Lawrence Ferlinghetti turns 94 today – Happy Birthday, Lawrence! – Chris Felver’s full-length documentary, Ferlinghetti – A Rebirth of Wonder is currently going the rounds and is undoubtedly a must-see. Last year’s landmark art-show – Cross-Pollination: The Art of Lawrence Ferlinghetti (at the Sonoma Valley Museum of Art) was a singular event, a major retrospective. Lawrence is interviewed about that (and about other matters) here.
Here’s previous birthday-posts on the Ginsberg blog – a links-rich posting from last year, and a salutation from 2011 (including a link to him speaking on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the City Lights bookstore) – also 2010‘s birthday-posting (which includes vintage notes from Kenneth Rexroth on Ferlinghetti).
His City Lights page (ah! City Lights, what an extraordinary achievement!) is here.
Time of Useful Consciousness is his latest book (hear him discuss it with Michael Silverblatt – here and read David Meltzer’s illuminating interview with him about it here).