Challenging the Modernity of American Culture: The Howl by Allen Ginsberg

Lee notices that Ginsberg’s use of anaphora questions “the historical origins of both social afflictions and collective resistance in Howl.” The “origins of both social afflictions” and “collective resistance” stems from America’s need to impose unrealistic expectations on young people. Ginsberg idealizes America’s youth by celebrating their imperfection. Ginsberg “blurs” his “central objects of identification” by finding a connection between the insanity that Carl Solomon and Naomi Ginsberg share. The “blighted hopes and wasted intellects” of America’s past and present generation are subject to

and his “best minds” pals encounter during a time after World War II. The “who” relates to Ginsberg

Ginsberg asserted that the best minds were the underrepresented outcast. For example, Ginsberg states beginning of the poem, “I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked, dragging themselves through the Negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix” (1-2). From the beginning of the poem, the reader would expect Ginsberg talking about intellectual people such as scientists, philosophers, inventors, etc. The best minds were regular people who had dreams and lived their life to the fullest. They would go to bars, look down on NY, talk about philosophy, do drugs, and be sexually active. It prevalent to our society

He uses words like “madness” , “hysterical”, and “hallucinating” to reinforce the theme. Ginsberg has personally experienced insanity in his life, his mom had struggled with it his whole life, and had been institutionalized several times. Ginsberg himself had pleaded insanity after he was convicted for theft and had spent time in a mental asylum. During his time in the mental in the mental asylum he met Carl Solomon, whom this poem is dedicated to. Carl Solomon was also a poet and he was struggling from severe Schizophrenia. Ginsberg is surrounded with insanity, so much so that he starts to see it everywhere in the world around him, and he reflects it in his works. In the poem Ginsberg describes the best minds of his generation as being “ mad” , he goes on to write about how they are struggling with drugs and with the inability to conform to society's norms.

Allen Ginsberg dedicates the entire third part of his epic poem, exclaiming his loyalty, to his dear friend, Carl Solomon. The third part of Howl is an example of loyalty that Beatnik artists and intellects have towards one another. In a small community like the Beatniks, it is sensible to be loyal to those whom one can truly trust and connect with as there are more who will challenge you than stand by you. So, it is crucial to hold on to those who share in your successes and tribulations with an open mind and open heart.

It was a 1951 TIME cover story, which dubbed the Beats a ‘Silent Generation, ’ that led to Allen Ginsberg’s retort in his poem ‘America,’ in which he vocalises a frustration at this loss of self- importance. The fifties Beat Generation, notably through Jack Kerouac’s On the Road and Allen Ginsberg’s Howl as will here be discussed, fought to revitalise individuality and revolutionise their censored society which seemed to produce everything for the masses at the expense of the individual’s creative and intellectual potential. Indeed, as John Clellon Holmes once noted: “TIME magazine called them the Silent Generation, but this may have been because TIME was not

Good art never dies, but rather lingers on in the minds of the society. Allan Ginsberg’s poem “Howl” has relevance many years after it was written. “Howl” is a poem, and a story about the history of the beat generation, and the philosophies of the beat poets. At the time that Howl was written America was in the middle of the cold war, and conservatism was the norm. The shocking nature and vulgar language of “Howl” makes the poem unique during a time when having your hair long, or even having a beard was risqué. Allan Ginsberg makes the reader think about their freedom and expression during the time when even the society is against them. By using his obscene, even by today’s standards, words he startles the read and gives them the branch to

With reference to Ginsberg's emulation of Walt Whitman's content, the Norton Anthology, Postmodern American Poetry, states that, "Ginsberg proposed a return to the immediacy, egalitarianism and visionary ambitions of Blake and Whitman." (130). His poem "America" caters toward themes of democracy, something Whitman's poetry also does. Yet unlike Whitman, Ginsberg takes a more questioning stance on America and does not use his poem to praise the nation.

Rant Within the poem “Howl” by Allen Ginsberg, the author delivers a brilliant example of remarkable word usage, and emotion. The poem illustrates how Ginsberg’s journey of exploration, hardship, and pain affected him for the rest of his life. At the time of its publishing, some of the language he used in the work was considered obscene and as a result, was banned in the U.S. His descriptions of places and happenings are both vague and intricate at the same time, compelling one’s imagination to participate in an attempt to relate to the words in some minor way. The language is harsh, but guides the readers to his locations and through his experiences. In the 1950s people dealt with poverty, war, civil rights, and drugs. Ginsberg’s poem is a

He writes “ I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked, / dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix” ( lines 1-2). Frank Casale discusses these lines in his article “Literary Contexts in Poetry: Allen Ginsberg’s ‘Howl.’” He writes “The poem’s opening line has become one of the most famous in American poetry. It serves as an opening into the experience of madness, drugs, prophecy, and a new vision that compose the field of the first part of the poem” (Casale 1). This line introduces the theme of the poem and introduces Ginsberg’s view on insanity and the Beat lifestyle. He supports those “who drove crosscountry seventytwo hours to find out if I had a vision or you had a vision or he had a vision to find out Eternity, / [...] who fell on their knees in hopeless cathedrals praying for each other’s salvation” (60, 62). Casale continues by saying “In ‘Howl’ the Beats are repeatedly referred to as ‘angels,’ to connect those in search of the new consciousness or new vision [...] with the prophetic tradition. The quest for ‘kicks’ was not just an epicurean activity, but a serious search for freedom and new meaning in an America growing more conformist and authoritarian” (Casale 2). As a member of the Beat Generation, Ginsberg understands the Beat lifestyle and the way society views them, and he provides this generation with a

This poem is sometimes referred to as a violent “howl” of human anguish. It attacks the forces of conformity and mechanization that Ginsberg believed destroyed the best minds of his generation. This poem has no real structure or rational connection of ideas, and the rules of grammar are abandoned in order to pack imagery into one line. The poem points the way toward a new and better existence, chronicling the pilgrimage of the “mad generation” toward a reality that is timeless and placeless, holy and eternal.

The Beat Generation is a literary movement during the 1950s that consisted of male authors including the widely known Allen Ginsberg, who explored American culture in their poems. The Beat Generation could be described as misogynistic and patriarchal due to their exclusion of women and concerns confined to only male outcasts. In Allen Ginsberg’s 1956 “Howl”, he brings his audience’s attention to male outcasts in society. In her 2015 “Howl”, a critical response to Ginsberg’s “Howl”, Amy Newman explores the oppression outcasted women endure in a male-dominated culture through the allusions of an admired female poet, Ginsberg’s original stanza form, and utilizing diction to convey a woman's perspective antithetically to Allen Ginsberg's original.

In Howl Allen Ginsberg uses a series of scenes and numerous images of confusion, disorder, and violence to show the Beat Generation’s life and thoughts. The best minds of the Beat Generation respect Moloch. Moloch is a symbol to represent the power of the society and controls material possessions. However, Moloch oppresses them and they bear the spiritual starving, which express Ginsberg’s criticism about social suppression and pursuit of material possessions. For them, the actual life is hopeless and only drugs, alcohol, and sex can make them forget sadness and affliction. They also choose to suicide to release: “jumping down the stoops off fire escapes off windowsills off Empire State” and “cut their wrists three times”. These varied scenes

Therefore, in the very beginning, Ginsberg presents to the reader the subject and tone of the poem in the context of this question. Ginsberg’s questions make the audience realize the seriousness of the issues that this poem discusess, such as America, politics, war, humanity, and ethics.

It is evident from the very beginning that Ginsberg is disillusioned with American society, and he is ready to turn his back on what he feels has been oppressing him. "America I've given you all and now I'm