Irwin Allen Ginsberg (June 3, 1926 – April 5, 1997) was an American Beat Generation poet born in Newark, New Jersey. Ginsberg is best known for 'Howl' (1956), a long poem about consumer society's negative human values.
In 1943 Ginsberg graduated from high school and briefly attended Montclair State University before entering Columbia University on a scholarship from the Young Men's Hebrew Association of Paterson. (1949). In his freshman year he met fellow undergraduate Lucien Carr, who introduced him to a number of future Beat writers including Jack Kerouac, William S. Burroughs, and John Clellon Holmes. Carr also introduced Ginsberg to Neal Cassady, one of the many that Ginsberg loved. Kerouac later described the meeting between Ginsberg and Cassady in the first chapter of his 1957 novel On the Road.
In 1954 Ginsberg met Peter Orlovsky, a young man of 21 with whom he fell in love and who remained his life-long lover, and with whom he eventually shared his interest in Tibetan Buddhism. Later in his life, Ginsberg formed a bridge between the Beat movement of the 1950s and the hippies of the 1960s, befriending, among others, Timothy Leary, Gregory Corso, Ken Kesey, Bob Kaufman, Herbert Huncke, Rod McKuen, and Bob Dylan.
External links[]
- 1985 audio interview with Allen Ginsberg by Don Swaim of CBS Radio, RealAudio
- Allen Ginsberg on Poets.org With audio clips, poems, and related essays, from the Academy of American Poets
- Allen Ginsberg
- "Ginsberg's Celestial Homework"
- "The clearing house for all things Ginsberg"
- On Allen Ginsberg by Ralph Lichtensteiger
- "The Great Marijuana Hoax – Allen Ginsberg" (the first half of which was written while on marijuana)
- allenginsberg.org | MP3 files and much more
- Naropa Audio Archives: Allen Ginsberg class (August 6th, 1976) Streaming audio and 64 kbit/s MP3 ZIP
- Naropa Audio Archives: Anne Waldman and Allen Ginsberg reading, including Howl (August 9th, 1975) Streaming audio and 64 kbit/s MP3 ZIP
- Article on Allen Ginsberg @ Lit Kicks
- Essay on Ginsberg’s In Back Of The Real
- Blue Neon Alley – Allen Ginsberg directory
- Spike Magazine Interview
- Ginsberg's Memorial Page
- Review of exhibit featuring photographs by Ginsberg
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