Friday’s Weekly Round-Up – 103

Peter Orlovsky & Allen Ginsberg at 9 rue Git le Coeur, Paris, aka “The Beat Hotel” December 1956. Photo  c. Harold Chapman/TopFoto

The Beat Hotel – You’ve read the book? You’ve seen the film? Now listen to the radio-program. Professor Andrew Hussey, dean of the University of London Institute in Paris (ULIP), “tells the story of how a dirty, run-down hotel in the medieval heart of Paris became, in the late 50’s and early 60’s, a bohemian mecca, attracting some of the most important figures of the Beat Generation”. This BBC link will be up for the next 12 months and, take it from us, is well worth catching.

Remembering Ken Regan – The iconic Rolling Thunder Revue photographer, sad to report, passed away last week (from cancer). Here‘s his obituary notice in The New York Times  – and here‘s an obituary note in Rolling Stone.  You’re all perhaps familiar with his famous snap(s) of Allen and Bob Dylan at Jack Kerouac’s grave? Here’s another, from that memorable day in Lowell, of Allen and Dylan:

Allen Ginsberg and Bob Dylan in Lowell, Mass, photograph by Ken Regan via Bob Dylan.com

A major event last week in England (not the U.S, interestingly (sic)) – the publication of the monumental  Collected Poems of Ed Dorn. A magisterial volume – 1000 pages! The book includes an introduction by Jennifer Dunbar Dorn, the poet’s widow, an appreciation by British poet, Jeremy Prynne, and an afterward by Amiri Baraka (editorial assistance, also, from Justin Katko, Reitha Pattison and Kyle Waugh). More information available here.

Daniel Radcliffe as Allen Ginsberg – Countdown now for John Krokidas’  Kill Your Darlings. The dates for the movie’s premiere are now set. The film is, among those scheduled to premiere next month (January 17-27) at Sundance (at the famed Sundance Film Festival) – Here‘s Radcliffe (“Harry Potter”) interviewed recently in the Huffington Post:
“There is,” he (Radcliffe) says carefully, “an upside to fame, in that, hopefully, a shit-load of people are going to be introduced to Allen Ginsberg….They can come in (to view the film)for the wrong reasons, I don’t care.  As long as they stay for the right reasons, because the material is good”.

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