=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 22:32:30 +0100
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Rinaldo Rasa <rinaldo@GPNET.IT>
Subject: Still Life with Women by La Loca
In-Reply-To:
<1.5.4.32.19971122205919.006a79f4@pop.pipeline.com>
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
La Loca
Still
Life with Women
"The
Square Dance" above the four-poster
was
your first. The four sisters,
dos a
dos, giddy as the fiddler's lick,
before
their lives happened.
You've
got them childless
and
kidding, eyes and hair
the
family chestnut.
What's
unseen is you, the oldest,
taller
than a man, buck-toothed,
double
left-footed, hulking
by the
punch, painting.
Behind
you is mother,
small
and not all there,
one
after another cracking
pistachios,
retinas like departed
souls:
a typical widow.
She beat
her girls with switches
pulled
from lenient firs.
Her
fat, child-bearing hands
shell
the favors to the last
and
then fold, stub to stub,
across
a stomach cultivated
from
marchpane and babies.
She
feels brown-haired again.
Under a
floor-length hoop
her
foot, once swept from ballrooms
by a
towering groom, sleeps.
A le
main left and your sisters skip
to
Cincinnati with their callers.
"Good
Night Ladies," and mother stands
you at
her back. Help me, is the phrase.
Starting
at the small, you undo
the
places she can't reach.
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 15:54:54 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
Subject: Re: opening chapter of duluoz
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
Diane
Carter wrote:
>
>
> I
have some trouble seeing your more positive reading of the passage. I
>
see it once again as a very tired Kerouac immersed in his own sorrow.
> DC
Diane,
your
whole post is wonderful (as usual) and i'll try to get to the rest
of it
on a day when i haven't used up so many of my ten posts. but
since
you and marie didn't see where i was really coming from on this
reading,
i thought i'd take a moment to try and clarify.
i'm not
sure that it is a positive reading per se, as much as an absurd
reading
with perhaps a positive lesson. i'll
try to be a bit clearer.
the
first positive i feel is the positiveness of identification. i
definitely
felt the "been there, done that and survived it" feeling
while
reading those words. certainly, the style
in which JK describes
it is
beyond me, but i definitely got the sense of -- yeah i've seen
life
that dark before. fairly similar to the
feeling i get when
listening
to something like Hank Williams' "I'm So Lonesome I Could
Cry",
it is absurd to find happiness in perhaps the saddest song ever
written,
but it is there for me in knowing that some one has felt depths
of
loneliness that when i feel them it seems i am the only one who could
ever
have been there and done that. it is
the idenitification with
another's
suffering as both showing that your suffering is real, but
also
that your suffering might not be the worst thing anyone has ever
felt
emotionally. in the passage from JK, it
is not just a loneliness,
but an
anger at the alien-ness of feeling like one doesn't belong to the
human
race. But in reading the words and
identifying with them and the
feelings
behind them, I know that there are people in the human race who
have
been where i've been and know the paths to some extent that i'm on.
another
level is the absurdity that this is the worst it could be. i
think
what brought the most laughter to me was when the viciousness of
the
emotions became associated with automobiles.
not only is the irony
of it
amazing as marie pointed out, but the absurdity of blaming it all
on a
car just had me in stitches. and in a
similar way as above, i find
myself
flashing back on situations in which emotional depths in my life
become
connected to particular symbols and those things or people can
hardly
deserve to be the scapegoat of the emotions.
I recall not so
long
ago a 35 cents pair of cutoffs became the focus of an anger that
had
lasted decades. Absurd. Just as in the automobile blaming.
And the
fact that JK is able to write his way out of the anger is
probably
the most beautifully positive experience of it. Not only does
the
author let you know these feelings are/were experienced, but also in
the
fact that you are reading the words the author has found a creative
means
to survive and move past the moments of those emotions. Certainly
it may
be a fleeting moment and emotions come back and haunt, but the
possibility
of escaping and finding happiness of some sort in our
natural
gifts provides some positive feelings (and perhaps this reading
is
aided by the hints provided that the emotion does not last through
the
entire book in another post on this thread).
And so
it is a twisting. Probably not a
conventional reading at all --
definitely
absurd -- but sometimes the absurd reading provides some
breakthroughs
that the conventional does not.
of
course, this is still twisted, but probably a different twistedness
than
the reading -- of course i promised that my third reading would be
completely
different from the second.
so - i
hope that others comment on the rest of your post and if not i'll
try to
give it more attention in the coming days.
and
thanks marie for providing more to look at.
david
rhaesa
salina,
Kansas
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 17:33:14 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: "Paul A. Maher Jr." <mapaul@PIPELINE.COM>
Subject: Re: opening and closing books duluoz
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>_____
>the
very fact that this book is a monologue of sorts to 'wifey' stella,
>who
cared not at all for the author jack, but just for the broken man he
>had
become, a refutation of what he had felt and lived and loved before
>becoming
so broken on the wheel of fame and his own alcoholic drowning
>of
self, this book reads to me as a dark negation.
>having
gone to levi's web page re: big sur, in which he argues very
>successfully
(in my mind) that his recording of his own nervous
>breakdown
was the end of the youthful optimistic believer in self and
>humanity
and spirituality.
>mc
> I just want to ask, how well did you know
Stella Kerouac? Paul. . .
"We
cannot well do without our sins; they are the highway to our virtues."
Henry David Thoreau
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 17:35:34 +0000
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Marie Countryman
<country@SOVER.NET>
Subject: Re: opening and closing books duluoz
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854";
x-mac-creator="4D4F5353"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
ya got
me there, paul! the admonition i have given others, hoisted by my own
petard,
so to speak, going out of text to sweeping generalization.
but i
stand by the rest of my points and quotes from the text, itself, and
my own love/hate relationship to this book, (as opposed to author - yet
snuck
in the back door with cheap shot toward stella) and thankyou david
o'kansas
for once again bringing your own wonderful sense of the absurd to
the
novel as well. i'll take under advisement
and
yes, dave: i caught the irony too. but also the darkness and no light at
the end
of the tunnel of the book.
Paul A.
Maher Jr. wrote:
>
>_____
>
>the very fact that this book is a monologue of sorts to 'wifey' stella,
>
>who cared not at all for the author jack, but just for the broken man he
>
>had become, a refutation of what he had felt and lived and loved before
>
>becoming so broken on the wheel of fame and his own alcoholic drowning
>
>of self, this book reads to me as a dark negation.
>
>having gone to levi's web page re: big sur, in which he argues very
>
>successfully (in my mind) that his recording of his own nervous
>
>breakdown was the end of the youthful optimistic believer in self and
>
>humanity and spirituality.
>
>mc
>
> I just want to ask, how well did
you know Stella Kerouac? Paul. . .
>
"We cannot well do without our sins; they are the highway to our
virtues."
>
Henry David Thoreau
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 15:55:16 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Jym Mooney <jymmoon@EXECPC.COM>
Subject: Re: Ordering of the Duluoz Legend
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
Preston
Whaley mentioned that I left "Pic" out of the Duluoz Legend. This
was not
an accident. I frankly don't see how it
fits in, as there is no
appearance
by Jack himself, in character or not. I
seem to recall that at
one
point Jack intended the main character to meet up with Sal and Dean,
but
that Memere encouraged him to edit that part out before publication.
Of
course, it has been years since I read "Pic," so maybe my memory is
faulty
on this. Anyone?
Jym
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 14:58:08 -0800
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: "Timothy K. Gallaher"
<gallaher@HSC.USC.EDU>
Subject: Re: Ordering of the Duluoz Legend
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>Preston
Whaley mentioned that I left "Pic" out of the Duluoz Legend. This
>was
not an accident. I frankly don't see
how it fits in, as there is no
>appearance
by Jack himself, in character or not. I
seem to recall that at
>one
point Jack intended the main character to meet up with Sal and Dean,
>but
that Memere encouraged him to edit that part out before publication.
>Of
course, it has been years since I read "Pic," so maybe my memory is
>faulty
on this. Anyone?
>
>Jym
yes, I
think neither Pic nor Town and City should be in the Duluoz Legend.
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 15:02:31 -0800
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: "Timothy K. Gallaher"
<gallaher@HSC.USC.EDU>
Subject: Re: Ordering of the Duluoz Legend
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
I think
that Lonesome Traveller has to be divuded up into its' consituent
stories. Some take place earlier and some later. For example the story
about
the gun and how Duluoz carefully chose not to bring it to his friend
is
earlier (around On the Road time) than October in the Railroad Earth
which
would be early fifities after Visions of Cody but pre-Subterraneans.
Jym's
original order
>>Visions
of Gerard
>>Dr.
Sax
>>Maggie
Cassidy
>>Vanity
of Duluoz
>>The
Town and the City
>>On
The Road
>>Visions
of Cody
>>Lonesome
Traveler
>>Book
of Blues
>>The
Subterraneans
>>The
Book of Dreams
>>The
Dharma Bums
>>The
Scripture of the Golden Eternity
>>Old
Angel Midnight
>>Some
of the Dharma
>>Desolation
Angels
>>Mexico
City Blues
>>Tristessa
>>Big
Sur
>>Trip
Trap
>>Satori
in Paris
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 17:24:26 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Jym Mooney <jymmoon@EXECPC.COM>
Subject: Re: Ordering of the Duluoz Legend
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
Timothy
K. Gallaher wrote:
> I
think neither Pic nor Town and City should be in the Duluoz Legend.
While I
agree re: "Pic," I must respectfully demur re: "Town and the
City."
Certainly "Town" is much more
fictionalized than most of Jack's other
books,
but if you look at the Martin brothers as essentially various
aspects
of Jack's personality split into separate characters, plus of
course
the inclusion of Ginsberg, Burroughs, and company as characters in
the
City section, one can see how this book fits into the Legend.
Jym
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 18:46:42 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: "Paul A. Maher Jr."
<mapaul@PIPELINE.COM>
Subject: Re: opening and closing books duluoz
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
It is
this savage plight that plagues most biographies, the ability of the
"biographer"
to capture the mind/thought of the person in question about who
he or
she was thinking or their particular motive in any situation. Stella
Kerouac
was one of the few supporters of Jack's work in Lowell and one of
the few
women who he really opened up to what he was thinking both
personally
and artistically. Check out the few letters in Selected Letters
for
example....Sincerely, Paul...
"We
cannot well do without our sins; they are the highway to our virtues."
Henry David Thoreau
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 18:47:50 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: "Paul A. Maher Jr."
<mapaul@PIPELINE.COM>
Subject: Re: Ordering of the Duluoz Legend
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
At
03:02 PM 11/22/97 -0800, you wrote:
>I
think that Lonesome Traveller has to be divuded up into its' consituent
>stories. Some take place earlier and some later. For example the story
>about
the gun and how Duluoz carefully chose not to bring it to his friend
>is
earlier (around On the Road time) than October in the Railroad Earth
>which
would be early fifities after Visions of Cody but pre-Subterraneans.
>
>
>
>Jym's
original order
>>>Visions
of Gerard
>>>Dr.
Sax
>>>Maggie
Cassidy
>>>Vanity
of Duluoz
>>>The
Town and the City
>>>On
The Road
>>>Visions
of Cody
>>>Lonesome
Traveler
>>>Book
of Blues
>>>The
Subterraneans
>>>The
Book of Dreams
>>>The
Dharma Bums
>>>The
Scripture of the Golden Eternity
>>>Old
Angel Midnight
>>>Some
of the Dharma
>>>Desolation
Angels
>>>Mexico
City Blues
>>>Tristessa
>>>Big
Sur
>>>Trip
Trap
>>>Satori
in Paris
>
Don't
forget the short but nonetheless effective piece, Home At Christmas.
Paul...
"We
cannot well do without our sins; they are the highway to our virtues."
Henry David Thoreau
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 08:10:28 -0800
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Diane Carter
<dcarter@TOGETHER.NET>
Subject: Re: opening chapter of duluoz
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
>
RACE wrote:
> it is the idenitification with
>
another's suffering as both showing that your suffering is real, but
>
also that your suffering might not be the worst thing anyone has ever
>
felt emotionally. in the passage from
JK, it is not just a loneliness,
>
but an anger at the alien-ness of feeling like one doesn't belong to
>
the
>
human race. But in reading the words
and identifying with them and the
>
feelings behind them, I know that there are people in the human race
>
who
>
have been where i've been and know the paths to some extent that i'm
>
on.
I can
understand your sense of the positive here, to know that someone
else
has been on the same paths and thought the same things. But it is
your
sense of positiveness as a reader rather than that Jack was making a
positive
statement.
>
another level is the absurdity that this is the worst it could be. i
>
think what brought the most laughter to me was when the viciousness of
>
the emotions became associated with automobiles. not only is the irony
> of
it amazing as marie pointed out, but the absurdity of blaming it all
> on
a car just had me in stitches. and in a
similar way as above, i
>
find
>
myself flashing back on situations in which emotional depths in my life
>
become connected to particular symbols and those things or people can
>
hardly deserve to be the scapegoat of the emotions. I recall not so
>
long ago a 35 cents pair of cutoffs became the focus of an anger that
>
had lasted decades. Absurd. Just as in the automobile blaming.
Now
here I recognize and identify with your sense of the "absurdity" of
it
all. However, to go back to the
original passage that Marie posted, I
didn't
feel his sense of anger was about the automobile but it was about
the
fact the people no longer have a sense of destination. Time has
changed
the human race but Jack has not changed with it, and he doesn't
see the
changes as positive. He identified with
the people that were
walking
fast toward something, perhaps even driving fast toward
something. But now the strolling from the automobile
parking lot has no
goal. People aren't doing what he wrote about in
On the Road, where the
automobile
was simply a new mechanism for a more spiritual striving. The
automobile
is simply a convenience. But he is not
angry at the
automobile
but at the emptiness of what it means to be human.
>
And the fact that JK is able to write his way out of the anger is
>
probably the most beautifully positive experience of it. Not only does
> the
author let you know these feelings are/were experienced, but also
> in
>
the fact that you are reading the words the author has found a creative
>
means to survive and move past the moments of those emotions.
>
Certainly
> it
may be a fleeting moment and emotions come back and haunt, but the
>
possibility of escaping and finding happiness of some sort in our
>
natural gifts provides some positive feelings (and perhaps this reading
> is
aided by the hints provided that the emotion does not last through
>
the entire book in another post on this thread).
I don't
know yet what happens by the end of the book as I have never read
it
completely through. But based on his
life and his other books it's
hard to
see the positive aspect of the writer working out his anger by
writing
about it. I don't think he worked out
his own anger at all, I
think
it was there in every drink he took to deal with it right to the
end of
his life. The positive part is that
readers can use what he wrote
to make
their own lives more positive, because most of the time his
dispair
is one mental step away from joy and positiveness but he
personally
didn't make the leap.
DC
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 08:36:45 -0800
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Diane Carter
<dcarter@TOGETHER.NET>
Subject: Re: opening and closing books duluoz
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
>
Marie Countryman wrote:
> pg
262-3
>
"in fact i began to behink myself in that hospital. i began to
>
understand that the city intellectuals of the world were divorced from
>
the folkbody blood of the land and were just rotless fools, to
>
permissable fools, who really didn't know how to go on living. I began
> to
get a new vision of my own of a truer
darkness which just
>
overshadowed all this overlaid mental garbage of 'existentialism' 'and
>
hipsterism' and bourgeois decadence' and whatever names you want to
>
give
>
it.
