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What are you reading?

Geoffrey Firmin

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It turns out that the second public reading of Ginsberg’s Howl was on our campus, due to Snyder’s friendship, and the earliest known recording of the poem was made that night and was discovered in the school archives a few years ago.
I recently listened to a early public reading/recording of Howl. Still capable of blowing my mind.
 

FlyingMonkey

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I’ve met two people who claimed to be characters in that book. That was definitely true of one, Gary Snyder, aka Japhy Ryder, who spoke at my graduation and attended the same college that I did, some 40 years earlier.

Wow, lucky you! Snyder is one of my favourite living poets.
 

imatlas

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Wow, lucky you! Snyder is one of my favourite living poets.

I love his work as well, and not just because of our tenuous association.

I’m a book collector, and I have a small collection of first editions by Snyder as well as by his college roommates Lew Welch and Philip Whalen. Snyder is the last survivor of that trio and he’s got to be close to 90.
 

Fueco

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I love his work as well, and not just because of our tenuous association.

I’m a book collector, and I have a small collection of first editions by Snyder as well as by his college roommates Lew Welch and Philip Whalen. Snyder is the last survivor of that trio and he’s got to be close to 90.

Can you recommend any other Beat novels? I’ve read On The Road, and have Naked Lunch in the queue.
 

FlyingMonkey

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Can you recommend any other Beat novels? I’ve read On The Road, and have Naked Lunch in the queue.

I'd rate the poetry far higher than the novels on the whole - Snyder, Ferlinghetti and Ginsberg in particular - I like Philip Whalen (mentioned above) too, but he wasn't really a beat.

Charles Bekowski wasn't really a beat either, but his best novel, Factotum, is somehow as perfect a beat novel as you'll find.
 

noob in 89

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So many people in college are into the Beats, the crazy Americana and the handsomeness of Kerouac in a few choice photos — but how many actually read them? Much of it is crap, tbh. (And probably stolen from the French).

That said, I really liked A Coney Island of the Mind, by Ferlinghetti, and also the novel Her...
 

Fueco

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Reading some poetry after fishing...

303B6692-F511-4F8E-B27C-0E33E49323A3.jpeg
 

edinatlanta

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Real talk: LBJ should not have been President.

I was thinking about why people are so eager for Caro to finish the biography and beyond that it's great writing and the man is coming close to his deadline it's that he so expertly shines a light on LBJ's need for acceptance, his ambition, his requirement that he be somebody. So many times Caro lays clear that from a young age LBJ wanted to be President. Caro writes that from his time as a lowly congressional secretary and high school teacher he may have been laying the groundwork at every second for a presidential campaign.

We all know how LBJ's story ends. But from the first few pages it's clear Caro understands the man's soul and his character. ANd getting to see his interpretation of LBJ's demise is going to be fascinating and utterly heartbreaking.
 

Mujib

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I just finished Silence of the Lambs and Red Dragon (in that order). They were OK. Few literary qualities. I started Hannibal but already sense it’s not as good as the other two. Should I bother continuing?
 

Big Pun

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Experiencing Architecture. Good for anyone with zero background education on the subject. Helpful illustrations.
 

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