It is clear to any reader of "Howl" that Allen Ginsberg is upset with the status quo, in fact, one might even borrow Ginsberg own words about how he feels about his “generation” when he states that they, “let themselves be fucked in the ass by saintly motorcyclists, and screamed with joy.” What a spit in the face. As I continued to read Ginsberg’s profanity-laced and prolonged verbal assault I was sure about convinced about one thing; Ginsberg is demanding for his generation to change by beating his generation with a rod like a sheep in need of direction.
A reader doesn’t have to look far to find textual evidence to reaffirm Ginsberg’s desire for transformation within his generation. From the first line, Ginsberg prepares the reader by mournfully …show more content…
Louis Ginsberg, Allen’s father, was “ a minor American lyric poet, and his mother Naomi was an active leftist” (Casale 1), as such his parents knowingly or not impacted their son’s views. Naomi’s leftist mentality charged Allen with a desire for social justice for all not just the privileged and Louis passed his desire to write as a medium in which Allen could then express his own feelings. In college at the University of Columbia Allen Ginsberg was introduced to “New York’s bohemian (Beat) and underground subculture” (Casale 1). What is beat culture though? What does it represent? According to …show more content…
For this reason, Philip Lopate an American teen who at fourteen years of age will stand in for as our average American. Lopate states in his recall of the poem, “I have to say that ‘Howl’ struck me from the first as a little ludicrous and overblown. In retrospect I think I may have been threatened by its intense emotions, and deaf to its more ironic registers. Then, too, much as we embraced Kerouac and Ginsberg as a retort to the ‘tranquilized Fifties,’ we were not immune to the ubiquitous parodies of them in the popular culture” (86). It isn’t too far-fetched to believe most people, especially teens and young adults, would find Ginsberg’s tone and position extreme and be taken back. Yet, when people dig deep into their passions they often find just how emotionally invested they truly are. Lopate figured out, “I have a feeling some shards of Ginsberg 's dangerous shrapnel lodged more deeply into my subconscious than I realized, because, soon after reading it, I wrote a poem called ‘I Hate It All’ and turned it into my English teacher for creative writing extra-credit” Lopate described it as a “ lurid rant enlisted every cliché”(86). For Lopate, similar to Ginsberg, his passion manifested itself through anger and rage. Further along, Lopate confides that “The strongest pull that ‘"Howl"’ exerted on me thus was cautionary. If it seemed an advertisement for madness, drug addiction, vagrancy, homosexuality,
A reader doesn’t have to look far to find textual evidence to reaffirm Ginsberg’s desire for transformation within his generation. From the first line, Ginsberg prepares the reader by mournfully …show more content…
Louis Ginsberg, Allen’s father, was “ a minor American lyric poet, and his mother Naomi was an active leftist” (Casale 1), as such his parents knowingly or not impacted their son’s views. Naomi’s leftist mentality charged Allen with a desire for social justice for all not just the privileged and Louis passed his desire to write as a medium in which Allen could then express his own feelings. In college at the University of Columbia Allen Ginsberg was introduced to “New York’s bohemian (Beat) and underground subculture” (Casale 1). What is beat culture though? What does it represent? According to …show more content…
For this reason, Philip Lopate an American teen who at fourteen years of age will stand in for as our average American. Lopate states in his recall of the poem, “I have to say that ‘Howl’ struck me from the first as a little ludicrous and overblown. In retrospect I think I may have been threatened by its intense emotions, and deaf to its more ironic registers. Then, too, much as we embraced Kerouac and Ginsberg as a retort to the ‘tranquilized Fifties,’ we were not immune to the ubiquitous parodies of them in the popular culture” (86). It isn’t too far-fetched to believe most people, especially teens and young adults, would find Ginsberg’s tone and position extreme and be taken back. Yet, when people dig deep into their passions they often find just how emotionally invested they truly are. Lopate figured out, “I have a feeling some shards of Ginsberg 's dangerous shrapnel lodged more deeply into my subconscious than I realized, because, soon after reading it, I wrote a poem called ‘I Hate It All’ and turned it into my English teacher for creative writing extra-credit” Lopate described it as a “ lurid rant enlisted every cliché”(86). For Lopate, similar to Ginsberg, his passion manifested itself through anger and rage. Further along, Lopate confides that “The strongest pull that ‘"Howl"’ exerted on me thus was cautionary. If it seemed an advertisement for madness, drug addiction, vagrancy, homosexuality,