> in
the purity of my hospital bed, weeks on end, i, staring at the dim
>
ceiling while the poor men snored, saw that life is a brute creation,
>
beautiful and cruel, that when you see a springtime bud covered with
>
raindew, how can you believe it's beautiful when you know the moisture
> is
just there to encourage the bud to flower out just so's it can fall
>
off sere dead dry in the fall? all the contemporary LSD acid heads (if
>
1967) see the cruel beauty of the brute creation just by closing their
>
eyes: i've seen it too since: a maniacal mandala circle all mosaic and
>
dense with millions of cruel things and beautiful scenes goin on, like
>
say, swiftly on one side i saw one night a choirmaster of some sort in
>
'heaven' slowly going Ooowith his mouth in awe at the beauty of what
>
they were singing but right next to him is a pig being fed to an
> alligator
by cruel attendants on a pier and people walking by
>
unconcerned. just an example. Or that horrible mother kali of ancient
>
india and its wisdom aeons with all her arms bejeweled, legs and belly
>
too, gyrating insanely to eat back thru the only part of her that's not
>
jeweled, her yoni or yin, everythings she's given birth to. Mother
>
nature giving you birth and eating you back.
>
and i say wars and social catastrophes arise from the cruel nature of
>
bestial creation, and not from 'society' which after all has good
>
intentions or it wouldn't be called 'society' wouold it?
> it
is, face it , a mean heartless creation emanated by a God of wrath,
>
jehovah, yaweth, no-name, who will pat you kindly on the head and say
>
'now your'e being good' when you pray, but when your're begging for
>
mercy anyway say like a soldier hung by one leg from a tree trunk in
>
today's Vietnam, when yaweh's really got you out in the back of the
>
barn
>
even in ordinary natureof fatal illness like my pa's then, he wont
>
(sic)
>
listen, he will whack away at your lil behind with the long stick of
>
what they call 'original sin' in the theological christian dogmatic
>
sects but what i call 'the original sacrifice.'
>
that's not even worse, for god's sake , than watching your own human
>
father pop die in real life when you really realize 'father, father,
>
why
>
has thou forsaken me?' for real, the man who gae you hopeful birth is
>
copping out right before your eyes and leaves you flat with the whole
>
problem and burden (your self) of his own foolishness in ever believing
>
that 'life' was worth anything what it smells like down in the bellevue
>
morgue when i had to identify franz'a body. your human father sits
>
there
> in
death before you almost satisfied. that's what's so sad and horrible
>
about the 'god is dead' movement in contemporary religion, it's the
>
most
>
tearful and forlorn phiosophical idea of all time."
>
_____
>
the very fact that this book is a monologue of sorts to 'wifey' stella,
>
who cared not at all for the author jack, but just for the broken man
> he
>
had become, a refutation of what he had felt and lived and loved before
>
becoming so broken on the wheel of fame and his own alcoholic drowning
> of
self, this book reads to me as a dark negation.
>
having gone to levi's web page re: big sur, in which he argues very
>
successfully (in my mind) that his recording of his own nervous
>
breakdown was the end of the youthful optimistic believer in self and
>
humanity and spirituality.
> mc
Marie,
thanks a lot for posting more passages.
I agree with your
assessment
of "a dark negation." What is also interesting in Kerouac is
that he
so often grasps onto the despair of life in connection with
death. Like in the above passage, he is so pained
by the
death-separation
of his own father. And then he looks at
his own death,
and
concludes that there is really no point to doing anything because we
are all
going to die. And to me, that is almost
the opposite of the way
he
describes the meaning of beat, to mean "beatific" not beaten. In the
above
passage he is beaten, when he writes stuff like "his own
foolishness
in ever believing that life was worth anything." The other
conclusion
could and should be that life is worth something because it
ends in
death. You should live now because you
are going to die. Why
give up
on life before death takes you. Also,
if one is going to grab
onto
the concept of original sin, a wrathful God, and the "Why or why
hast
thou forsaken me attitude?," why not also grab onto the more
positive
points of Catholicism? His own deep
self-hatred seemed to
negate
the positive points in almost everything.
DC
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 19:24:28 EST
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Bill Gargan
<WXGBC@CUNYVM.BITNET>
Subject: Re: opening chapter of duluoz
In-Reply-To: Message of Sat, 22 Nov 1997 14:00:41 +0000
from
<country@SOVER.NET>
On Sat,
22 Nov 1997 14:00:41 +0000 Marie Countryman said:
>wrote
_the medium is the message_ has great short cameo role in annie hall.
>
>RACE
--- wrote:
>
>>
Marie Countryman wrote:
>>
> Look, furthermore, my anguish as I call it arises from the fact that
>>
> people have changed so much, not only in the past five years for God's
>>
> sake, or past ten years as McLuhasn says,
>>
> mc
>>
>>
anyone know which McLuhan (if any specific) he might be referring to
>>
here? i scanned the M's on my
bookshelves and saw many but too lazy to
>>
check publication dates <off to coffee gallery - perhaps to breakthrough
>>
to the other side of writer's block>
>>
>>
david rhaesa
>>
salina, Kansas
Kerouac
may have read "The Mechanical Bride" (1951). I think he would have bee
n in
sympathy with McLuhan's views on the "American Mama's Boy."
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 18:53:09 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Mike Rice
<mrice@CENTURYINTER.NET>
Subject: Re: opening chapter of duluoz
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
The big
McLuhan book is Understanding Media, but Marshall
was a
mirky explainer of his own stuff, which isn't about beats
anyway,
but about media. His insight was that
the FORM of the
medium
was more important than the content that was on it. He
pointed
out that certain types of people were more fit to perform
in one
media than in another. Certain types of content were more
suitable
for new media like Television, than other kinds of
content. He made other kinds of assertions like that,
but his
books
are hard to read. I read in the NYTimes Book
Review
in the last week, a review of a book that explains
McLuhan
better than the now-dead media maven did himself. I'll
dig it
out for you if you're interested.
Mike
Rice
At
10:14 AM 11/22/97 -0800, you wrote:
>>Timothy
K. Gallaher wrote:
>>>
>>>
>Marie Countryman wrote:
>>>
>> Look, furthermore, my anguish as I call it arises from the fact that
>>>
>> people have changed so much, not only in the past five years for God's
>>>
>> sake, or past ten years as McLuhasn says,
>>>
>> mc
>>>
>
>>>
>anyone know which McLuhan (if any specific) he might be referring to
>>>
>here?
>>>
>>>
Marshall McCluhan (sp?) of the medium is the Message fame.
>>
>>well
obviously, but is that what he's referencing or perhaps Gutenberg
>>Galaxy
- i think way too early for Medium is the mAssage (but not
>>certain). I hadn't seen Marshall M. on the reading
lists for Jack that
>>we'd
been creating (so i suppose he might be added) - but i think the
>>basic
themes of the kinds of changes MM is describing might really
>>frustrate
a natural born writer.
>>
>
>You
think a good boy like Jack wasn't reading Catholic World?
>
>I
am sure he was familiar with McCluhan fro awhile from mcCluhans writings
>about
Finnegans wake.
>
>(Which
McCluhan book is specifically referred to in the opening allusion in
>Vanity
of Duluoz (if any partiular one) --I don't know).
>
>
>>david
rhaesa
>>salina,
Kansas
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 19:49:42 +0000
Reply-To: randyr@southeast.net
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Comments: Authenticated sender is
<randyr@pop.jaxnet.com>
From: randy royal
<randyr@MAILHUB.JAXNET.COM>
Subject: Re: A little too much of the Dharma
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-type:
text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-transfer-encoding:
7BIT
wet
toilet paper does the trick just fine.
>
"The President of the United States, the big ministers of state, the great
>
bishops and shmishops and big shots everywhere, down to the lowest factory
>
worker with all his fierce pride, movie stars, executives and great engineers
>
and presidents of law firms with silk shirts and neckties and great expensive
>
traveling cases in which they place these various expensive English imported
>
hair brushes and shaving gear and pomades and perfumes are all walking around
>
with dirty azzoles! All you gotta do is simply wash yourself with soap and
>
water! it hasnt occurred to anybody in America at all! it's one of the
>
funniest things I've ever heard of! dont you think it's marvelous that we're
>
being called filthy unwashed beatnikes but we're the only ones walking around
>
with clean azzoles?" [sic all punctuation/capitalization]
>
> In
only slight contrast, perfectly appropriate to a Zen master, Lin-Chi says:
>
>
"In Buddhism there is no place for using effort. Just be ordinary and
nothing
>
special. Eat your food, move your bowels, pass water, and when you're tired
> go
and lie down again. The ignorant will laugh at me, but the wise will
>
understand.
>
>
> I
always am reminded how deep was Jack's search (no pun) for spirituality
>
when I read the many, many things he wrote about the care and feeding of his
>
body while obeying his equally strong compulsion for self-destruction.
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 20:28:53 -0400
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Preston Whaley
<paw8670@MAILER.FSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: Ordering of the Duluoz Legend
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>Preston
Whaley mentioned that I left "Pic" out of the Duluoz Legend. This
>was
not an accident. I frankly don't see
how it fits in, as there is no
>appearance
by Jack himself, in character or not. I
seem to recall that at
>one
point Jack intended the main character to meet up with Sal and Dean,
>but
that Memere encouraged him to edit that part out before publication.
>Of
course, it has been years since I read "Pic," so maybe my memory is
>faulty
on this. Anyone?
>
>Jym
Jym,
thankyou
for stating your reasons. i typed way
too soon. Haven't read Pic.
I'm (em)bare-assed. Is Pic written first person? JK once wrote in OR
he'd
wished he were a negro. Since the book
was begun in '51, I wonder if
there
is a vicarious dimension to it? I'll
have to read-see.
Preston
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 22:00:26 +0000
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Marie Countryman
<country@SOVER.NET>
Subject: Re: opening and closing books duluoz
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854";
x-mac-creator="4D4F5353"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
have
done so since yr last post. again, thanks paul.
mc
Paul A.
Maher Jr. wrote:
> It
is this savage plight that plagues most biographies, the ability of the
>
"biographer" to capture the mind/thought of the person in question
about who
> he
or she was thinking or their particular motive in any situation. Stella
>
Kerouac was one of the few supporters of Jack's work in Lowell and one of
>
the few women who he really opened up to what he was thinking both
>
personally and artistically. Check out the few letters in Selected Letters
>
for example....Sincerely, Paul...
>
"We cannot well do without our sins; they are the highway to our
virtues."
>
Henry David Thoreau
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 22:11:51 +0000
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Marie Countryman
<country@SOVER.NET>
Subject: beat-lives!!!
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854";
x-mac-creator="4D4F5353"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
even
when caught with foot in mouth (hat off to paul) i am feeling
wonderful
about beat-l again! so glad that the duluoz has prompted so
many
thoughtful posts!
will
finish my re-ead of big sur, am also
thinking that dharma bums
makes a
good contrast and am beginning to re-read it as well. many
thanks
to all who responded! beat-l lives!
(and
still am curious re: wsb and letters to ginsberg, interzone, naked
lunch:
if the routines were separate, i still wonder if their seeds are
not to
be found in the letters- wsb specialists, any takers?
thanks
for a great, thought provoking day.
mc
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 22:30:29 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Nancy B Brodsky
<nbb203@IS8.NYU.EDU>
Subject: SOTD @ St.Marks
In-Reply-To: <199711181828.KAA17029@hsc.usc.edu>
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Is
anyone going to the Some of the Dharma reading at St.Mark's on December
3rd?
Let me know, I would love to meet people from the list. Thanks.
~Nancy
The
Absence of Sound, Clear and Pure, The Silence Now Heard In Heaven For
Sure-JK
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 21:56:26 -0700
Reply-To: saras@sisna.com
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Sara Straw <saras@SISNA.COM>
Organization:
SaraGRAPHICS
Subject: Re: opening chapter of duluoz
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
Mike
Rice wrote:
>
>
The big McLuhan book is Understanding Media, but Marshall
>
was a mirky explainer of his own stuff, which isn't about beats
>
anyway, but about media. His insight
was that the FORM of the
>
medium was more important than the content that was on it. He
>
pointed out that certain types of people were more fit to perform
> in
one media than in another. Certain types of content were more
>
suitable for new media like Television, than other kinds of
>
content. He made other kinds of
assertions like that, but his
>
books are hard to read. I read in the NYTimes Book
>
Review in the last week, a review of a book that explains
>
McLuhan better than the now-dead media maven did himself. I'll
>
dig it out for you if you're interested.
>
>
Mike Rice
>
Mike,
thanks for that explanation... You know, I tried and TRIED to
"get"
that book, but it just seemed like gobbledygook when I read it,
back in
'73. Of course, I was always stoned
back then, but I like your
explanation
better...
s
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 23:50:54 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
Subject: Re: beat-lives!!!
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
Marie
Countryman wrote:
>
>
even when caught with foot in mouth (hat off to paul) i am feeling
>
wonderful about beat-l again! so glad that the duluoz has prompted so
>
many thoughtful posts!
>
will finish my re-ead of big sur, am
also thinking that dharma bums
>
makes a good contrast and am beginning to re-read it as well. many
>
thanks to all who responded! beat-l lives!
>
(and still am curious re: wsb and letters to ginsberg, interzone, naked
>
lunch: if the routines were separate, i still wonder if their seeds are
>
not to be found in the letters- wsb specialists, any takers?
>
thanks for a great, thought provoking day.
> mc
beat-l
has risen indeed.
i think
there are some obvious connections between WSB letters and
writings. i recall specifically due to geography a
routine in one of
the
books about the connection with the President.
In the letters the
same
appears but the President is explicitly my neighbor to the east --
Eisenhower.
david
rhaesa
salina,
Kansas
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 23:52:14 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Jym Mooney <jymmoon@EXECPC.COM>
Subject: Re: Pic
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
Preston
Whaley wrote:
> Is
Pic written first person? JK once wrote
in OR
>
he'd wished he were a negro. Since the
book was begun in '51, I wonder
if
>
there is a vicarious dimension to it?
I'll have to read-see.
Yes, in
the persona of a ten year old black boy from the south.
Jym
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 02:20:04 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Anthony Celentano
<VegasDaddy@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: is this still beat-l?
I'm new
to the list, and I'm reading all this stuff about Gap ads and atheism
and
semantics and potential topics etc etc, and I guess I expected more of a
discussion
about actual Beat literature. I mean, I
could discuss the
pristine
lyric of Corso's "Haarlem" or "Ode to Coit Tower" forever,
but all
this
political business...I think that the wonderful thing about Jack Kerouac
was his
essential political apathy, and I think that he would have been
amused
at all this heated discussion about his image in the media. I think
it's
wonderful when the Beat writers are being discussed at all, in any
vein...but
I was wondering if anyone agrees about starting more discussions
about
the beautiful prose and phenomenal poetry itself. Those cats captured
something
magical in their literature and I for one would like to delve into
that
magic. I was also wondering if anyone
would agree with me when I
contend
that Corso was the greatest poet among the Beats? Thanks, and
perhaps
I am totally off the mark here and don't know what the hell I'm
talking
about,
Anthony
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 03:27:45 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Alex Howard
<kh14586@ACS.APPSTATE.EDU>
Subject: Re: Kerouac Gap Ad
In-Reply-To:
<971122150508_1247905025@mrin51.mail.aol.com>
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
> I
think if you look closely you will see that the the Gap ad is not the same
>
photo as on Minor Characters by Joyce Johnson. Same roll of film, and it is
>
possible that Joyce was airbrushed out in the the gap photo, but different
>
photos.
What I
know is from Joyce's mouth, and that's the same picture she cites.
