He lived modestly, buying his clothing in second-hand stores and residing in apartments in New York City's East Village. Ginsberg was a Buddhist who extensively studied Eastern religious disciplines. Horn ruled that "Howl" was not obscene, asking: "Would there be any freedom of press or speech if one must reduce his vocabulary to vapid innocuous euphemisms?" : 338 The poem reflected Ginsberg's own sexuality and his relationships with a number of men, including Peter Orlovsky, his lifelong partner. San Francisco police and US Customs seized copies of "Howl" in 1956, and a subsequent obscenity trial in 1957 attracted widespread publicity due to the poem's language and descriptions of heterosexual and homosexual sex at a time when sodomy laws made (male) homosexual acts a crime in every state. īest known for his poem " Howl", Ginsberg denounced what he saw as the destructive forces of capitalism and conformity in the United States. He vigorously opposed militarism, economic materialism, and sexual repression, and he embodied various aspects of this counterculture with his views on drugs, sex, multiculturalism, hostility to bureaucracy, and openness to Eastern religions. Burroughs and Jack Kerouac, forming the core of the Beat Generation. As a student at Columbia University in the 1940s, he began friendships with William S. Irwin Allen Ginsberg ( / ˈ ɡ ɪ n z b ɜːr ɡ/ June 3, 1926 – April 5, 1997) was an American poet and writer.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |