Kathryn Winner on Allen Ginsberg and the Tape Recorder

Kathryn Winner‘s recently-published article, in the New Yorker, “Allen Ginsberg’s Self-Recording Sessions” is a lively and engaging read. Focusing on “Wichita Vortex Sutra” and  The Fall of America (and The Fall of America Journals), she traces Allen’s embrace of, and engagement with, the tape-recorder – his composition of so-called “auto-poesy” – “In the late sixties, Ginsberg began taping many of his public appearances, as well as his casual and private conversations”, she writes. “He used the recordings to compose his greatest work.”

From Winner on Allen’s process:

“When he was composing what he called “auto poesy,” (he) would switch on the machine and spout lines into the air of the Volkswagen. He recorded his reactions to billboards, pop songs, ads, and news reports – confessed intimate feelings; and addressed an eclectic list of higher powers (Hindu saints, yogis, Herman Melville, and Bob Dylan). He would replay the recordings again and again, listening carefully—repeating and re-recording certain lines, refining and building on his rhythms. Then he’d transcribe the tapes’ contents into his journal, editing, formatting, and polishing as he went. His journals suggest that he planned to clear his schedule of commitments, drive back and forth across the continental U.S., and spontaneously record his thoughts about life, friendship, waning youth, and the search for authenticity”

“He used a Uher, an upscale German model that was distributed in the United States by Martel. The Uher was easy to carry (weighing only several pounds), plus its special features included a rechargeable battery that could be plugged into any outlet and a microphone that doubled as an electromagnetic remote control, making it possible to start and stop the recorder from a distance.”

“He would replay the recordings again and again, listening carefully -repeating and re-recording certain lines, refining and building on his rhythms. Then he’d transcribe the tapes’ contents into his journal, editing, formatting, and polishing as he went. His journals suggest that he planned to clear his schedule of commitments, drive back and forth across the continental U.S., and spontaneously record his thoughts about life, friendship, waning youth, and the search for authenticity..”

and on The Fall of America

Ginsberg once wrote in his journal that “the best antipolice state strategy was total exposure of all secrets.” “Unclassify everybody’s private life,” he suggested. “President Johnson’s as well as mine.” The years spanned by The Fall of America roughly coincide with the time that the F.B.I. was compiling a dossier on Ginsberg, focussing primarily on his sexuality, drug use, and psychiatric history. We could see Ginsberg’s obsession with self-recording as strategic, an effort to counteract repressive invasions of privacy by preëmptively surrendering everything to the eyes and ears of everyone…”

“To read The Fall of America is to follow its author as he continuously converts individual experience into a stream of bright, informationally dense mosaics – a perusable abundance of compelling images, catchy sounds, and sensitive reactions to looming existential threats. Where Ginsberg went and with whom, how he dressed and what he ate, the headlines and articles he read and reacted to, the protests he attended, the hotel rooms he passed through, the meditations he practiced, the drugs he took, the sights, sounds, and smells he enjoyed or endured – all of this is discoverable. Ginsberg’s auto poesy gives us his life not merely as a collection of facts, but as an imminent reality – there for you to judge, worship, reject, envy, study, or imitate as you will.”

Read the full article – here

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