There
was quite a bit of other work done to it to play up certain parts of
the
image over others, sharpen it, etc. The
original, I seem to remember,
was
much darker and a little duller, color too maybe. Probably switched
to
black and white for mood and ease of editing, sharpness, etc.
------------------
Alex
Howard (704)264-8259 Appalachian State
University
kh14586@am.appstate.edu P.O. Box 12149
http://www1.appstate.edu/~kh14586 Boone, NC 28608
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 10:11:48 +0100
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Rinaldo Rasa <rinaldo@GPNET.IT>
Subject: (FWD) Comparative Religions
In-Reply-To:
<1.5.4.32.19971122205919.006a79f4@pop.pipeline.com>
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>Date:
Tue, 14 Oct 1997 10:25:58 -0400 (EDT)
>From:
YokoMofo@aol.com
>Subject:
Comparative Religions
>
>A
short guide to comparative religions
>
>
Taoism - Shit happens.
>
>
Confucism - Confucius say, "Shit happens."
>
>
Islamism - If shit happens, it is the will of Allah.
>
>
Buddhism - If shit happens, it isn't really shit.
>
>
Roman Catholicism - Shit happens because you are bad.
>
>
Calvinism - Shit happens becuase you don't work hard enough.
>
>
Judaism - Why does this shit always happen to us?
>
>
Lutheranism - If shit happens, have fiath, and it will stop happening.
>
>
Presybterianism - If shit has to happen, let it happen to someone else.
>
>
Zen - What is shit?
>
>
Jesuitism - If shit happens and nobody hears it, did it really make a sound?
>
>
Christian Science - If shit happesn, don't worry; it will go away on its
>own.
>
>
Hedonism - When shit happens, enjoy it.
>
>
Seventh Day Adventism - Shit happens every day but Saturday.
>
>
Hare Krishna - Shit happens. Rama,
rama, ohm, ohm.
>
>
Kastafarianism - Let's smoke this shit.
>
>
Hinduism - This shit happened before
>
>
Mormonism - This shit happened before, and it's going to happen again.
>
>
Atheism - Shit doesn't happen.
>
>
Agnosticism - Maybe shit happens, and maybe it doesn't
>
>
Stoicism - So shit happens Big deal. I
can take it!!!
>
>
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 06:56:14 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
Subject: Corso best? (was Re: is this still beat-l?
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
Anthony
Celentano wrote:
>
>
I'm new to the list, and I'm reading all this stuff about Gap ads and atheism
>
and semantics and potential topics etc etc, and I guess I expected more of a
>
discussion about actual Beat literature.
I mean, I could discuss the
>
pristine lyric of Corso's "Haarlem" or "Ode to Coit Tower"
forever, but all
>
this political business...I think that the wonderful thing about Jack Kerouac
>
was his essential political apathy, and I think that he would have been
>
amused at all this heated discussion about his image in the media. I think
>
it's wonderful when the Beat writers are being discussed at all, in any
>
vein...but I was wondering if anyone agrees about starting more discussions
>
about the beautiful prose and phenomenal poetry itself. Those cats captured
>
something magical in their literature and I for one would like to delve into
>
that magic. I was also wondering if
anyone would agree with me when I
>
contend that Corso was the greatest poet among the Beats? Thanks, and
>
perhaps I am totally off the mark here and don't know what the hell I'm
>
talking about,
>
>
Anthony
what
your talking about writing sounds wonderful.
i hope to learn tons
from
your posts. I especially like the idea
of someone big into Corso
posting
stuff. I'm still very weak in his
department. I got MineField
on my
last trip to Denver and have read some of it but not enough.
i don't
know whether i'll agree with you on him being the best poet, but
i'll
certainly enjoy the posts.
david
rhaesa
salina,
Kansas
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 07:11:18 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
Subject: Re: opening chapter of duluoz
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
Diane
Carter wrote:
> The positive part is that readers can use
what he wrote
> to
make their own lives more positive, because most of the time his
>
dispair is one mental step away from joy and positiveness but he
>
personally didn't make the leap.
> DC
This
reader-based orientation is probably what i'm looking at more in my
initial
post. I think it is a little more than
that. It is the reader
meeting
the author finding points of identification and then being able
to see
from the distance of time and the medium the pathway around the
anger. Without JK's lovely accounting of these
kinds of feelings, it
might
be easy to fall into the same traps. At
least for me :)
david
rhaesa
salina,
Kansas
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 06:49:33 -0800
Reply-To: Leon Tabory <letabor@cruzio.com>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Leon Tabory
<letabor@CRUZIO.COM>
Subject: Re: opening chapter of duluoz
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
I like
your point here, David
leon
-----Original
Message-----
From:
RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
To:
BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Date:
Sunday, November 23, 1997 5:12 AM
Subject:
Re: opening chapter of duluoz
>Diane
Carter wrote:
>> The positive part is that readers can use
what he wrote
>>
to make their own lives more positive, because most of the time his
>>
dispair is one mental step away from joy and positiveness but he
>>
personally didn't make the leap.
>>
DC
>
>This
reader-based orientation is probably what i'm looking at more in my
>initial
post. I think it is a little more than
that. It is the reader
>meeting
the author finding points of identification and then being able
>to
see from the distance of time and the medium the pathway around the
>anger. Without JK's lovely accounting of these
kinds of feelings, it
>might
be easy to fall into the same traps. At
least for me :)
>
>david
rhaesa
>salina,
Kansas
>.-
>
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 09:56:04 +0000
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Marie Countryman
<country@SOVER.NET>
Subject: Re: Corso best? (was Re: is this still beat-l?
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854";
x-mac-creator="4D4F5353"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
welcome
aboard, anthony!
glad to
have another person interested in discussing the beats and literature.
i'm
very
fond of corso, _love elegaic feelings american_,and also the pranksterish
role he
so often played among the crowd. there is a video (i'll get this
backward
i know)
called fried shoes and something else-- beats at naropa, in which AG and
corso
and others(gap in memory) which is much like a 'home movie' : beat poets
hang
out at naropa, kidding around, reading bits and pieces, and then all go out
to
train tracks to demonstrate against nuclear material being sent (oh boy, no
memory
this morning but i'll trudge on and hope someone clarifies this for me -
irony
would be that you've already seen it, anthony- any way, corso reads BOMB.
i
don't
know if he is best poet, but sure is a very beat beat. (in beautific
sense)
now
i'll muddle myself outta here. keep them posts and questions coming
mc
RACE
--- wrote:
>
Anthony Celentano wrote:
>
>
>
> I'm new to the list, and I'm reading all this stuff about Gap ads and
atheism
>
> and semantics and potential topics etc etc, and I guess I expected more of
a
>
> discussion about actual Beat literature.
I mean, I could discuss the
>
> pristine lyric of Corso's "Haarlem" or "Ode to Coit
Tower" forever, but all
>
> this political business...I think that the wonderful thing about Jack
Kerouac
>
> was his essential political apathy, and I think that he would have been
>
> amused at all this heated discussion about his image in the media. I think
>
> it's wonderful when the Beat writers are being discussed at all, in any
>
> vein...but I was wondering if anyone agrees about starting more
discussions
>
> about the beautiful prose and phenomenal poetry itself. Those cats
captured
>
> something magical in their literature and I for one would like to delve
into
>
> that magic. I was also wondering
if anyone would agree with me when I
>
> contend that Corso was the greatest poet among the Beats? Thanks, and
>
> perhaps I am totally off the mark here and don't know what the hell I'm
>
> talking about,
>
>
>
> Anthony
>
>
what your talking about writing sounds wonderful. i hope to learn tons
>
from your posts. I especially like the
idea of someone big into Corso
>
posting stuff. I'm still very weak in
his department. I got MineField
> on
my last trip to Denver and have read some of it but not enough.
>
> i
don't know whether i'll agree with you on him being the best poet, but
>
i'll certainly enjoy the posts.
>
>
david rhaesa
>
salina, Kansas
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 09:28:54 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
Subject: Re: opening chapter of duluoz
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
Leon
Tabory wrote:
>
> I
like your point here, David
>
>
leon
thanks. it sure is taking me a lot of posts to try
and make sense of
myself
<grin>.....after re-reading my posts on this thread, i think that
they
made the most sense to me in reading this one first and then going
back
the other stuff made more sense to me.
meeting
the author (and characters as well) is a big part of any reading
experience
for me. i haven't quite grasped what
the experience of
reading
is supposed to be about when it doesn't include that.
david
>
-----Original Message-----
>
From: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
>
To: BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
>
Date: Sunday, November 23, 1997 5:12 AM
>
Subject: Re: opening chapter of duluoz
>
>
>Diane Carter wrote:
>
>> The positive part is that
readers can use what he wrote
>
>> to make their own lives more positive, because most of the time his
>
>> dispair is one mental step away from joy and positiveness but he
>
>> personally didn't make the leap.
>
>> DC
>
>
>
>This reader-based orientation is probably what i'm looking at more in my
>
>initial post. I think it is a
little more than that. It is the reader
>
>meeting the author finding points of identification and then being able
>
>to see from the distance of time and the medium the pathway around the
>
>anger. Without JK's lovely
accounting of these kinds of feelings, it
>
>might be easy to fall into the same traps.
At least for me :)
>
>
>
>david rhaesa
>
>salina, Kansas
>
>.-
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 21:32:38 +0100
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Rinaldo Rasa <rinaldo@GPNET.IT>
Subject: a poem by Carol Berge.
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
OF ROOTS AND SOURCES by Carol Berge
(for d. levertov)
as when the person's bones and
thoughts
show like branches, through the skin,
through the years, overlaid in muted
or
fern tracery. or the voice remembered
when the page is read. it is the sense
of the thing to come, when discovering
this face that is not new, after all:
the idea opposite you which agrees
with these definitions you have
become.
under spruce, the needles fall and
fall,
the new in patterns resembling
letters,
the past forming their base or the way
through which the fine sheets climb.
it is those moving near you, to remind
of roots and sources, of your own
leaf.
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 16:46:09 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: You_Be Fine
<AngelMindz@AOL.COM>
Subject: big surLiSizeD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=unknown-8bit
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
quoted-printable
There
was a big photo spread in LOOK magazine, 1964, and I was 13. It was
about
LSD and the various places in San Francisco where a person could go=
in
and
trip, and the origins of the drug, which was discovered existing
naturally
in rye ergot, after an entire village in France in the 1940s or=
so
had
eaten tainted bread and gone mad from the effects of the chemical in =
its
found
state.=20
On the
way to church one Sunday morning, my dad and mom were talking abou=
t a
girl
who'd run away from home to go be a beatnik in San Francisco, and th=
at
she was
"taking the LSD." And I announced, "I'm going to take LSD
someday=
,"
because
it wasn't illegal yet and tripping sounded really cool, except fo=
r
that
part in the magazine story where one of the Frenchmen had gone crazy=
and
had
jumped out of a building, and I remember the horrible description of =
his
legs
"telescoping into his body" click click click click ugh.... and my d=
ad
said,
"No you're not going to do that, and you're crazy if you think you
are."
But I
was crazy and a few years later became a regular acidhead, whenever=
I
could
afford the buck-fifty to three bucks per hit, whenever anyone had
anything
good, and spent my weekends dropping, rushing, peaking and crash=
ing
into
the grunge state (grunge being a word jack used in some of his writi=
ng,
and the
word we used to describe that icky way we felt coming down from
psychedelics).
Last
time I dropped was in 1970, Valentine's Day, with a whole bunch of
friends,
and we all flipped out big time for the next dozen hours or so, =
but
it
seemed like much longer. Everyone was sure this was "the kind of acid =
you
don't
come back from." I remember seeing a vision of myself sitting in a
white
room in a straitjacket, lashed to a chair, my parents coming in to =
talk
to me
and me not being able to explain what had happened, but knowing I w=
as
never
going to come down, I was never going to have a life, and whatever =
I'd
known
before I'd never know again. They were crying and praying over me.
After
that vision, lying wide awake staring into darkness on a fold-out c=
ouch
at a
friend's house, my little sister sleeping peacefully beside me, my
sister
who'd been smart enough not to drop that acid, tears rolling down =
the
sides
of my eyes into my ears, I prayed to god, prayed and prayed, "If yo=
u'll
just
let me come down from this, I promise, I'll never take drugs again, =
I
promise...."
I prayed for hours and didn't even notice when I fell asleep=
,
although
I remember seeing the sun rise, as other people in the house pac=
ed
through
the kitchen into the living room, saying "Whew... jesus.... whew.=
..
shit...."
and breathing hard but too afraid to explain, too afraid to adm=
it
what
was going on, too afraid to admit how afraid we all were, like talki=
ng
about
it would cause everyone in the world to flip out.
It was
Sunday morning and I awoke, feeling destroyed, but I rose and went=
to
church,
and confessed and enlisted confederates to help me go confiscate =
that
bad acid
from others who'd bought it but hadn't dropped that night with u=
s. I
was
amazed to be alive and scared shitless. I never took drugs again. Hel=
l, I
didn't
need to.
So I'm
reading Big Sur and thinking about 1970, after reading jack's word=
s:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------=
-----
------------------------------
And I
realize the unbearable anguish of insanity: how uninformed people c=
an
be
thinking insane people are "happy," O God, in fact it was Irwin
Garden
once
warned me not to think the madhouses are full of "happy nuts,"
"Ther=
e's
a
tightening around the head that hurts, there's a terror of the mind tha=
t
hurts
even more, they're so unhappy and especially because they cant expl=
ain
it to
anybody or reach out and be helped through all the hysterical paran=
oia
they
are really suffering more than anyone in the world and I think the
universe
in fact," and Iriwn knew this from observing his mother Naomi wh=
o
finally
had to have a lobotomy=97Which sets me thinking how nice to cut a=
way
therefore
all that agony in my forehead and STOP IT! STOP THAT BABBLING!.=
..
Poor
jackie, he tries to get a grip, calling out to God:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------=
-----
-----------
...I
say through all the noise of the voices "I'm with you, Jesus, for
always,
thank you"=97I lie there in cold sweat wondering what's come over=
me
for
years my Buddhist studies and pipesmoking assured meditations on
emptiness
and all of a sudden the Cross is
manifested to me=97My eyes fi=
ll
with
tears=97"We'll all be saved=97I wont even tell Dave Wain about it, I=
wont go
wake
him up down there and scare him, he'll know soon enough=97now I can
sleep."
As I
read this book I remembered someone once telling me it was part of t=
he
required
reading in some college-level psych courses, illustrating so
accurately
a certain type of descent into madness that comes from some
chemical
imbalance in the brain. And I was wondering if maybe jack had go=
t
hold of
some bad rye bread just before he went to the cabin... he was alw=
ays
eating
free and found bread and crowing about how much money he saved.
But the
catalyst is unimportant, because mind-altering chemicals only unl=
ock
what's
already in the brain, and when I read Big Sur now I think of Book =
of
Dreams,
and my own dreams, unexpressed except in my dream journal because
they
reveal too much about me and my twisted mind, and God never saved me
though
I saved God, and the sea that took Joyce didn't kindly sweep jack =
up,
but he
went on for 9 more years after Big Sur in this vulnerable state, n=
ot
really
writing anymore but not being mad, either, dying a more grisly dea=
th
than he
ever feared that night in Big Sur.
