My two passages

                The first time I read “Howl” I had no idea what was going on. But having to sit down and actually work through a passage to create a thesis was actually very helpful and enlightening. The pictures of the graphic novel helped as well, not all were a perfect representation as Professor Lennon pointed out, but it allowed me to view the poem as a poem of people and movement, not just words. “Howl” is a poem of challenging society norms as well as pushing the boundary of people’s thinking.  The first passage I analyzed was on page 61 and started with “who bit detectives.” The first thing I did was look up the word pederasty, since I did not know it. The definition was of someone who has anal intercourse with people especially young boys.  This term made more sense after I analyzed the first part of my passage. Ginsberg portrays the police force as intrusive and suspicious. It is not just the police that are investigating the people, but detectives. The use of the word detective gives the passage more weight. The idea of biting the detectives in the neck hints at the action of taking the police down where they are most vulnerable or at least tried to. The second line of the passage discusses how the people being arrested participated in no crime but doing something that may not be deemed normal by society such as pederasty or intoxication of any nature. The passage as a whole gave a sense of Ginsberg or the people who he surrounded himself with being persecuted by society for their beliefs. As someone mentioned in class on Wednesday, Ginsberg’s choice of words adds a criminalizing agent to the idea of homosexuality. Ginsberg through this passage highlights the persecution he felt by society simply for believing and doing the things he did.

                My second passage is on page 107 and discusses the idea of conformity. The first thing that I noticed when I read this passage was the first few words “who drove crosscountry.” This idea of driving across the continent was reminiscent of Jack Kerouac’s On The Road. Since Ginsberg and Kerouac were friends, a crossover of ideas was not too surprising. With Kerouac, the idea of going across the continent to obtain “it” was something that he was compelled to do. But for Ginsberg I think he is trying to get across the idea that this chasing after enlightenment might be something that is not all that unique. To support this idea of conformed enlightenment, Ginsberg goes on to say “if I had a vision or you had a vision or he had a vision to find eternity.” This phrasing suggests that the search for enlightenment is not unique to any one person. Ginsberg spent most of “Howl” trying to tell his message of the downfalls of society and through this simple phrasing he illuminates how even a spiritual interaction may not be as singular as once thought. On other major thing that I found in the passage is the reference to driving precisely seventy two hours crosscountry. I found that adding this number to a passage about prophets and finding eternity was purposeful. Seventy two hours is exactly three days which is the time it took for Christ to come back from the dead as the prophet of God. This time reference is used to reinforce the idea of the prophet who brings the word, even if he is Christ himself, possibly being anyone else. 

"America"

In Ginsberg’s other poem, “America,” the image of America as a country is discussed again. Through this poem Ginsberg tries to figure out what his America looks like. A notion that reappears frequently through his work is the idea of taking off one’s clothes and becoming naked. In “America,” Ginsberg asks America when it will “take off its clothes.” This stripping of ideals and values, in Ginsberg’s eyes, will allow the true essence of his country to emerge. There are echoes of Ginsberg’s desire to be naked in order to get at the truth of a matter is echoed in Jack Kerouac’s On the Road with Ginsberg’s naked adventures with the “Holy Con Man,” Neal Cassidy. Ginsberg discusses the concept of power and control through the idea of America controlling as well as using the Atomic bomb. Ginsberg’s blunt “go fuck yourself with your atomic bomb” is the doorway to the idea of the large scale corruption that follows from owning such a weapon. This sense of corruption is then followed immediately with Ginsberg’s declaration of feeling ill: “I don’t feel good don’t bother me. “ The control and the power that the atomic bomb gave America seemed to Ginsberg to upset the natural order of things. As a result, he did not feel well.  But there are good aspects of America which Ginsberg represents with the line: “You made me want to be a saint.” The power of the American ideal and the connotation of personal freedom as well as purity drove Ginsberg to strive for more than the corruption filled air of the business district of America. Along this same line of thought, Ginsberg mentions Time Magazine as being an obsession as well as an emotional crutch. Ginsberg also begs the question of if the impression he gains of America through his television set is correct. This idea of conformity haunts every large consumerist nation. Ginsberg is out to wake up America to what it can be and what it should not become.  

Movement and Beauty

Allen Ginsberg, a member of the beats, exemplifies one of the main themes of the generation: movement. In his poem “In Back of the Real,” Ginsberg depicts a man walking by a tank factory and coming across a flower. This poem starts in mid-conscious stream with the first line starting halfway through the first thought, uncapitalized and intriguing. Movement was essential for the beats, providing them with constant experiences and reminders about how the human condition operates. The flower that the narrator describes develops an image with the reader of being ugly as well as worn down. But the narrator calls this flower “the flower of the world” at the very end of the poem. Along with this declaration, Ginsberg describes the flower as tough and a “flower nonetheless.”  The flower’s thorns are described as being like the spikes of Jesus’ crown, adding to a sense of sacrifice. This sense of hidden beauty and self-sacrifice lends itself to an image of the flower as a representation of the effect of industry on America. Industry wears down the country and people lose sight of the real beauty of nature as well as of each other.

Neal as God?

For Jack Kerouac, going west was not just about finding his friends in Denver, but also about discovering the country he called home and possibly finding a bit of himself along the way. Kerouac’s personality was more of a sponge than anything else, soaking up the tendencies of the mad men he chose to call friends. This dependent tendency can be strikingly seen even from the beginning of the novel. Kerouac starts the novel by introducing his friend Neal Cassidy in the very first line: “I first met Neal not long after my father died” (109). Cassidy’s antics strongly influence Kerouac and his behavior. This sponge-like attribute to Kerouac may be recognized as a fault to some. But to Kerouac it was a response to his surroundings. In a time period characterized by unfortunate events and a need for faith, Kerouac found all the emotions he needed to live by simply being around his friends. His religion was the friends themselves, and god was none other than Neal Cassidy. Cassidy was described as being the “perfect guy for the road because he actually was born on the road” and this made him the perfect higher power for the ever moving Kerouac “(109). Religion is formed on stead-fast belief and rituals. The passage of Cassidy in and out of Kerouac became the ritual that started the religion and the steadfast belief that Kerouac placed in Cassidy’s higher knowledge is as strong as any other faith. 

Neal Cassidy and The West

Going west is a major theme in Jack Kerouac’s novel, On The Road. Along with the actual use of the phrase “going west,” Kerouac exemplifies the ideals of the West within the food and drink he consumes as well as the people he idolizes. The cowboys that Kerouac comes in contact with are not simply cowboys but are representative of the West as an ideal. The West was about adventuring, manhood, and discovering the great expanse of land called America. Kerouac starts the novel’s timeline not long after his father passes, and what follows does not harbor many memories of the man. But through his friendship with Neal Cassidy, Kerouac is motivated to stop “vaguely planning and never specifically taking off” and finally venture off to Denver to meet his friends (109). Throughout his travels,  Kerouac embraces things that remind him of his western ideal: apple pie, whiskey, cowboys, as well as his friends themselves.  But the idea of being his own man through going west is somewhat deluded by Kerouac’s co-dependence on Cassidy. Starting the book by basically recounting their first meeting, and commenting all the way through about his whereabouts and activities; Kerouac illuminates his intense need for a guide, or to be more specific a father figure. Kerouac tends to ingest his friends personality traits while he stays with them, but Neal Cassidy is the only one that Kerouac finds himself so entwined with that he actually marks his life by his comings and goings. With a father who was not a stable figure for his son, Kerouac goes in search of a father figure within the west and the individuals who embody it.