Deliberate Prose: Selected Essays 1952-95
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Book Overview
Allen Ginsberg's essays, collected here for the first time, were written over the course of a long, productive, and politically engaged life. With his finger ever on the pulse of America, Ginsberg was consistently outspoken and passionate about his beliefs. Whether criticizing the American government, protesting the proliferation of nuclear weapons or the waging of war in Vietnam, or denouncing the injustice of capitalists Ginsberg gave voice to a moral conscience of the nation. His views on free speech and the drug, culture, his quest for inner peace, the creation of the Beat generation, and his innovative poetics reflect the, concerns of a postwar American culture that he helped shape.
Arranged by subject, these essays offer a fascinating counterpoint to Allen Ginsberg's poems. Hey are provocative, playful, eloquent, and of the moment. In the section titled "Politics and Prophecies," Ginsberg takes on everyone from the Federal Drug Administration to the Pentagon to the Hell's Angels. Included here are his notes on how to make march/spectacle (drawn up in 1965 when a march was planned at Berkeley to support the cause of peace in Vietnam and to protest the draft), and his thoughts on how the raging issues of the day'China, Vietnam, and the 1968 Democratic National Convetion in Chicago. In another section, "Censorship and Sex Laws," Ginsberg's pieces demonstrate the strength of his belief in the right to free speech, which leads him to defend NAMBLA (North America Man Boy Love Association), comedian Lenny Bruce, and writer William S. Burroughs, author of Naked Lunch. Ginsberg's essays on "Writers" focus on those he particularly admired, including William Blake. Walt Whitman, Gregory Corso, Jack Kerouac, and Robert Creely. Through a combination of literary criticism and personal reflection, Ginsberg illuminates the life and work of these artists. Also, profiled are such influential figures as jean Genet, W. H. Auden, John Lennon and Yoko Ono, Andy Warhol, Robert Frank, and Philip Glass, artists whose work and sensibility deeply affected him.
Personal as well as political, Deliberate Prose is more than a collection of essays from one of the greatest cultural figures of our time. It is also a social history of modern America that reminds us of the events and issues that preoccupied the minds of a nation in the postwar years.
Customer Reviews
Rated 5 starsDon't say prose poetry...
...but you could say that for the Ginsberg nut, this is a must-have tho not always interesting all the way through. The essay on Whitman is particularly windy, but the above-mentioned line about beard cutting & district attorneys gives an example of Ginsberg at his loony lovegod best. And there are some paranoid rants, as well as blurry recollections of bad trips & marches & armies of fairies fellating anyone who gets...
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Rated 5 starsClassic Collection
It's sad to think the state that America is in right now, with hardly a new voice of reason to combat it. Allen Ginsberg made sense when he wrote and he makes sense now. But has anything changed? In reading what Ginsberg wrote about then and even more recently it seems not so much so. Those who consider themselves in the know might benefit from a new (or renewed) look at this collection.
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Rated 5 starsEssential Ginsberg
The totality of this book results in a Ginsberg manifesto, delivered in his own unique prose style, and bursting forth with great honesty and impassioned integrity. Invaluable as a document of the times (roughly late 40s thru early 90s), as a sourcebook for things Beat, as a reference source to Ginsbergian Mind Speak, this book is a major addition to Ginsberg's published work. My only criticism is that it is presented topically,...
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Rated 4 starsLittle "gold nuggets" make a excellent read!
Yes, this is a peak into the mind of Ginsberg. It may be more of a peak into his persona at the time the work was written, whether poet,bluesman, hippie,scholar, political activist etc. What makes it worthwhile are little nuggets found throughout the work which probably were unnoticed by most of us when originally published. I do wish this book had a complete table of contents (pagination) rather than just page numbers...
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