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 22:03:32 UT
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Sherri
<love_singing@CLASSIC.MSN.COM>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD
that's
an amazing story. and yeah, i think you
hit it right on the head, man,
that
horrible place of knowing and fearing the knowing. knowing you can't go
back,
frightened to go forward, not sure if there is a forward. scared to
live
and scared to die. like Joyce's
"general paralysis of the insane"...
only
magnified by the horrors of all the demons in one's head...
sherri
----------
From: BEAT-L: Beat Generation List on behalf of
You_Be Fine
Sent: Sunday, November 23, 1997 1:46 PM
To: BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
Subject: big surLiSizeD
There
was a big photo spread in LOOK magazine, 1964, and I was 13. It was
about
LSD and the various places in San Francisco where a person could go=
in
and
trip, and the origins of the drug, which was discovered existing
naturally
in rye ergot, after an entire village in France in the 1940s or=
so
had
eaten tainted bread and gone mad from the effects of the chemical in =
its
found
state.=20
On the
way to church one Sunday morning, my dad and mom were talking abou=
t a
girl
who'd run away from home to go be a beatnik in San Francisco, and th=
at
she was
"taking the LSD." And I announced, "I'm going to take LSD
someday=
,"
because
it wasn't illegal yet and tripping sounded really cool, except fo=
r
that
part in the magazine story where one of the Frenchmen had gone crazy=
and
had
jumped out of a building, and I remember the horrible description of =
his
legs
"telescoping into his body" click click click click ugh.... and my d=
ad
said,
"No you're not going to do that, and you're crazy if you think you
are."
But I
was crazy and a few years later became a regular acidhead, whenever=
I
could
afford the buck-fifty to three bucks per hit, whenever anyone had
anything
good, and spent my weekends dropping, rushing, peaking and crash=
ing
into
the grunge state (grunge being a word jack used in some of his writi=
ng,
and the
word we used to describe that icky way we felt coming down from
psychedelics).
Last
time I dropped was in 1970, Valentine's Day, with a whole bunch of
friends,
and we all flipped out big time for the next dozen hours or so, =
but
it
seemed like much longer. Everyone was sure this was "the kind of acid =
you
don't
come back from." I remember seeing a vision of myself sitting in a
white
room in a straitjacket, lashed to a chair, my parents coming in to =
talk
to me
and me not being able to explain what had happened, but knowing I w=
as
never
going to come down, I was never going to have a life, and whatever =
I'd
known
before I'd never know again. They were crying and praying over me.
After
that vision, lying wide awake staring into darkness on a fold-out c=
ouch
at a
friend's house, my little sister sleeping peacefully beside me, my
sister
who'd been smart enough not to drop that acid, tears rolling down =
the
sides
of my eyes into my ears, I prayed to god, prayed and prayed, "If yo=
u'll
just
let me come down from this, I promise, I'll never take drugs again, =
I
promise...."
I prayed for hours and didn't even notice when I fell asleep=
,
although
I remember seeing the sun rise, as other people in the house pac=
ed
through
the kitchen into the living room, saying "Whew... jesus.... whew.=
..
shit...."
and breathing hard but too afraid to explain, too afraid to adm=
it
what
was going on, too afraid to admit how afraid we all were, like talki=
ng
about
it would cause everyone in the world to flip out.
It was
Sunday morning and I awoke, feeling destroyed, but I rose and went=
to
church,
and confessed and enlisted confederates to help me go confiscate =
that
bad
acid from others who'd bought it but hadn't dropped that night with u=
s. I
was
amazed to be alive and scared shitless. I never took drugs again. Hel=
l, I
didn't
need to.
So I'm
reading Big Sur and thinking about 1970, after reading jack's word=
s:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------=
-----
------------------------------
And I
realize the unbearable anguish of insanity: how uninformed people c=
an
be
thinking insane people are "happy," O God, in fact it was Irwin
Garden
once
warned me not to think the madhouses are full of "happy nuts,"
"Ther=
e's
a
tightening around the head that hurts, there's a terror of the mind tha=
t
hurts
even more, they're so unhappy and especially because they cant expl=
ain
it to
anybody or reach out and be helped through all the hysterical paran=
oia
they
are really suffering more than anyone in the world and I think the
universe
in fact," and Iriwn knew this from observing his mother Naomi wh=
o
finally
had to have a lobotomy=97Which sets me thinking how nice to cut a=
way
therefore
all that agony in my forehead and STOP IT! STOP THAT BABBLING!.=
..
Poor
jackie, he tries to get a grip, calling out to God:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------=
-----
-----------
...I
say through all the noise of the voices "I'm with you, Jesus, for
always,
thank you"=97I lie there in cold sweat wondering what's come over=
me
for
years my Buddhist studies and pipesmoking assured meditations on
emptiness
and all of a sudden the Cross is
manifested to me=97My eyes fi=
ll
with
tears=97"We'll all be saved=97I wont even tell Dave Wain about it, I=
wont go
wake
him up down there and scare him, he'll know soon enough=97now I can
sleep."
As I
read this book I remembered someone once telling me it was part of t=
he
required
reading in some college-level psych courses, illustrating so
accurately
a certain type of descent into madness that comes from some
chemical
imbalance in the brain. And I was wondering if maybe jack had go=
t
hold of
some bad rye bread just before he went to the cabin... he was alw=
ays
eating
free and found bread and crowing about how much money he saved.
But the
catalyst is unimportant, because mind-altering chemicals only unl=
ock
what's already
in the brain, and when I read Big Sur now I think of Book =
of
Dreams,
and my own dreams, unexpressed except in my dream journal because
they
reveal too much about me and my twisted mind, and God never saved me
though
I saved God, and the sea that took Joyce didn't kindly sweep jack =
up,
but he
went on for 9 more years after Big Sur in this vulnerable state, n=
ot
really
writing anymore but not being mad, either, dying a more grisly dea=
th
than he
ever feared that night in Big Sur.
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 17:10:25 +0000
Reply-To: randyr@southeast.net
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Comments: Authenticated sender is
<randyr@pop.jaxnet.com>
From: randy royal
<randyr@MAILHUB.JAXNET.COM>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-type:
text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-transfer-encoding:
7BIT
hello
from
what i read, LSD was created by a swiss scientist by accident in
a
labratory in the fifties. it is synthetic though. but you did have
a nice
theory about jack's catalyst, and excellent insight. you can
check
hyperreal, though. they always have the staight dope <g>
randall
>
There was a big photo spread in LOOK magazine, 1964, and I was 13. It was
>
about LSD and the various places in San Francisco where a person could go in
>
and trip, and the origins of the drug, which was discovered existing
>
naturally in rye ergot, after an entire village in France in the 1940s or so
>
had eaten tainted bread and gone mad from the effects of the chemical in its
>
found state.
>
> On
the way to church one Sunday morning, my dad and mom were talking about a
>
girl who'd run away from home to go be a beatnik in San Francisco, and that
>
she was "taking the LSD." And I announced, "I'm going to take
LSD someday,"
>
because it wasn't illegal yet and tripping sounded really cool, except for
>
that part in the magazine story where one of the Frenchmen had gone crazy and
>
had jumped out of a building, and I remember the horrible description of his
>
legs "telescoping into his body" click click click click ugh.... and
my dad
>
said, "No you're not going to do that, and you're crazy if you think you
>
are."
>
>
But I was crazy and a few years later became a regular acidhead, whenever I
>
could afford the buck-fifty to three bucks per hit, whenever anyone had
>
anything good, and spent my weekends dropping, rushing, peaking and crashing
>
into the grunge state (grunge being a word jack used in some of his writing,
>
and the word we used to describe that icky way we felt coming down from
>
psychedelics).
>
>
Last time I dropped was in 1970, Valentine's Day, with a whole bunch of
>
friends, and we all flipped out big time for the next dozen hours or so, but
> it
seemed like much longer. Everyone was sure this was "the kind of acid you
>
don't come back from." I remember seeing a vision of myself sitting in a
>
white room in a straitjacket, lashed to a chair, my parents coming in to talk
> to
me and me not being able to explain what had happened, but knowing I was
>
never going to come down, I was never going to have a life, and whatever I'd
>
known before I'd never know again. They were crying and praying over me.
>
>
After that vision, lying wide awake staring into darkness on a fold-out couch
> at
a friend's house, my little sister sleeping peacefully beside me, my
>
sister who'd been smart enough not to drop that acid, tears rolling down the
>
sides of my eyes into my ears, I prayed to god, prayed and prayed, "If
you'll
>
just let me come down from this, I promise, I'll never take drugs again, I
>
promise...." I prayed for hours and didn't even notice when I fell asleep,
>
although I remember seeing the sun rise, as other people in the house paced
>
through the kitchen into the living room, saying "Whew... jesus....
whew...
>
shit...." and breathing hard but too afraid to explain, too afraid to
admit
>
what was going on, too afraid to admit how afraid we all were, like talking
>
about it would cause everyone in the world to flip out.
>
> It
was Sunday morning and I awoke, feeling destroyed, but I rose and went to
>
church, and confessed and enlisted confederates to help me go confiscate that
>
bad acid from others who'd bought it but hadn't dropped that night with us. I
>
was amazed to be alive and scared shitless. I never took drugs again. Hell, I
>
didn't need to.
>
> So
I'm reading Big Sur and thinking about 1970, after reading jack's words:
>
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
------------------------------
>
And I realize the unbearable anguish of insanity: how uninformed people can
> be
thinking insane people are "happy," O God, in fact it was Irwin
Garden
>
once warned me not to think the madhouses are full of "happy nuts,"
"There's
> a
tightening around the head that hurts, there's a terror of the mind that
>
hurts even more, they're so unhappy and especially because they cant explain
> it
to anybody or reach out and be helped through all the hysterical paranoia
>
they are really suffering more than anyone in the world and I think the
>
universe in fact," and Iriwn knew this from observing his mother Naomi who
>
finally had to have a lobotomy-Which sets me thinking how nice to cut away
>
therefore all that agony in my forehead and STOP IT! STOP THAT BABBLING!...
>
>
Poor jackie, he tries to get a grip, calling out to God:
>
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
-----------
>
...I say through all the noise of the voices "I'm with you, Jesus, for
>
always, thank you"-I lie there in cold sweat wondering what's come over me
>
for years my Buddhist studies and pipesmoking assured meditations on
>
emptiness and all of a sudden the Cross
is manifested to me-My eyes fill
>
with tears-"We'll all be saved-I wont even tell Dave Wain about it, I wont
go
>
wake him up down there and scare him, he'll know soon enough-now I can
>
sleep."
>
> As
I read this book I remembered someone once telling me it was part of the
>
required reading in some college-level psych courses, illustrating so
>
accurately a certain type of descent into madness that comes from some
>
chemical imbalance in the brain. And I was wondering if maybe jack had got
>
hold of some bad rye bread just before he went to the cabin... he was always
>
eating free and found bread and crowing about how much money he saved.
>
>
But the catalyst is unimportant, because mind-altering chemicals only unlock
>
what's already in the brain, and when I read Big Sur now I think of Book of
>
Dreams, and my own dreams, unexpressed except in my dream journal because
>
they reveal too much about me and my twisted mind, and God never saved me
>
though I saved God, and the sea that took Joyce didn't kindly sweep jack up,
>
but he went on for 9 more years after Big Sur in this vulnerable state, not
>
really writing anymore but not being mad, either, dying a more grisly death
>
than he ever feared that night in Big Sur.
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 16:37:04 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
randy
royal wrote:
>
>
hello
>
from what i read, LSD was created by a swiss scientist by accident in
> a
labratory in the fifties. it is synthetic though. but you did have
> a
nice theory about jack's catalyst, and excellent insight. you can
>
check hyperreal, though. they always have the staight dope <g>
>
randall
>
>
> There was a big photo spread in LOOK magazine, 1964, and I was 13. It was
>
> about LSD and the various places in San Francisco where a person could go
in
>
> and trip, and the origins of the drug, which was discovered existing
>
> naturally in rye ergot, after an entire village in France in the 1940s or
so
>
> had eaten tainted bread and gone mad from the effects of the chemical in
its
>
> found state.
rye
egot dates back much further than this.
it is supposedly something
used in
religious ritual in the ancient greek mystery religions.
according
to some accounts, it was given to Socrates by the Oracle at
Delphi. such an account of Socrates' initiation
provides quite a
different
spin on all the writings about him.
i
wonder how long i need to leave the rye bread out? :)
LSD is
a synthesized hallucinogen which has qualities similar to rye
egot or
mushrooms. while the comments that it
is all there in one's
mind
already and LSD just makes it apparent, my experience is that the
pace at
which one experiences it is sped up incredibly. Some of the
ideas
revealed over ten years ago just make sense in real-time. Other
notions
have yet to be revealed.
The
words I heard Allen Ginbserg use on some video attributing to JK
about
LSD that "walking on water wasn't built in a day" is a fairly
accurate
assessment in some ways of some of the experiences. never a
"bad"
trip....but always baffling notions at the edges and the edges are
at the
level that might not be built in several lifetimes but are pushed
into
such a compressed time as to be potentially disabling when the
walking
on water wears off. this is especially
the case if one is in a
rush to
learn the meaning of any particular visions.
also,
everyone's brain chemistry is different and so some folks may have
experiences
as "odd" without the addition of chemicals which it would
take
others huge quantities of chemicals to imitate. just differences
we all
have.
just a
few notions from a disabled veteran of psychedelics and
psychotropics
:)
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 16:52:46 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Michael Skau
<mskau@CWIS.UNOMAHA.EDU>
Subject: Re: opening chapter of duluoz
Comments:
To: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
In-Reply-To: <347754AE.5C4@midusa.net>
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Sat,
22 Nov 1997, RACE --- wrote:
>
Diane Carter wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> I have some trouble seeing your more positive reading of the passage. I
>
> see it once again as a very tired Kerouac immersed in his own sorrow.
>
> DC
>
>
Diane,
>
>
your whole post is wonderful (as usual) and i'll try to get to the rest
> of
it on a day when i haven't used up so many of my ten posts. but
>
since you and marie didn't see where i was really coming from on this
>
reading, i thought i'd take a moment to try and clarify.
>
>
i'm not sure that it is a positive reading per se, as much as an absurd
>
reading with perhaps a positive lesson.
i'll try to be a bit clearer.
>
>
the first positive i feel is the positiveness of identification. i
>
definitely felt the "been there, done that and survived it" feeling
>
while reading those words. certainly,
the style in which JK describes
> it
is beyond me, but i definitely got the sense of -- yeah i've seen
>
life that dark before. fairly similar
to the feeling i get when
>
listening to something like Hank Williams' "I'm So Lonesome I Could
>
Cry", it is absurd to find happiness in perhaps the saddest song ever
>
written, but it is there for me in knowing that some one has felt depths
> of
loneliness that when i feel them it seems i am the only one who could
>
ever have been there and done that. it
is the idenitification with
>
another's suffering as both showing that your suffering is real, but
>
also that your suffering might not be the worst thing anyone has ever
>
felt emotionally. in the passage from
JK, it is not just a loneliness,
>
but an anger at the alien-ness of feeling like one doesn't belong to the
> human
race. But in reading the words and
identifying with them and the
>
feelings behind them, I know that there are people in the human race who
>
have been where i've been and know the paths to some extent that i'm on.
>
David,
I agree
with you. Kerouac seems to have gotten some sense of relief (or
release)
by articulating his Rubaiyat-like disgruntlement with the human
condition.
Remember Sal Paradise after seeing _Fidelio_(?) in _On the
Road_:
he goes around chirping "What gloom!"
Cordially,
Mike
Skau
>
>
david rhaesa
>
salina, Kansas
>
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 16:55:32 -0800
Reply-To: vic.begrand@sk.sympatico.ca
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Adrien Begrand
<vic.begrand@SK.SYMPATICO.CA>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
quoted-printable
How can
I myself offer any analysis of Big Sur after yr incredible
heartfelt
post? That was one of the best postings to the list that I've
read in
my year or so on beat-l. It's a keeper.
