in A Supermarket in California,
we can notice the strong allitteration ( What ... Walt Whitman.... I walked....What peaches... Wives... what were... watermelons...etc.) and
repetition of the name of the addresse.
Like the other "American bard", Ginsberg used open forms and stressed
the value of free and spontaneous expression; like Whitman, he
was restlessly searching for illumination and new and direct
experiences. The only thing that mattered to him was to live each
moment as intensely as possible.
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