Mastodawn

JACK KEROUAC
Readings By Jack Kerouac On The Beat Generation
2024 U.S. MONO reissue

The end of a very long day; spent travelling down island on a day trip to Victoria.

Found a couple gems through my day’s adventures, THIS being my favorite one.

I discovered #JackKerouac when I was 14; the first time I read On the Road, and my whole world opened up. I was hypnotized by Jack’s rhythm and language, & it’s been a life long love affair.

Unlike his legendary album with Steve Allen, there is no jazz piano here. No musical accompaniment.

Just Jack alone, reading excerpts from his various writings, and it’s remarkable.

The aforementioned rhythm and language really takes on a different energy hearing it directly from Jack’s mouth.

Smoky jazz clubs, lovers and drinkers, the heartbeats of San Francisco, the infinite and immaterial.

This is my favorite find of the year.

#vinyl #vinylrecords #vinylcommunity #vinylcollection #retro #vintage #art #music #analog #poetry #beatgeneration

Jamez Barrett 🜃 ॐ Ⓐ Apr 22

The Life and Times of Allen Ginsberg is a 1993 film by Jerry Aronson chronicling the poet Allen Ginsberg's life up to that point, along with his views on death; Ginsberg was in his mid 60s when the movie was first released, and died at age 70. The film has been completed and released a number of times due to changing technologies and world events. The first release of the film was in 1993 at the Sundance Film Festival after which it enjoyed an international festival run and USA theatrical run. When Aronson showed him the film the poet is reported to have nodded his head thoughtfully and said, "So, that's Allen Ginsberg."

After Ginsberg passed in 1997, Jerry Aronson decided to update the ending of the film to include the poet's passing, added a shot of Ginsberg's headstone in New Jersey, and added a new recording of Paul Simon singing Ginsberg's "New Stanzas for Amazing Grace" for the closing credits.

https://soulvlog.blogspot.com/2026/04/the-life-and-times-of-allen-ginsberg.html

#BeatGeneration

The Life and Times of Allen Ginsberg

The Life and Times of Allen Ginsberg is a 1993 film by Jerry Aronson chronicling the poet Allen Ginsberg's life up to that point, along w...

Liam O'Mara IV, PhD Apr 5

Leftwing activist, #BeatGeneration poet, and queer #counterculture icon #AllenGinsberg died on #ThisDayInHistory in 1997. An influence on my poetic voice, a former professor kept the only copy of a tribute I wrote ('For Allen'). I still play a recording of 'America' in classes.

Ben! (Boo!)Apr 4

So many of the Beats were assholes, right-wingers (Kerouac, Burroughs), murderers (Burroughs, Lucien Carr), or open pedophiles (NAMBLA member Ginsberg). It is one subculture I mostly cannot get into at all even if young Ben liked some of their poems (mostly Ginsberg) and books. There's only a couple late-period Beats who were explicitly left-wing like Gary Snyder that I actually still enjoy reading and will defend.

#beatgeneration #beats #bookstodon #books #poetry

The Ghost Monk Mar 30

Weird art of the day: something by Harry Everett-Smith. #weird #weirdart #psychedelia #psychedelic #BeatGeneration #Gnostic #artsky

harriehq Mar 29

Damn. I knew, and then temporarily forgot, that "The Nervous Set" was a beatnik / Beat Generation era (inspired) musical, but I failed to pick up on "The Ballad of the Sad Young Men" being a direct lift from F. Scott Fitzgerald - who, while not a Beat author, can definitely be considered to be a Beat precursor. Heck, the whole Lost Generation was a direct influence, once you see it.

I love finding these interlocking webs betwixt different eras and movements. (And feel a little silly for not catching it sooner.)

#F.-Scott-Fitzgerald #Beat-Generation #Beatnik #beatific #American-literature #20th-c-literature #musical-theatre #The-Lost-Generation #Jack-Kerouac

Liam O'Mara IV, PhD Mar 25

Copies of the great #AllenGinsberg poem #Howl were seized by #UnitedStatesCustoms on #ThisDayInHistory in 1957, and #LawrenceFerlinghetti and #ShigeyoshiMurao of #CityLightsBooks were charged with obscenity. They were later acquitted and continued publishing #BeatGeneration work.

Jamez Barrett 🜃 ॐ Ⓐ Mar 1

"The Center Street Cut-Ups"

"The Center Street Cut-Ups" is the abbreviated title of the latest Third Mind Books original presentation, "HAVE A PLEASANT TRIP... 210 Center Street NYC 1965: the Cut-Up Life of William S. Burroughs," -- crafted with monocle at the ready by TMB founder & Ann Arbor eminence, Arthur S. Nusbaum with the assistance of Joe Provenzano (VP of Operations at Third Mind Books, and Nusbaum's protégé in life and literature).

The focus, here as elsewhere is on WILLIAM S. BURROUGHS -- the Patron Saint-Demon of Third Mind Books -- and even more specifically, on a tranche of documents acquired at auction belonging to the painter, David Prentice. Prentice was a close, personal friend to Burroughs and his Papers document
document a very key time in the development of the Cut-Ups as both a literary technique and original philosophic contribution.

The presentation was first delivered at the European Beat Studies Network Conference (ebsn.eu) in Paris, France in September of 2023, and was re-recorded with narration by the author in December of that same year.

https://soulvlog.blogspot.com/2026/03/the-center-street-cut-ups.html

#Burroughs #BeatGeneration #CutUps