Thanks,
Adrien
You_Be
Fine wrote:
>=20
>
There was a big photo spread in LOOK magazine, 1964, and I was 13. It w=
as
>
about LSD and the various places in San Francisco where a person could =
go in
>
and trip, and the origins of the drug, which was discovered existing
>
naturally in rye ergot, after an entire village in France in the 1940s =
or so
>
had eaten tainted bread and gone mad from the effects of the chemical i=
n its
>
found state.
>=20
> On
the way to church one Sunday morning, my dad and mom were talking ab=
out a
>
girl who'd run away from home to go be a beatnik in San Francisco, and =
that
>
she was "taking the LSD." And I announced, "I'm going to take
LSD somed=
ay,"
>
because it wasn't illegal yet and tripping sounded really cool, except =
for
>
that part in the magazine story where one of the Frenchmen had gone cra=
zy and
>
had jumped out of a building, and I remember the horrible description o=
f his
>
legs "telescoping into his body" click click click click ugh.... and
my=
dad
>
said, "No you're not going to do that, and you're crazy if you think yo=
u
>
are."
>=20
>
But I was crazy and a few years later became a regular acidhead, whenev=
er I
>
could afford the buck-fifty to three bucks per hit, whenever anyone had
>
anything good, and spent my weekends dropping, rushing, peaking and cra=
shing
>
into the grunge state (grunge being a word jack used in some of his wri=
ting,
>
and the word we used to describe that icky way we felt coming down from
>
psychedelics).
>=20
>
Last time I dropped was in 1970, Valentine's Day, with a whole bunch of
>
friends, and we all flipped out big time for the next dozen hours or so=
, but
> it
seemed like much longer. Everyone was sure this was "the kind of aci=
d you
>
don't come back from." I remember seeing a vision of myself sitting in =
a
>
white room in a straitjacket, lashed to a chair, my parents coming in t=
o talk
> to
me and me not being able to explain what had happened, but knowing I=
was
>
never going to come down, I was never going to have a life, and whateve=
r I'd
>
known before I'd never know again. They were crying and praying over me.
>=20
>
After that vision, lying wide awake staring into darkness on a fold-out=
couch
> at
a friend's house, my little sister sleeping peacefully beside me, my
>
sister who'd been smart enough not to drop that acid, tears rolling dow=
n the
>
sides of my eyes into my ears, I prayed to god, prayed and prayed, "If =
you'll
>
just let me come down from this, I promise, I'll never take drugs again=
, I
>
promise...." I prayed for hours and didn't even notice when I fell asle=
ep,
>
although I remember seeing the sun rise, as other people in the house p=
aced
>
through the kitchen into the living room, saying "Whew... jesus.... whe=
w...
>
shit...." and breathing hard but too afraid to explain, too afraid to a=
dmit
>
what was going on, too afraid to admit how afraid we all were, like tal=
king
>
about it would cause everyone in the world to flip out.
>=20
> It
was Sunday morning and I awoke, feeling destroyed, but I rose and we=
nt to
>
church, and confessed and enlisted confederates to help me go confiscat=
e that
>
bad acid from others who'd bought it but hadn't dropped that night with=
us. I
>
was amazed to be alive and scared shitless. I never took drugs again. H=
ell, I
>
didn't need to.
>=20
> So
I'm reading Big Sur and thinking about 1970, after reading jack's wo=
rds:
>
-----------------------------------------------------------------------=
-------
>
------------------------------
>
And I realize the unbearable anguish of insanity: how uninformed people=
can
> be
thinking insane people are "happy," O God, in fact it was Irwin Gard=
en
>
once warned me not to think the madhouses are full of "happy nuts,"
"Th=
ere's
> a
tightening around the head that hurts, there's a terror of the mind t=
hat
>
hurts even more, they're so unhappy and especially because they cant ex=
plain
> it
to anybody or reach out and be helped through all the hysterical par=
anoia
>
they are really suffering more than anyone in the world and I think the
>
universe in fact," and Iriwn knew this from observing his mother Naomi =
who
>
finally had to have a lobotomy=97Which sets me thinking how nice to cut=
away
>
therefore all that agony in my forehead and STOP IT! STOP THAT BABBLING=
!...
>=20
>
Poor jackie, he tries to get a grip, calling out to God:
>
-----------------------------------------------------------------------=
-------
>
-----------
>
...I say through all the noise of the voices "I'm with you, Jesus, for
>
always, thank you"=97I lie there in cold sweat wondering what's come ov=
er me
>
for years my Buddhist studies and pipesmoking assured meditations on
>
emptiness and all of a sudden the Cross
is manifested to me=97My eyes =
fill
> with
tears=97"We'll all be saved=97I wont even tell Dave Wain about it,=
I wont go
>
wake him up down there and scare him, he'll know soon enough=97now I ca=
n
>
sleep."
>=20
> As
I read this book I remembered someone once telling me it was part of=
the
>
required reading in some college-level psych courses, illustrating so
>
accurately a certain type of descent into madness that comes from some
>
chemical imbalance in the brain. And I was wondering if maybe jack had =
got
>
hold of some bad rye bread just before he went to the cabin... he was a=
lways
>
eating free and found bread and crowing about how much money he saved.
>=20
>
But the catalyst is unimportant, because mind-altering chemicals only u=
nlock
>
what's already in the brain, and when I read Big Sur now I think of Boo=
k of
>
Dreams, and my own dreams, unexpressed except in my dream journal becau=
se
>
they reveal too much about me and my twisted mind, and God never saved =
me
>
though I saved God, and the sea that took Joyce didn't kindly sweep jac=
k up,
>
but he went on for 9 more years after Big Sur in this vulnerable state,=
not
>
really writing anymore but not being mad, either, dying a more grisly d=
eath
>
than he ever feared that night in Big Sur.
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 18:18:52 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: You_Be Fine
<AngelMindz@AOL.COM>
Subject: Fwd: big surLiSizeD
---------------------
Forwarded
message:
Subj: Re: big surLiSizeD
Date: 97-11-23 18:12:34 EST
From: AngelMindz
To: randyr@southeast.net
In a
message dated 97-11-23 18:06:00 EST, randy wrote:
<<
from what i read, LSD was created by a swiss scientist by accident in
a labratory in the fifties. it is synthetic
though. >>
yeah, i
think this is true, in terms of isolating the chemical itself. But I
do
believe the magazine story (early Sixties notwithstanding) was accurate,
as
well, since most chemical substances (including that good old mold,
penicillin)
occur naturally somewhere in our ecosystem, not just in a petri
dish.
and there are no accidents; just discoveries.
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 08:14:52 -0800
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Diane Carter
<dcarter@TOGETHER.NET>
Subject: from Vanity of Duluoz
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
There's
a really interesting passage I found (I don't know the page
number
as not having the book I'm reading the selections that are in The
Portable
Kerouac) in Book V, where it seems like it might be the first
time
that Jack has really looked at his own life in terms of the greater
universe. This takes place the summer before his
sophomore year at
Columbia
where he is still playing football and not yet a writer.
"One
night my cousin Blanche came to the house and sat in the kitchen
talking
to Ma among the packed boxes. I sat on
the porch outside and
leaned
way back with feet on rail and gazed at the stars for the first
time in
my life. A clear August night, the
stars, the Milky Way, the
whole
works clear. I stared and stared till
they stared back at me.
Where
the hell was I and what was all this?
I went into the parlour and sat down
in my father's old deep easy
chair
and fell into the wildest daydream of my life.
This is important
and
this is the key to the story, wifey dear:
[I'm
leaving out the entire daydream as it is quite long but the gist of
it is
in the paragraph below where he is a champion in just about any
activity
he undertakes]
I'm the world's heavyweight boxing
champion, the greatest writer,
the
world's champ miler, Rose Bowl and (pro-bound with New York Giants
football
non pareil) now offered every job on every paper in New York,
and
what else? Tennis anyone?
I woke up from this daydream suddenly
realizing that all I had to
do was
go back on the porch and look at the stars again, which I did, and
they
still just stared at me blankly.
In other words I suddenly realized
that all my ambitions, no
matter
how they came out, and of course as you can see fom the preceding
narrative,
they came out fairly ordinary, it wouldnt matter anyway in the
intervening
space between human breathings and the 'sigh of the happy
stars,'
so to speak, to quote Thoreau again.
It just didn't matter what I did,
anytime, anywhere, with anyone;
life is
funny like I said.
I suddenly realized we were all crazy
and had nothing to work for
except
the next meal and the next good sleep.
O God in the Heavens, what a fumbling,
hard-hanging, goof world
it is,
that people actually think they can gain anything from either
this, or
that, or thissa, or thatta, and in so doing, corrupt their
sacred
graves in the name of sacred-grave corruption."
DC
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 19:08:44 +0000
Reply-To: randyr@southeast.net
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Comments: Authenticated sender is
<randyr@pop.jaxnet.com>
From: randy royal
<randyr@MAILHUB.JAXNET.COM>
Subject: Re: Fwd: big surLiSizeD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-type:
text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-transfer-encoding:
7BIT
david
and all:
you'd
know better than i thru experience. and with stuff as sticky
like
this, i think i'd like to leave it that way.
randy
>
---------------------
>
Forwarded message:
>
Subj: Re: big surLiSizeD
>
Date: 97-11-23 18:12:34 EST
>
From: AngelMindz
>
To: randyr@southeast.net
>
> In
a message dated 97-11-23 18:06:00 EST, randy wrote:
>
>
<< from what i read, LSD was created by a swiss scientist by accident in
> a labratory in the fifties. it is synthetic
though. >>
>
>
yeah, i think this is true, in terms of isolating the chemical itself. But I
> do
believe the magazine story (early Sixties notwithstanding) was accurate,
> as
well, since most chemical substances (including that good old mold,
>
penicillin) occur naturally somewhere in our ecosystem, not just in a petri
>
dish. and there are no accidents; just discoveries.
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 19:36:56 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Gary Mex Glazner <PoetMex@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD
Comments:
To: race@midusa.net
Hey
Beat-list have any of you tried Toad Venom?
T.V.
"I've
got a new drug."
Fritz
has a new drug.
"Toad
venom wanna smoke some?"
"What
does it do?"
"Mild
high, acid, hash, coke buzz."
"Totally
toadular."
Nee
deep, Nee deep.
We
drive to the beach,
Climb
down cliffs.
Fritz
loads the pipe,
Flaky
wax substance.
Take a
hit,
Rolling,
ground.
Kids on
the cliff shout,
"Hey
man, smoke that bud up here dude."
Fritz
takes a hit. Now we are both rolling,
I yell
back to them,
"TOAD
VENOM!!"
Frog
high, web brain.
Buddha
bug tongue buzz.
Old
pond splashes in mind.
Close
eyes.
Tune to
insects,
Scope,
sight, snatch.
Toad
Mind, Toad Soul, Wart Love!!
Hallucinaphibians
in desert,
Arizona
evenings, web foot summer.
Glands
in the backs of their necks,
defense
against being bit.
Squeeze,
pop, juicy, squirt,
On
Pyrex dish.
Let it
dry over night.
Scrape,
scrape.
Fly
paper lily pad, LEAP!
Nee
deep, Nee deep, Nee Deep.
Yrs,
Gary
Mex Glazner
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 19:42:04 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Dave Redfern
<mushroom@INTERLOG.COM>
Subject: Big Sur / LSD
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
LSD was
discovered in 1938 in a Sandoz Lab in Basil Switzerland, the 25th in
a
series of ergot derivatives, thus the name LSD25. Dr Hofman, the
scientist
who discovered it, shelfed it until 1943, when shortly after the
Manhatten
Project's first nuclear chain reaction, he returned to it and
accidently
absorbed some through his fingertips.
Some suggest the two
events
were cosmiclly linked.
The
last documented case of rye ergot poisoning, sometimes referred to as St
Anthony's
Fire, occured in Pont-Saint-Esprit, France in 1951. Some deaths
did
occur.
The
ancient greeks had an ergot laced drink called Kykeon that they used in
an
annual pagan ritual which I believe was called the "Elusinian
Mysteries."
D.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 00:59:05 GMT
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: "Christopher M. Dumond"
<cmdumond@EHC.EDU>
Subject: Re: Kerouac Gap Ad
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Why am
I prolonging this?
I
believe the original photo can be found in the booklet that comes with the
audio
set, "The Jack Kerouac Collection"
I'm
almost positive that this is the one edited for the Khakis ad.
Just my
two cents
Chris
"I
just keep on running faster, chasing the happily I am ever after..."
~Lyle
Lovett
Visit
Chris's Page at http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Studios/2124
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 16:46:52 -0800
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Kris Kurrus
<kurrus@WORLDNET.ATT.NET>
Subject: Re: Fwd: big surLiSizeD
In-Reply-To:
<971123181851_207236322@mrin45.mail.aol.com>
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
At
11:18 PM 11/23/97 +0000, you wrote:
>---------------------
>Forwarded
message:
>Subj: Re: big surLiSizeD
>Date: 97-11-23 18:12:34 EST
>From: AngelMindz
>To: randyr@southeast.net
>
>In
a message dated 97-11-23 18:06:00 EST, randy wrote:
>
><<
from what i read, LSD was created by a swiss scientist by accident in
> a
labratory in the fifties. it is synthetic though. >>
>
>yeah,
i think this is true, in terms of isolating the chemical itself. But I
>do
believe the magazine story (early Sixties notwithstanding) was accurate,
>as
well, since most chemical substances (including that good old mold,
>penicillin)
occur naturally somewhere in our ecosystem, not just in a petri
>dish.
and there are no accidents; just discoveries.
>
LSD as
we know it, or know of it, DOES NOT exist naturally...
OK... I
have just been reading posts here for the last few days or so (as i
am
doing a graduate study on the "beat generation writiers"-- and
whatever
that
vague term may be construed to mean)
as an
old acidhead myself (and as a somewhat historically minded writer) I
have
some insights into the LSD phenomenon (as well as a little historical
perspective)....
OK...
so here goes... the indole, LSD (that
is d-Lysergic Acid
Diethylamide
or LysergSaureDiethylamid in it original German) was first
synthesized
in Basil, Switzerland, yes, Sandoz labs (1938-43) by a Dr.
Albert
Hoffman (I remember doing paper hits with his portrait on them in
the
70s, hehehe), but did not make into biochemical psychiatry until after
April
16, 1943 (the day Dr Albert accidentally dosed himself) and it was
many
years later that this research was released to the medical community
at
large (Zurich 1947, first scientific paper published, 1949 first North
American
Study, 1953 Sandoz applies to the FDA, and SIMULTANEOUSLY begins
distributing
large quantinities of this drug to "qualified" scientists
around
the world).... anyhow, after that all hell broke loose.....
So,
back to JACK and ergot (and ergotism).... as someone said earlier,
ergot
goes way back, in France around 945AD to 1600AD it was known as
"Saint
Anthony's Fire" (officially around 1100AD) and was/is quite lethal,
causing
muscle spasms, convulsions, and various disturbances of the
consciousness
and thinking (version #1). Another
version of ergotism
(Version
#2 same fungus, different deal) causes limbs to become swollen and
violent
burning pain (i.e. the "Fire" of our saint?) which moves rapidly
into
gangrene because the ergot causes a contraction of the blood vessels,
hence
cutting of blood flow to the limbs... ohh, nasty stuff huh?
So
anyway, it is important to note that ergot has Lysergic Acid in it (thus
its
property as a hallucinogen) and it was work with this fungus (Claviceps
purpurea)
and its alkaloids that lead Dr. Hoffman to the discovery of LSD...
