Beats as a Counterculture

Mike Kupferman

Freshman Comp 1

Amy Washburn

October 10, 2002

The Beats As A Counterculture

Many of the Beat writers wrote in a style known as spontaneous prose. Allen Ginsberg often writes in this style. He does so in the poem "Howl" in which he rants and raves about society via his friends - Jack Kerouac, Willaim S. Burroughs, Lawrence Ferlingetti, and Neil Cassidy to name a few, live. He discusses their poverty, civil disobedience, the ways that they fight society, and his personal fight against industrialization; he uses many images in order to allow the reader to understand his lifestyle, the lifestyle of his friends and points of view, specifically their rejection of society.

Ginsberg depicts the deprived environment in which he chooses to live in through imagery. For instance the speaker proclaims: "...Dragging themselves through the Negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix."(Ginsberg 62) This is a scene depicting an average morning after a night of partying. His friends are trying to make their way back to reality. They search the streets where they have been in Jazz clubs for more drugs so they do not have to "suffer[ing] Eastern sweats and Tangerian bone grindings and migraines of China under junk-withdrawal..."(Ginsberg 63) Ginsberg is telling of his friend's addiction and fear of withdrawal. The speaker states: "...Yakketyyakking screaming vomiting whispering facts and memories and anecdotes and eyeball kicks and shocks of hospitals and jails and wars..." (Ginsberg 63) In this passage the speaker of "Howl" depicts an insane asylum because his mother, himself and many of his friends; specifically Carl Solomon, who the poem is dedicated to, had been admitted or admitted themselves into hospitals.

The Beats were all connected to the reality of poverty. Ginsberg states: "Who poverty and tatters and hollow-eyed and high sat up smoking in the supernatural darkness of cold-water flats floating across the tops of cities contemplating jazz."(Ginsberg 62) The obvious image of poverty is when he clearly states "poverty" but along with this image Ginsberg says "cold-water flats," meaning that there was not enough money to have hot water. Another image of poverty is "who plunged themselves under meat trucks looking for an egg." They were so desperate for food that they jumped under trucks in search of a single egg. The Beats chose this poverty stricken lifestyle in order to further reject society.

The Beats were strong willed and opinionated and were not afraid to get arrested for a cause. This is depicted in the quote: "who got bused in their public beards returning through Laredo with a belt of marijuana for New York," The belief that Marijuana should not be illegal provoked them to attempt to bring marijuana across the Mexican boarder. Certain Beats were arrested for the cause of legalization. The narrator of "Howl" pronounces: "Who bit detectives in the neck and shrieked with delight in policecars for committing no crime but their own wild cooling pederasty..." They had the will to be arrested simply because they did not believe in a law and be glad about being arrested as an act of civil disobedience. It is one of the ways in which people can fight against society.

The fight against societal values was a constant battle. As an anti-society act The Beats " threw their watches off the roof to cast their ballot for Eternity outside of Time, & alarm clocks fell on their heads every day for the next decade." This shows the irony of their battle against society because although it would be nice to live completely outside of society it is very difficult. Because they threw their watches off the roof they were forced to ask the time wherever they went in order to coincide with the "outside world." This battle