One of the highlights of the Ginsberg Centennial celebration has been the publication of a wide-ranging volume of scholarly essays, from Cambridge University Press, Allen Ginsberg
in Context, edited by Erik Mortenson. We alerted you to it back in January – here
“I am proud to claim”, Mortenson writes,”that Allen Ginsberg in Context is a veritable
“who’s who” of Ginsberg scholars, biographers and collaborators”. They have been deftly gathered together here, in a sequential, but also rhizomatic, overview of Allen’s extraordinary multi-faceted genius.
For a full list of these figures and their individual contributions, see our January posting.
It is our hope, in the coming months, to touch on a number of these essays, indicators of that multiplicity. We begin with brief notes on Mortenson’s introduction.
He begins the book as follows:
“Internationally recognized poet, activist and advocate, spiritual seeker and drug experimenter, Buddhist Jew, provocateur and counterculture guru, supportive teacher and perpetual student, Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997) wore many hats in what can only be describe as an exceptional career. Ginsberg was fond of pushing limits and challenging boundaries, both in his work and in his life. He was a homosexual who wrote openly about his sexual experiences, a tireless proponent of free speech, and a champion of environmental causes. Ginsberg’s writing reflected his myriad commitments and, garnered attention not just for its innovative style and personal candor, but for its range of theme, and willingness to meaningfully engage the world in a bid to change it.
The goal of this volume is to provide readers with the context necessary to understand how Ginsberg’s life and interests shaped his work, how his work, in turn, entered the greater poetic discourse of the time; and finally, how Ginsberg sought to influence not just America, but indeed global and political cultural realities of the postwar period. Taking a broadly chronological approach, this volume will chart the wide variety of contexts crucial to understanding not just Ginsberg, his writing, and his career, but many of the larger trends of the long twentieth century as well. Allen Ginsberg is critical to an understanding of not just twentieth-century poetry, but of the twentieth century itself.”
Not only the twentieth century:
“Ginsberg’s passing in 1997 might have marked the end of his earthly corporeal presence, but it certainly didn’t mark the end of is importance in both poetry circles and in the cultural at large. Much of Ginsberg’s writing has reached publication, and his poetry is solidly in the pantheon of important twentieth century verse. Ginsberg has been continually taught at both high school and college levels…Ginsberg might be gone but he is by no means forgotten. His work will continue to inspire young poets and seekers as it has always done and will be taught as a premier example of politically engaged poetry in the turbulent postwar years, and Ginsberg the raconteur and voice of dissent will most likely remain a force in our culture as long as censorship, trigger warnings, homophobia, and cultural and political repression remain. Thus, for some time to come.”
Mortenson goes on to enumerate the book’s five basic sections – “Part I examines Ginsberg’s formative years” and also examines “direct literary influences”; Part II, “pivots towards the important accomplishments for which Ginsberg is most well known”; Part III, “looks at (his) travels and their importance”; Part IV, “explores a range of themes essential to understanding Ginsberg, his work, and his cultural impact; and, finally, Part V, “looks at his death and its representation, as well as the ways in which he continues to live on in tributes, commemorations and cultural representations” – it also looks at “how the poet is represented today, as well as the difficulties Ginsberg still produces as his work continues to meet resistance.”
An important and comprehensive volume.