Outside
of the beats and Jack's possible ingestion of an ergot dose (which
doesn't
seem likely, to me, due to the harsh side effects)... it is
interesting
to note (if you are into the Salem witch trials, that I have
read a
couple great articles that tie convulsive ergotism (version #1) to
the
eight "possesed" girls that started all that hullaballu back in
1692....
oh well, probably not
anyhow,
I hope this clears up a little about
the possibility of Jack's
exposurem
to ergotism during the Big Sur era..... but then, who knows.....
psychedelically
yours,
kris
kurrus
spokane,
washington
and
(interestingly, only symptomatic treatment exists even today)....
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 20:27:49 +0000
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Marie Countryman
<country@SOVER.NET>
Subject: Re: LSD INFO RESEARCH HISTORY
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854";
x-mac-creator="4D4F5353"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
FIRST
OF ALL REMEMBER IN ALL HORROR STORIES YOU HEAR, SET AND SETTING PLAY A
MAJOR
ROLE IN SAFETY AND ENHANCEMENT OF THE PSYCHEDELIC EXPERIENCE.
LSD 25
was an accidental discovery, yes, but by hoffman who was investigating
all
uses of
ergot; not the ergot that contaminates rye see. many other strains. the
bicycle
trip home is a classic and is to be found in many of the books listed
below.
many books below are out of print. the more scholarly ones were used in
classes
exploring the psychedelic experience approx 1966-73, at M.I.T. (one of
co
authors
below was an M.I.T. faculty member.
best
sources of info relating to discovery and development of lsd as well as
beats/sixties
cross over:
*jay
stevens : Storming Heaven LSD and the american dream; harper&row/perennial
library,
1988
best
source of cia involement and results:
martin
a. lee&bruce shlain: ACID DREAMS the complete social history of LSD: the
CIA,
the sixties and beyond;
grove
pressNY1985
best
source of knowledge of all naturally occuring psychedelics:
PLANTS
OF THE GODS / albert hofmann and schultes/healing arts press rochester
vt1992
LSD MY
PROBLEM CHILD: Albert Hoffman
other
resources
PSYCHEDELICS:
the uses and implications of halluciongenic drugs/ bernard Asson
and
huphrey osmond:anchor books; double day anchor book and company 1970
scholarly
studies, both professors
ALTERED
STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS: ed. charles t. tart/double day anchor
presscirca
1970 -
scholarly research including lsd both professors
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 20:33:41 +0000
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Marie Countryman
<country@SOVER.NET>
Subject: LSD INFO ADDENDUM
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854";
x-mac-creator="4D4F5353"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
In most
recounts of JK and lsd, by the principals who dosed him,
including
leary, the poop was he was acutely uncomfortable with the
experience.
it's in
one or two of the books i cited.
storming
heaven has account of AG and Peter O's first trip in which they
came
bursting exuberantly into leary's living room stark naked wanting
to call
the president and kruschev to tell them of how they could end
the
cold war....
mc
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 19:58:19 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
Subject: Re: LSD INFO ADDENDUM
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
Marie
Countryman wrote:
>
> In
most recounts of JK and lsd, by the principals who dosed him,
>
including leary, the poop was he was acutely uncomfortable with the
>
experience.
>
it's in one or two of the books i cited.
>
storming heaven has account of AG and Peter O's first trip in which they
>
came bursting exuberantly into leary's living room stark naked wanting
> to
call the president and kruschev to tell them of how they could end
>
the cold war....
> mc
burroughs
letters suggest that he was less than fond of the experience
as
well. but in junkie he refers to having
hallucinations as a child
naturally
so perhaps his particular chemical makeup wasn't well suited
to this
type of chemical change. from what i
understand about the
Doctor
Sax character and some of the other early kerouac tales, it seems
as
though he had a very very active imagination that reached the edges
from
early on. so the chemical stimulations
from hallucinogenics might
not
make sense -- and the understanding of the desire for alcohol to
sedate
the negations to which his mind leapt so easily later is also
understandable.
perhaps
some form of speed (which provides focus as well as lift - hence
its use
on attention-deficit difficulties) was the natural chemical for
Jack. so much of what is considered his kicks and
joy seem to come in
periods
associated with this chemical use.
does
someone know more about the changes in Kerouac's chemical use in
the
past ten years or so? did he move
strictly to alcohol? when did he
slow on
stimulants? are there accounts of what
his attitude towards
stimulants
were in the later years?
wondering
in kansas. soon to head for turkey in
Denver.
david
rhaesa
salina,
Kansas
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 20:01:04 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
Subject: oops typo Re: LSD INFO ADDENDUM
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
RACE
--- wrote:
>
>
does someone know more about the changes in Kerouac's chemical use in
>
the past ten years or so? did he move
strictly to alcohol? when did he
>
slow on stimulants? are there accounts
of what his attitude towards
>
stimulants were in the later years?
>
>
wondering in kansas. soon to head for
turkey in Denver.
>
>
david rhaesa
>
salina, Kansas
i meant
to say "last" ten years, not "past" ten years. though if
anybody
on the list has heard from Jack in the past ten years concerning
chemicals
or other matters i'd love to hear that too!!!!!
david
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 18:52:49 -0800
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Maggie Gerrity
<u2ginsberg@YAHOO.COM>
Subject: ginsberg and GAP
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
I found this on the net during one of my
intensive Ginsberg
searches.
I thought it's a bit relevant to the Kerouac GAP ad
discussion
of last week.
Maggie
Allen
Ginsberg wears Khakis
I saw
it in a GAP ad
in
Interview Magazine.
Did
someone from the public
relations
department at the GAP
call up
Allen Ginsberg
and
say:
"Picture
it --
you're
sitting on the
floor
surrounded by classic books (we'll even let you choose the
authors)
There's
an antique typewriter
sitting
in front of you.
You're
wearing
the
traditional
uniform
of beatnik
poets
-- literary spectacles,
a classic
white T-,
a
rugged
tweed
jacket, and of course,
khaki
pants.
On the
bottom of the page,
we see
in
elegant black
letters,
ALLEN GINSBERG WEARS KHAKIS.
So what
do ya think, Allen?"
__________________________________________________________________
Sent by
Yahoo! Mail. Get your free e-mail at http://mail.yahoo.com
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 22:02:54 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: You_Be Fine
<AngelMindz@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=unknown-8bit
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
quoted-printable
In a
message dated 97-11-23 21:13:42 EST, Kris wrote:
<<
distributing large quantinities of this drug to "qualified"
scientists
around the world).... anyhow, after that all
hell broke loose.....
=20
So, back to JACK and ergot (and ergotism)....
as someone said earlier,
>>
I
didn't really intend to imply (or even hypothesize) that jack had gotte=
n
hold of
some naturally occurring LSD (necessarily). When I read Big Sur o=
ver
again,
I was simply struck by how similar his madness was to acid & mesca=
line
trips I
took in the Sixties and finally, in 1970. Seems to me there must =
have
been a
catlyst that set him off. I've heard people say it was the DTs, an=
d I
don't
know too much about those, but I'm betting bummers, DTs and Jeffers=
on
Airplane
flights all come out of the same place, and are activated throug=
h
the
hypothalmus gland.
But I'd
love to hear other accounts of experiences similar to that jack w=
rote
about
in Big Sur, and know how they came about. I've seen two schizophren=
ic
breakdowns,
but they didn't heal right up like jack's did, and the worst =
of
his
delusions seemed to take place over a period of time that was less th=
an
24
hours long.
On the
other hand, like Ferlinghetti (Monsanto) keeps telling jack in the
book,
"Don't think too much... you think too much." And jack himself wrot=
e
about
that:
I GO
WALKING TOWARDS Mien Mo mountain in the moon illuminated August nigh=
t,
see
gorgeous misty mountains rising the horizon and like saying to me "Yo=
u
dont
have to torture your consciousness with endless thinking" so I sit i=
n
the
sand and look inward=85 "Man is a busy little animal, a nice little a=
nimal,
his
thoughts about everything dont amount to shit."
I sure
don't want to overthink this. There are some absolutely tactile im=
ages
in Big
Sur, and sometimes I think we overlook the quality of his prose in=
a
book
that has so much autobiographical information. We get hung up on "th=
e
story
behind the story," and fail to see the beauty.
I was
thinking how incredible it was that he had the presence of mind to =
be
aware
of what was happening to him, and to write it down so faithfully wh=
en
he was
finished cracking up. To me, that is a measure of his inspired sou=
l as
a
chosen one, a vessel through which such beauty flows as most ignorant f=
olks
can't
really understand. He certainly believed he was inspired:
BUT MY
WAKING UP would take place and then everything would vanish except
Heaven,
which is God=97And that was why later in life after these rather
strange
you must admit childhood reveries, after I had that fainting visi=
on
of the
Golden Eternity and others before and after it=85 in the woods, I
conceived
of myself as a special solitary angel sent down as a messenger =
from
Heaven
to tell everybody or show everybody by example that their peeking
society
was actually the Satanic Society and they were all on the wrong
track.
But he
saw his weaknesses:
WITH
ALL THIS IN MY BACKGROUND, now at the point of adulthood disaster of=
the
soul,
through excessive drinking, all this was easily converted into a
fantasy
that everybody in the world was witching me to madness:
And
maybe drugs were getting to him:
BUT
THAT'S NOT the point, about pot paranoia, yet maybe it is at that=97I=
=92ve
long
given it up because it bugs me anyway=97
Who
knows? He was certainly disillusioned:
=85I
USED TO STAND by the windows like this in my childhood and look out =
on
dusky
streets and think how awful I was in this development everybody sai=
d
was
supposed to be "my life" and "their lives." =96Not so much
that I=92m=
a
drunkard
that I feel guilty about but that others who occupy this plane o=
f
"life
on earth" with me don=92t feel guilty at all=97
I'm
happy to stipulate that jack's collapse didn't have anything to do wi=
th
LSD,
but was some kind of inner look in midlife where he couldn't deal wi=
th
what he
saw, and I add this tiny bit of theory: I think there were so few
peers
in his world who could ever reach him, because he was on a plane pe=
ople
could
witness but never visit. I know people like that. They just can't b=
e
reached,
not with fame, not with money, not with success, not with family=
,
not with
love. You can offer them everything, but their connection to god=
or
creation
is the only one they know and can hear, and when that connection
gets
fucked up... they're gone, baby, gone like jack.
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 22:17:15 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Nancy B Brodsky <nbb203@IS8.NYU.EDU>
Subject: Re: LSD INFO RESEARCH HISTORY
In-Reply-To: <199711240129.UAA21757@pike.sover.net>
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Potato
Chips were also an accidental discovery, jus thought youd like to
know...
On Sun,
23 Nov 1997, Marie Countryman wrote:
>
FIRST OF ALL REMEMBER IN ALL HORROR STORIES YOU HEAR, SET AND SETTING PLAY A
>
MAJOR ROLE IN SAFETY AND ENHANCEMENT OF THE PSYCHEDELIC EXPERIENCE.
>
LSD 25 was an accidental discovery, yes, but by hoffman who was investigating
> all
>
uses of ergot; not the ergot that contaminates rye see. many other strains.
the
>
bicycle trip home is a classic and is to be found in many of the books listed
>
below. many books below are out of print. the more scholarly ones were used in
>
classes exploring the psychedelic experience approx 1966-73, at M.I.T. (one of
> co
>
authors below was an M.I.T. faculty member.
>
>
best sources of info relating to discovery and development of lsd as well as
>
beats/sixties cross over:
>
*jay stevens : Storming Heaven LSD and the american dream;
harper&row/perennial
>
library, 1988
>
>
best source of cia involement and results:
>
martin a. lee&bruce shlain: ACID DREAMS the complete social history of LSD:
the
>
CIA, the sixties and beyond;
>
grove pressNY1985
>
>
best source of knowledge of all naturally occuring psychedelics:
>
PLANTS OF THE GODS / albert hofmann and schultes/healing arts press rochester
>
vt1992
>
>
LSD MY PROBLEM CHILD: Albert Hoffman
>
>
other resources
>
PSYCHEDELICS: the uses and implications of halluciongenic drugs/ bernard Asson
>
and huphrey osmond:anchor books; double day anchor book and company 1970
>
scholarly studies, both professors
>
>
ALTERED STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS: ed. charles t. tart/double day anchor
> presscirca
>
1970 - scholarly research including lsd both professors
>
The
Absence of Sound, Clear and Pure, The Silence Now Heard In Heaven For
Sure-JK
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 22:40:46 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Tyson Ouellette <Tyson_Ouellette@UMIT.MAINE.EDU>
Organization:
University of Maine
Subject: Re: Kerouac Gap Ad
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
8bit
>Why
am I prolonging this?
>I
believe the original photo can be found in the booklet that comes
>with
the
>audio
set, "The Jack Kerouac Collection"
>I'm
almost positive that this is the one edited for the Khakis ad.
you mean the one with Edie in the
background? that's what i
thought
when i saw the ad too.
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 21:43:42 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
You_Be
Fine wrote:
> I know people like that. They just can't be
>
reached, not with fame, not with money, not with success, not with family,
>
not with love. You can offer them everything, but their connection to god or
>
creation is the only one they know and can hear, and when that connection
>
gets fucked up... they're gone, baby, gone like jack.
i think
i understand what you're saying. but on
a lot of JK threads
over
the same year i feel like there is an anger towards JK for his
drinking
and his dying young -- and i'm not certain that it is exactly
rational. i'm not saying that you're going this far
here. but if JK is
one of
those folks that is ultimately connected with these magical
mysterious
forces more than with us mortals -- perhaps he went away b/c
that's
where he truly belonged. i don't know. just wonder sometimes if
our
collective feeling of being cheated out of more years of the JK that
has
been pedestalized isn't unfair.
david
rhaesa
salina,
Kansas
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 21:55:18 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
Subject: on the other hand (was Re: big
surLiSizeD without LSD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
RACE
--- wrote:
>
>
You_Be Fine wrote:
>
> I know people like that. They just
can't be
>
> reached, not with fame, not with money, not with success, not with family,
>
> not with love. You can offer them everything, but their connection to god
or
>
> creation is the only one they know and can hear, and when that connection
>
> gets fucked up... they're gone, baby, gone like jack.
>
> i
think i understand what you're saying.
but on a lot of JK threads
>
over the same year i feel like there is an anger towards JK for his
>
drinking and his dying young -- and i'm not certain that it is exactly
>
rational. i'm not saying that you're
going this far here. but if JK is
>
one of those folks that is ultimately connected with these magical
>
mysterious forces more than with us mortals -- perhaps he went away b/c
>
that's where he truly belonged. i don't
know. just wonder sometimes if
>
our collective feeling of being cheated out of more years of the JK that
>
has been pedestalized isn't unfair.
>
>
david rhaesa
>
salina, Kansas
<so
now i'm talking to myself on the Listserve!!!>
(another
typo BTW -- should have been "past" year not "same" year)
on the
other hand, also important not to pedestalize self-destruction
for
it's own sake. in the event that one
feels JK may have been
ultimately
connected with mysteries better met post-mortem, it hardly
means
this is the proper path for most of us.
This is part of why i
think
that reading his work as a means of avoiding self-destructiveness
(as
suggested in the Vanity threads) can be very important.
but
then again - what do i know ---- i've been threw more crackups than
Jack
and definitely had my own self-destructive phase so perhaps i
should
not be preachy --- if i was being preachy --
i'll go
back to talking to myself in private now..... :)
david
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 23:03:24 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Nancy B Brodsky <nbb203@IS8.NYU.EDU>
Subject: Good Blonde
In-Reply-To: <3478F7EE.3D0A@midusa.net>
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
I am
using Good Blonde for an assigment which entails studying a group of
essays
written by one author. The next part of the assigment requires that
I find
an essay on the original essays. Does anyone know if there are ny
books
out there that critique Kerouac's work, particularly those Good
Blonde?
