Yesterday, we looked at Erik Mortenson‘ introductory notes to the Centennial volume on Allen, Allen Ginsberg in Context
Today, we note Mortenson’s own contribution to that volume – Allen as pedagogue – “Ginsberg in the Classroom”
“By far the most prevalent conception we have of Allen Ginsberg”, he writes, “is that of the iconoclast. Whether marching in protest, decrying opposition from a stage, or reading his work excitedly from a podium, Ginsberg is most often seen as an instigator , challenging his audiences to question accepted beliefs and provoking them make a change. Institutions with their rigid structures and stagnant bureaucracies seem an especially easy target to attack. Thus it comes as little surprise to read Ginsberg’s famous quip about high education: “A word on Academies: poetry has been attacked by an ignorant & frightened bunch of bores who don’t understand how it’s made,& the trouble with these creeps is they wouldn’t know poetry it came up and buggered them in broad daylight”. While Ginsberg uttered these words in 1960, they seem in keeping with his overall persona as provocateur. Sealed in their “ivory towers” university professors are incapable of engaging with the true nature of poetry as it is practiced far below them on the actual streets. The university, in this view, is out of step with reality.
Yet an examination of Ginsberg’s life reveals a more complicated picture/ While his quote might suggest disdain for higher education, Ginsberg himself was in many ways a model student who graduated from esteemed Columbia University and even did some graduate work at UC Berkeley. Even more surprising for those unacquainted with his biography Ginsberg went on to, not just teach at various colleges, but to even cofound one, the Jack Kerouac School at Naropa University. How do we reconcile this seeming incongruity?
That question will drive this chapter as we explore the importance of the classroom for an understanding of Ginsberg and his work
Mortenson breaks it down as “Ginsberg As Student”, “Ginsberg The Teacher”, and “Teaching Ginsberg”, and concludes:
“In his poignant short poem, “When I Heard The Learn’d Astronomer”, Walt Whitman’s speaker appreciates a university lecturer on the night sky, but leaves before the audiences applause to gaze up longingly at the stars. Ginsberg, an ardent fan of Whitman, could certainly appreciate the feeling. Despite his vexed relationship to the academy, Ginsberg understood its value, so much so that he spent a great deal of his life involved in such institutions. But education alone is never enough – it needs to be coupled with other, more experiential, modes of learning. As Ginsberg himself would claim, “The message is – widen the area of consciousness”. [Editorial note – the epigraph of his book Kaddish and Other Poems] The classroom is an important part of the journey, even if the poet always has one foot out the door, eager for the next thought, idea, for experience the helps bring meaning to the cosmic whole. Through sexual experimentation, travel, drugs, meditation, frank discussion and careful observation of the world, the idea was to push perception and expand the range of consciousness so that true understanding could be achieved. What Ginsberg is really advocating is bringing back the idea of wisdom to the classroom. Education is not just accreditation. On the contrary, it is a crucible – an alchemical laboratory, where texts, learning, experience, and feeling magically become more than the sum of its parts. The student does not learn; they transform. And that metamorphosis cannot be taught, only modeled, encouraged, shared and, hopefully, celebrated.”
Mortenson is also the author (with Tony Triglio) of The Beats and The Academy – A Renegotiation (2023) – further insights into this subject
