An Array of Utopian Flowers
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The Underworld, Rebirth and Renewal with Ceres and Proserpina
Posted on June 29, 2018 | No Comments -
Cinematic Cultural Change in West Africa with Idrissa Ouédraogo
Posted on June 3, 2018 | No Comments -
Mild Satire, Outrage and Hostility, with Philip Roth
Posted on June 2, 2018 | No Comments -
Big Noise from Big Band Drummer Gene Krupa
Posted on April 10, 2018 | No Comments -
Loose Nuts: Edison Reveals Huge Gap in Safety at San Onofre
Posted on April 9, 2018 | No Comments
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Beat Generation Archive
Stranger in Tangier: Paul Bowles Under The Sheltering Sky
Posted on November 14, 2017 | 1 CommentPaul Bowles during his life (1910-1999) remained aloof from all the hipsters and hypesters of U.S. letters. Living in self-imposed exile in Tangier, he had cast a spell over such talents as Tennessee Williams, Libby Holman, Truman Capote, and Allen Ginsberg. We revisit an essay penned by Jay McInerny in 1985, on how the inimitable expatriate writer-composer's dark arts retain their power, even more so 32 years later.
Bukowski’s ‘Born Into This’ – Treachery, Hatred, Violence, Absurdity
Posted on June 29, 2017 | 1 CommentThe documentary, 'Bukowski: Born into This' rehashes stories of the inimitable misanthrope, poet, and author Charles Bukowski. Post features the poem, 'Dinosauria, we.'
Improvised Beat Generation Dreams of John Cassavetes
Posted on August 17, 2016 | No CommentsCassavetes' Shadows "improvises" Beat Generation Manhattan, where two brothers and a sister, black but inexplicably played by two white actors, careening off track to scaled-back sketches of Charles Mingus' saxophone jazz yearnings. Black and white neon signs blink and the old Times Square looms like the otherworld, naturalistic cordial racism separating the chosen from the downtrodden, both dreaming of making it, of creating something.
Adams on Kerouac: The Buddha’s First Noble Truth Unveiled at Big Sur
Posted on August 11, 2012 | 1 CommentJohn Adams' "The Dharma at Big Sur," composed for the opening of LA's Disney Hall, references Jack Kerouac's evocation of the first of Buddha's Four Noble Truths in microtones, celebrating the freedom of the California coast at Big Sur.
Jack Kerouac’s Lowell Blues: Cast-off Boots of Time
Posted on July 1, 2012 | 1 CommentJack Kerouac wrote in 1950: “I wish to evoke that indescribable sad music of the night in America–for reasons which are never deeper than the music. Bop only begins to express that American music. It is the actual inner sound of a country.”
William S. Burroughs – Commissioner of Literary Addictions
Posted on June 21, 2012 | 6 CommentsBurroughs wanted to free people from the slavery of addiction, whether to heroin or money or sex. "The Garden of Earthly Delights" was his shorthand for the diseased saturnalia of American affluence. From his earliest writings Burroughs foresaw a time when human beings, drenched in orgasmic "freedom," would be reduced to their bodies, their minds completely manipulated by advertising and mass media.