Thanks.
~Nancy
The
Absence of Sound, Clear and Pure, The Silence Now Heard In Heaven For
Sure-JK
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 22:18:42 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Patricia Elliott
<pelliott@SUNFLOWER.COM>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
RACE
--- wrote:
>
>
You_Be Fine wrote:
>
> I know people like that. They just
can't be
>
> reached, not with fame, not with money, not with success, not with family,
>
> not with love. You can offer them everything, but their connection to god
or
>
> creation is the only one they know and can hear, and when that connection
>
> gets fucked up... they're gone, baby, gone like jack.
>
> i
think i understand what you're saying.
but on a lot of JK threads
>
over the same year i feel like there is an anger towards JK for his
>
drinking and his dying young -- and i'm not certain that it is exactly
>
rational. i'm not saying that you're
going this far here. but if JK is
>
one of those folks that is ultimately connected with these magical
>
mysterious forces more than with us mortals -- perhaps he went away b/c
>
that's where he truly belonged. i don't
know. just wonder sometimes if
>
our collective feeling of being cheated out of more years of the JK that
>
has been pedestalized isn't unfair.
>
>
david rhaesa
>
salina, Kansas
I feel
some anger at jack, it is probably the
same anger when you see
someone
choose "not to" It is a
tiring business this life and i am
impatient
and frustrated when a gift and vision is drowned in poison. I
believe
that jack drowned his gift in alcohol and killed it. I don't
know
why and i sure haven't walked in those shoes,
maybe the same gift
that
let him feel and see things as he did, dealt him the terror of his
life
being out of control. Maybe some of the
terror that is life burnt
him and
so he drank himself to death. but
still, i am angry that he
drank
himself to death.
patricia
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 23:24:07 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: "R. Bentz Kirby"
<bocelts@SCSN.NET>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
RACE
--- wrote:
<snip>
perhaps
he went away b/c
>
that's where he truly belonged. i don't
know. just wonder sometimes if
>
our collective feeling of being cheated out of more years of the JK that
>
has been pedestalized isn't unfair.
>
>
david rhaesa
>
salina, Kansas
Jack
gave everything he had in his soul to give.
He then was truly a "homeless"
man in
that he was on this planet past his time.
He wrote it all. With Thomas
Wolfe,
they told the story of 20th Century America.
They both then left as it
was
time to
go. Jack just could not adjust to
living without the fire in his gut.
He
couldn't
make the change. That's cool. As Neil Young said, "Better to burn
out,
than to
fade away."
--
Peace,
Bentz
bocelts@scsn.net
http://www.scsn.net/users/sclaw
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 23:27:51 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: "R. Bentz Kirby"
<bocelts@SCSN.NET>
Subject: What she said
Comments:
To: Hey Joe <hey-joe@gartholamew.solidsolutions.com>,
byrdmaniax
<byrdmaniax@waxing-eloquent.com>
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
My
eight year old daughter has not asked about Santa so she hasn't been
told. But, she is thinking about this Myth. So, tonight she says to
her
mother. "You know those guys at
the mall. They take the things
that
you tell them, then they email them back to Santa. That way, Santa
knows
what you want."
Now
that is a good edition to the American myth.
Email to Santa from
how
many malls and how many messages. No
wonder the backbone is being
overloaded! I mean, think of the flow around 9:00 in
each time zone!
:-)
--
Peace,
Bentz
bocelts@scsn.net
http://www.scsn.net/users/sclaw
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 23:31:43 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: "R. Bentz Kirby"
<bocelts@SCSN.NET>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
Patricia
Elliott wrote:
> I
feel some anger at jack, it is probably
the same anger when you see
>
someone choose "not to" It is
a tiring business this life and i am
>
impatient and frustrated when a gift and vision is drowned in poison. I
>
believe that jack drowned his gift in alcohol and killed it. I don't
>
know why and i sure haven't walked in those shoes, maybe the same gift
>
that let him feel and see things as he did, dealt him the terror of his
>
life being out of control. Maybe some
of the terror that is life burnt
>
him and so he drank himself to death.
but still, i am angry that he
>
drank himself to death.
>
patricia
Patricia
I did
not mean to sanction what Jack did. My
point was that once he knew that
his
purpose
as a "writer" had been manifest, he could not adjust to a new
role. I
think
it is
tragic that he lacked the courage to do it.
It's just that some choose to
leave
once they "do it." I have
always admired WSB's courage for hanging tough
no
matter
what. I wish that Jack had more of
that. But he didn't. So, it is
better
that he
is gone. And he did give us all of his
heart and soul, even if he
couldn't
do it
in real life relationships.
--
Peace,
Bentz
bocelts@scsn.net
http://www.scsn.net/users/sclaw
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 00:15:40 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: You_Be Fine <AngelMindz@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
In a
message dated 97-11-24 00:07:24 EST, Bentz wrote:
<<
Jack just could not adjust to living without the fire in his gut.
He couldn't make the change. That's cool. >>
Now
this I don't agree with. I think jack was so passive... the observer of
all the
ones who HAD the fire in their guts. But I know he became more
passive
and more timid as he grew older, as so many of us do. Sometimes it's
hard to
look back on exploits of one's salad days and believe we really
survived
it all.
jack
had a disease (at least one). He suffered the progressive disease of
alcoholism.
That takes a tremendous physical toll, and sometimes I think he
was
just living on psychotic energy or something to get from day to day. I
don't
know. I'm no expert. I can only speak from personal experience and
death
certificates.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 00:27:22 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: You_Be Fine
<AngelMindz@AOL.COM>
Subject: big surLiSizeD without anger
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=unknown-8bit
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
quoted-printable
In a
message dated 97-11-24 00:08:13 EST, you write:
<<=20
on the other hand, also important not to
pedestalize self-destruction
for it's own sake. in the event that one feels JK may have been
ultimately connected with mysteries better
met post-mortem, it hardly
means this is the proper path for most of
us. >>
Yeah,
the artist/poet myth that allows for unchecked drinking and
self-destructive
behaviour is romantic and bogus and SICK. The
self-destruction
that jack suffered was NOT deliberate, nor was it connec=
ted
to his
gift... his "angel mind," if you will (hee hee hee)... He was an
artist
IN SPITE of it, not BECAUSE of it. He was an alcoholic, an angel, =
a
vessel,
a drunk. To be angry at him is understandable, at a distance from
whence
we view it today. But if only we had seen him up close... I don't
think
anyone would have wasted their anger on him. Again, in his words:
"WELL
I DONT KNOW all those big theories about how everything should be
goddamit
all I know it that I=92m a helpless hunk of horse manure looking=
in
your
eye saying Help me"=97
Shit,
why am I explaining? It's all there, in Big Sur, and it only takes =
a
Saturday
to read it.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 00:23:03 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Mark Slattey
<08SLATTERY@CUA.EDU>
Subject: Re: LSD INFO ADDENDUM
MIME-version:
1.0
Content-type:
TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII
Content-transfer-encoding:
7BIT
Unsubsribe beat list
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 1997 23:58:23 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: jo grant <jgrant@BOOKZEN.COM>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD
In-Reply-To:
<971123164607_1483088457@mrin86.mail.aol.com>
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
AngelMindz@AOL.COM
wrote:
>After
that vision, lying wide awake staring into darkness on a fold-out couch
>at
a friend's house, my little sister sleeping peacefully beside me, my
>sister
who'd been smart enough not to drop that acid, tears rolling down the
>sides
of my eyes into my ears, I prayed to god, prayed and prayed, "If you'll
>just
let me come down from this, I promise, I'll never take drugs again, I
>promise...."
Anyone
remember that great country song of 40 or so years ago:
"I
got tears in my ears from layin' on my back 'n crying my heart out over
you."
j grant
Small Press Publishers and
Authors
Display Books Free At
BookZen
592,901
Visitors 07-01-96 to 11-01-97
http://www.bookzen.com
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 06:05:24 UT
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Sherri <love_singing@CLASSIC.MSN.COM>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
man
have you hit that, except that i think he still was on his path and just
had to
ride it out. he got what he needed to
learn that time around, and
somehow
i feel like maybe he got far enough along that he has no need to
revisit
this plane.
JK was
definitely more of the spiritual realm than of this one, IMHO, from his
early
childhood.
ciao,
sherri
----------
From: BEAT-L: Beat Generation List on behalf of
You_Be Fine
Sent: Sunday, November 23, 1997 7:02 PM
To: BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
In a
message dated 97-11-23 21:13:42 EST, Kris wrote:
<<
distributing large quantinities of this drug to "qualified" scientists
around the world).... anyhow, after that all
hell broke loose.....
=20
So, back to JACK and ergot (and ergotism)....
as someone said earlier,
>>
I
didn't really intend to imply (or even hypothesize) that jack had gotte=
n
hold of
some naturally occurring LSD (necessarily). When I read Big Sur o=
ver
again,
I was simply struck by how similar his madness was to acid & mesca=
line
trips I
took in the Sixties and finally, in 1970. Seems to me there must =
have
been a
catlyst that set him off. I've heard people say it was the DTs, an=
d I
don't
know too much about those, but I'm betting bummers, DTs and Jeffers=
on
Airplane
flights all come out of the same place, and are activated throug=
h
the
hypothalmus gland.
But I'd
love to hear other accounts of experiences similar to that jack w=
rote
about
in Big Sur, and know how they came about. I've seen two schizophren=
ic
breakdowns,
but they didn't heal right up like jack's did, and the worst =
of
his
delusions seemed to take place over a period of time that was less th=
an
24
hours long.
On the
other hand, like Ferlinghetti (Monsanto) keeps telling jack in the
book,
"Don't think too much... you think too much." And jack himself wrot=
e
about
that:
I GO
WALKING TOWARDS Mien Mo mountain in the moon illuminated August nigh=
t,
see
gorgeous misty mountains rising the horizon and like saying to me "Yo=
u
dont
have to torture your consciousness with endless thinking" so I sit i=
n
the
sand and look inward=85 "Man is a busy little animal, a nice little a=
nimal,
his
thoughts about everything dont amount to shit."
I sure
don't want to overthink this. There are some absolutely tactile im=
ages
in Big
Sur, and sometimes I think we overlook the quality of his prose in=
a
book
that has so much autobiographical information. We get hung up on "th=
e
story
behind the story," and fail to see the beauty.
I was
thinking how incredible it was that he had the presence of mind to =
be
aware
of what was happening to him, and to write it down so faithfully wh=
en
he was
finished cracking up. To me, that is a measure of his inspired sou=
l as
a
chosen one, a vessel through which such beauty flows as most ignorant f=
olks
can't
really understand. He certainly believed he was inspired:
BUT MY
WAKING UP would take place and then everything would vanish except
Heaven,
which is God=97And that was why later in life after these rather
strange
you must admit childhood reveries, after I had that fainting visi=
on
of the
Golden Eternity and others before and after it=85 in the woods, I
conceived
of myself as a special solitary angel sent down as a messenger =
from
Heaven
to tell everybody or show everybody by example that their peeking
society
was actually the Satanic Society and they were all on the wrong
track.
But he
saw his weaknesses:
WITH
ALL THIS IN MY BACKGROUND, now at the point of adulthood disaster of=
the
soul,
through excessive drinking, all this was easily converted into a
fantasy
that everybody in the world was witching me to madness:
And
maybe drugs were getting to him:
BUT
THAT'S NOT the point, about pot paranoia, yet maybe it is at that=97I=
=92ve
long
given it up because it bugs me anyway=97
Who
knows? He was certainly disillusioned:
=85I
USED TO STAND by the windows like this in my childhood and look out =
on
dusky
streets and think how awful I was in this development everybody sai=
d
was
supposed to be "my life" and "their lives." =96Not so much
that I=92m=
a
drunkard
that I feel guilty about but that others who occupy this plane o=
f
"life
on earth" with me don=92t feel guilty at all=97
I'm
happy to stipulate that jack's collapse didn't have anything to do wi=
th
LSD,
but was some kind of inner look in midlife where he couldn't deal wi=
th
what he
saw, and I add this tiny bit of theory: I think there were so few
peers
in his world who could ever reach him, because he was on a plane pe=
ople
could
witness but never visit. I know people like that. They just can't b=
e
reached,
not with fame, not with money, not with success, not with family=
,
not
with love. You can offer them everything, but their connection to god=
or
creation
is the only one they know and can hear, and when that connection
gets
fucked up... they're gone, baby, gone like jack.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 06:11:34 UT
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Sherri
<love_singing@CLASSIC.MSN.COM>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
i was
writing a post like this when this came up, Bentz. thanks. the soul
chooses
its path for its own reasons. who are
we to judge that? hell, i'm in
love
with JK - sometimes reading him is like reading myself (only a thousand
times
better). i was just a kid when he died
and the only thing i really knew
about
him was having seen him on the Steve Allen show when i was probably
about 5
or 7. i knew of him as a writer, but didn't 'meet' him until fairly
recently. the moment i 'met' him there was an instant
soul connection for me.
sometimes
the feet can't cling to this earth any more.
he needed to go sooner
than he
did. "Big Sur" makes it obvious. but his doubt kept him here and
the
drink dulled the fear. i definitely say
a huge YES to life. and as much
as i
would have liked Jack to be around when i could have appreciated him and
would
have been greedy to have more and more books from him, i would never
have
wished for his continued misery. i'll
always mourn him, but i'll never
be
angry at him - he owed me nothing.
ciao,
sherri
"there's
a black cat caught in a high treetop (that's my soul up there)...
i'll
always be queen of pain"
----------
From: BEAT-L: Beat Generation List on behalf of
R. Bentz Kirby
Sent: Sunday, November 23, 1997 8:24 PM
To: BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
RACE ---
wrote:
<snip>
perhaps
he went away b/c
>
that's where he truly belonged. i don't
know. just wonder sometimes if
>
our collective feeling of being cheated out of more years of the JK that
>
has been pedestalized isn't unfair.
>
>
david rhaesa
>
salina, Kansas
Jack
gave everything he had in his soul to give.
He then was truly a
"homeless"
man in
that he was on this planet past his time.
He wrote it all. With
Thomas
Wolfe,
they told the story of 20th Century America.
They both then left as it
was
time to
go. Jack just could not adjust to
living without the fire in his gut.
He
couldn't
make the change. That's cool. As Neil Young said, "Better to burn
out,
than to
fade away."
--
Peace,
Bentz
bocelts@scsn.net
http://www.scsn.net/users/sclaw
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 00:20:26 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: jo grant <jgrant@BOOKZEN.COM>
Subject: Re: LSD INFO RESEARCH HISTORY
In-Reply-To:
<Pine.OSF.3.95.971123221643.32078B-100000@is8.nyu.edu>
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>Potato
Chips were also an accidental discovery, jus thought youd like to
>know...
So were
Post It notes, Ivory (it floats) bar soap, and flubber.
Small Press Publishers and
Authors
Display Books Free At BookZen
592,901
Visitors 07-01-96 to 11-01-97
http://www.bookzen.com
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 01:40:48 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Alex Howard
<kh14586@ACS.APPSTATE.EDU>
Subject: Re: Kerouac Gap Ad
In-Reply-To: <msg1274808.thr-3c78858a.55d4a82@umit.maine.edu>
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
> you mean the one with Edie in the
background? that's what i
>
thought when i saw the ad too.
