Beat Generation

The Beat Generation has drawn parallels to other movements such as the French Impressionists, because, similar to that movement, the Beat writers, a small clique of friends, became responsible for a movement which formed from the themes, issues, techniques and portrayals in their works. The central ideology or theme connecting the Beat writers was their complete rejection of middle-class values and lifestyle. The main concerns they expressed through their works targeted at these values and lifestyle are now concerns championed by most rational contemporary citizens: pacifism, respect for nature over technological development, and expansion of individual consciousness. The roots of the Beat writers are founded in transcendentalism, Thoreau, and Whitman. The most successful and well-known Beat writers were Jack Kerouac, William S. Burroughs, and Allen Ginsberg. However, other writers like Henry Miller and Tom Wolfe were significant in adding to the general vocabulary, themes, and concerns of the Beat generation, basically a rebellious movement that laid the foundation for the anti-establishment Hippie culture of the 1960s. Inherent in the lives of these writers was a heavy reliance on drugs, alcohol and sex with one or bother genders. Despite these aspects of their personalities, the Beat writers were generally composed of intelligent young adults who refused to accept the social norms of their era. Mainly ch

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ore him as a vision. He denounced his homosexuality and proclaimed himself heterosexual during his late 20s and even took a legitimate job as a marketing researcher but neither of these phases lasted long. The poet's fame as a poet grew as the drug oriented, Hippie generation of the 1960s came to the fore. He never moved from his humble apartment in New York and continued to be a prominent figure at poetry readings and a social activist until his death. Ginsberg was eventually perceived as the most talented writer among the Beat's, but Howl's graphic explanation of saintly motorcyclists performing sodomy had another famous Beat poet, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, founder of San Francisco's famous City of Lights bookstore, arrested for selling obscenity. Ferlinghetti was found innocent, but the episode shows the Beat's attempt to throw their harsh criticisms of American social institutions into the face of the middle-class with little attempt at reconciliation of viewpoints. William S. Burroughs was another Beat writer instrumental in the formation of the movement, and he was also legendary for his drug abuse. His novel, Naked Lunch, is a hallucinatory novel about an addict who is faceless (a condition the Beat writers found simila

Category: Literature - B