Argh. I swear, I'm really sorry to keep bothering
people with this, but
its
Joyce Johnson, not Edie Parker.
------------------
Alex
Howard (704)264-8259 Appalachian State
University
kh14586@am.appstate.edu P.O. Box 12149
http://www1.appstate.edu/~kh14586 Boone, NC 28608
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 06:55:37 +0000
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Marie Countryman
<country@SOVER.NET>
Subject: Re: oops typo Re: LSD INFO ADDENDUM
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854";
x-mac-creator="4D4F5353"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
hi
dave: in vanity of duluoz, he talks of
developing phlebitis from too many
benzedrine
inhalers, but i don't know if this stopped his use
RACE
--- wrote:
>
RACE --- wrote:
>
>
>
> does someone know more about the changes in Kerouac's chemical use in
>
> the past ten years or so? did he
move strictly to alcohol? when did he
>
> slow on stimulants? are there
accounts of what his attitude towards
>
> stimulants were in the later years?
>
>
>
> wondering in kansas. soon to head
for turkey in Denver.
>
>
>
> david rhaesa
>
> salina, Kansas
>
> i
meant to say "last" ten years, not "past" ten years. though if
>
anybody on the list has heard from Jack in the past ten years concerning
>
chemicals or other matters i'd love to hear that too!!!!!
>
>
david
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 05:57:47 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
Subject: Re: oops typo
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
Marie
Countryman wrote:
>
> hi
dave: in vanity of duluoz, he talks of
developing phlebitis from too many
>
benzedrine inhalers, but i don't know if this stopped his use
>
oh yeah
- i forgot about the phlebitis factor.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 07:06:53 +0000
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Marie Countryman <country@SOVER.NET>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854";
x-mac-creator="4D4F5353"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
i
agree, david- and i also believe it was the disconnection that alcoholism
brought
on. JK was JK and he wrote and left us so much to read understand enjoy
and cry
about in the autobiographical explorations of self and friends and
search
for
spirituality.
i don't
feel ripped off, i do feel sorrowful at such an untimely and horrible
death.
mc
RACE
--- wrote:
> i
think i understand what you're saying.
but on a lot of JK threads
>
over the same year i feel like there is an anger towards JK for his
>
drinking and his dying young -- and i'm not certain that it is exactly
>
rational. i'm not saying that you're
going this far here. but if JK is
>
one of those folks that is ultimately connected with these magical
>
mysterious forces more than with us mortals -- perhaps he went away b/c
>
that's where he truly belonged. i don't
know. just wonder sometimes if
>
our collective feeling of being cheated out of more years of the JK that
>
has been pedestalized isn't unfair.
>
>
david rhaesa
>
salina, Kansas
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 07:09:45 +0000
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Marie Countryman <country@SOVER.NET>
Subject: Re: on the other hand (was Re: big
surLiSizeD without LSD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854";
x-mac-creator="4D4F5353"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
RACE
--- wrote:
> on
the other hand, also important not to pedestalize self-destruction
>
for it's own sake. in the event that
one feels JK may have been
>
ultimately connected with mysteries better met post-mortem, it hardly
> means
this is the proper path for most of us.
This is part of why i
>
think that reading his work as a means of avoiding self-destructiveness
>
(as suggested in the Vanity threads) can be very important.
>
>
but then again - what do i know ---- i've been threw more crackups than
>
Jack and definitely had my own self-destructive phase so perhaps i
>
should not be preachy --- if i was being preachy --
>
>
i'll go back to talking to myself in private now..... :)
>
>
david
nah dave you were talking to me, with my own
share of crackups, never have i
suggested
(even with art flowing out after the fact) that the way to
understanding
lies in
a psychic meltdown.
mc
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 07:16:19 +0000
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Marie Countryman
<country@SOVER.NET>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without anger
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1; x-mac-type="54455854";
x-mac-creator="4D4F5353"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
quoted-printable
>
i've always called it the dylan thomas syndrome, falling dead off his
>
barstool and all who have emulated the sickness as a way to let out or
>
discover creativity.
mc
>
>
>
Yeah, the artist/poet myth that allows for unchecked drinking and
>
self-destructive behaviour is romantic and bogus and SICK. The
>
self-destruction that jack suffered was NOT deliberate, nor was it conn=
ected
> to
his gift... his "angel mind," if you will (hee hee hee)... He was an
>
artist IN SPITE of it, not BECAUSE of it. He was an alcoholic, an angel=
, a
>
vessel, a drunk. To be angry at him is understandable, at a distance fr=
om
>
whence we view it today. But if only we had seen him up close... I don'=
t
>
think anyone would have wasted their anger on him. Again, in his words:
>
"WELL I DONT KNOW all those big theories about how everything should be
>
goddamit all I know it that I=92m a helpless hunk of horse manure looki=
ng in
>
your eye saying Help me"=97
>
>
Shit, why am I explaining? It's all there, in Big Sur, and it only take=
s a
>
Saturday to read it.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 09:02:09 +0000
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Marie Countryman
<country@SOVER.NET>
Subject: jo grant
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854";
x-mac-creator="4D4F5353"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
sorry
all, but i need to get in touch with you jo, my attempts to
contact
you back channel keep bouncing back
thanks
marie c
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 08:18:17 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
Subject: Re: Good Blonde
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
Nancy B
Brodsky wrote:
>
> I
am using Good Blonde for an assigment which entails studying a group of
>
essays written by one author. The next part of the assigment requires that
> I
find an essay on the original essays. Does anyone know if there are ny
>
books out there that critique Kerouac's work, particularly those Good
>
Blonde? Thanks.
>
~Nancy
>
>
The Absence of Sound, Clear and Pure, The Silence Now Heard In Heaven For
>
Sure-JK
In reading
through all the titles of the reviews and whatnot at
<http://www.charm.net/~brooklyn/Biblio/KerouacBiblio.html>
there wasn't
anything
that seemed explicitly devoted to GB.
Perhaps the maintainer
of that
site will have further ideas.
good
luck.
david
rhaesa
salina,
Kansas
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 08:17:51 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Jym Mooney <jymmoon@EXECPC.COM>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
How
about them toad-suckers
Ain't
they sappy?
Sucking
them bog frogs
Sure
makes 'em happy...
Mason Williams (a man well
ahead of his time)
----------
>
From: Gary Mex Glazner <PoetMex@AOL.COM>
>
To: BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD
> Date:
Sunday, November 23, 1997 6:36 PM
>
>
Hey Beat-list have any of you tried Toad Venom?
>
>
T.V.
>
"I've got a new drug."
>
Fritz has a new drug.
>
"Toad venom wanna smoke some?"
>
"What does it do?"
>
"Mild high, acid, hash, coke buzz."
>
"Totally toadular."
>
Nee deep, Nee deep.
> We
drive to the beach,
>
Climb down cliffs.
>
Fritz loads the pipe,
>
Flaky wax substance.
>
Take a hit,
>
Rolling, ground.
>
Kids on the cliff shout,
>
"Hey man, smoke that bud up here dude."
>
Fritz takes a hit. Now we are both rolling,
> I
yell back to them,
>
"TOAD VENOM!!"
>
Frog high, web brain.
>
Buddha bug tongue buzz.
>
Old pond splashes in mind.
>
Close eyes.
>
Tune to insects,
>
Scope, sight, snatch.
>
Toad Mind, Toad Soul, Wart Love!!
>
Hallucinaphibians in desert,
>
Arizona evenings, web foot summer.
>
Glands in the backs of their necks,
>
defense against being bit.
>
Squeeze, pop, juicy, squirt,
> On
Pyrex dish.
>
Let it dry over night.
>
Scrape, scrape.
>
Fly paper lily pad, LEAP!
>
Nee deep, Nee deep, Nee Deep.
>
>
Yrs,
>
Gary Mex Glazner
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 01:00:09 -0800
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Diane Carter
<dcarter@TOGETHER.NET>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
> R.
Bentz Kirby wrote:
>
> I
did not mean to sanction what Jack did.
My point was that once he
>
knew that
> his
>
purpose as a "writer" had been manifest, he could not adjust to a new
>
role. I
> think
> it
is tragic that he lacked the courage to do it.
It's just that some
>
choose to
>
leave once they "do it." I
have always admired WSB's courage for
>
hanging tough
> no
>
matter what. I wish that Jack had more
of that. But he didn't. So,
> it
is
> better
>
that he is gone. And he did give us all
of his heart and soul, even if
> he
> couldn't
> do
it in real life relationships.
Bentz,
It
still seems to me that what you are saying with the ideas of "better
to burn
than fade away," and "his purpose as a writer had been manifest"
is
awfully close to fatalism, that we are all given certain paths in life
and
there's nothing we can do to change them.
I agree with Patricia that
"Jack
drowned his gift in alcholism and killed it." I don't feel
particularly
angry about that but I do feel very sad about that. Even if
you
believe alcoholism is a disease, it is a disease with a choice. It's
not
like cancer. You can choose not to
drink. It brings us back to the
whole
erroneous idea that the nature of the artist is to suffer and burn
out in
self-destructiveness. What a wonderful
excuse that is to think
you are
fated to be self-destructive. The woman
in Big Sur tries
continually
to help Jack but he continues to choose the path he is on,
which
is a slow suicide. But when Billie runs
out into the ocean, for a
moment,
Jack thinks she is going to commit suicide, and writes, "I
suddenly
wonder if she's going to horrify the heavens and me too with a
sudden
suicide walk into those awful undertows..." The thought shocked
him, it
horrified him, he didn't think, it's fate, it's OK for her to
choose
death now. Big Sur is a record of a
human being's own
self-destruction.
And if anyone reads it with the attitude that, "yes
Jack
was meant to be this way, he was in too much pain to live on earth,
it was
good he died young, then it is also sending a message to whole new
generations
of writers and other humans that self-destruction is OK. So
maybe
then after writing this I do agree with Patricia's anger; it's
true,
we can never walk in anyone else's shoes but we should be angry
when
any person's gift is lost to the world through self-destruction.
DC
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 09:05:25 -0800
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: "Timothy K. Gallaher"
<gallaher@HSC.USC.EDU>
Subject: Re: Good Blonde
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>Nancy
B Brodsky wrote:
>>
>>
I am using Good Blonde for an assigment which entails studying a group of
>>
essays written by one author. The next part of the assigment requires that
>>
I find an essay on the original essays. Does anyone know if there are ny
>>
books out there that critique Kerouac's work, particularly those Good
>>
Blonde? Thanks.
>>
~Nancy
Good
Blonde is a recent compilation of assorted pieces by kerouac. As such
you won't
find anything about this book but might find some things about
the
individual pieces.
As I
recall cityCityCITY is in Good Blonde.
This was first publshed in The
Moderns
(as was New York Scenes--an excerpt from Visions of Cody--is this
in Good
Blonde?), edited by Leroi Jones. He
wrote an introductory essay to
the
stories, you could look there. But you
will need a university library
to find
it I'll bet.
The
Moderns might help for what you are trying to do.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 12:26:16 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: You_Be Fine
<AngelMindz@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
In a
message dated 97-11-24 11:41:01 EST, DC wrote:
<< I agree with Patricia that
"Jack drowned his gift in alcholism and
killed it." I don't feel
particularly angry about that but I do feel
very sad about that. Even if
you believe alcoholism is a disease, it is a
disease with a choice. It's
not like cancer. You can choose not to drink.
It brings us back to the
whole erroneous idea that the nature of the
artist is to suffer and burn
out in self-destructiveness. What a wonderful excuse that is to think
you are fated to be self-destructive. The woman in Big Sur tries
continually to help Jack but he continues to
choose the path he is on,
which is a slow suicide. >>
Good,
bad or indifferent, jack always drank and jack always wrote. He didn't
"drown
his gift in alcoholism." All the while he was drinking, taking speed,
and
smoking dope, he was writing the beautiful words we all read today, but
not
because of the drinking, as I said before; IN SPITE OF IT.
If you
think alcoholism is any less fatal or imprisoning than cancer, I'd say
you
should do a little research on the subject. It's a complicated disease,
and
from the outside, it looks like drinkers SHOULD be able to choose, should
be able
to stop. But if they could, they would. In the Big Book of Alcoholics
Anonymous,
1939, Bill W. (founder of AA) wrote:
RARELY
HAVE WE SEEN A PERSON FAIL who hs thoroughly followed our path. Those
who do
not recover are people who cannot or will not completely give
themselves
to this simple program, usually men and women who are
constitutionally
incapable of being honest with themselves. There are such
unfortunates.
They are not at fault; they seem to be born that way.
He goes
on to say, "Remember that we deal with alcohol--cunning, baffling,
powerful!
Without help it is too much for us." Alcoholics Anonymous, the most
recommended
group in the world for recovering from alcoholism, still has a
less
than 10% success rate. That's not because it isn't a good program. It's
because
alcoholism is a disease that grabs one by the soul, mind and body,
all at
once, and releasing its grip is, for most of us, impossible.
As for
Billie, man, there is one sick puppy. That woman is despicable, and
she's
not "helping" jack at all in Big Sur. She's only interested in what
she
can get
from him. She's in love with Neal, and wants to use jack to get to
Neal.
In jack's mind, he sees the conspiracy:
CAN IT
BE it was all arranged by Dave Wain via Cody that I would meet Billie
and be
driven mad and now they've got me alone in the woods and they are
going
to give me final poisons tonight that will utterly remove all my
control
so that in the morning I'll have to go to a hospital forever and
never
write another line?--Dave Wain is jealous because I wrote 10
novels?--Billie
has been assigned by Cody to get me to marry her so he'll get
all my
money?
Here's
jack with this beautiful blonde who wants to fuck all the time, but
continually
lays trips on him about how she has nothing to live for and is
going
to kill herself. Not only is she going to kill herself, but she's going
to take
her 4-year-old son, Elliot, out with her. And well she should, since
she's
messed him up beyond belief, encouraging the child to watch her and her
lovers
fucking and to ask questions about it, but then when he asks too many
questions,
she flips out, tells the kid she's going to beat him, beats him,
and
then tells him it's his fault she's beating him and because she feels so
bad
about beating him, she has to kill herself. This, to a four-year-old. I
say, no
fucking wonder jack flipped out with Billie.
Near
the end, when Billie digs an Elliot-sized grave, that little wigged-out
child
is hysterical, screaming, "grabs the shovel and refuses [to] go near
the
hole," Billie plays a sadistic game with Elliot and jack, and when jack
confronts
her about it: "With the same quiet steady smile Billie says, 'Oh
you're
so fucking neurotic!'"
This
woman is more insane than jack, more neurotic and twisted. As I was
reading
Big Sur this time, I was wondering what ever happened to her son,
who'd
be 40 or 41 today. He was one of the several children jack mentions in
Big
Sur, including Michael McClure's "pretty little angel daughter... coming
in to
hand me an extremely tiny flower," and the 8, 9 and 10 year old girls
the
pedophile Perry Yturbide says have "the most beautiful cans in town,"
to
which
jack thinks, "I realize he's dangerously insane," as he kidnaps the
10-year-old
and takes her off to molest her. But Billie, when jack tells her
this,
only says, "That's the way he is, be sure to dig him"--
No,
that whole scene contributed to his crack-up at Big Sur, not just his own
alcoholism
(which lowered his defenses) but the users and misfits and ghouls
that
somehow attached themselves to jack, comprising that Beatnik scene.
Read
the book and maybe you'll see. No one can save anyone from anything, and
no one
can ruin anyone's life. But when someone is sick, as jack was then,
entering
the last stages of alcoholism with weeks-long binges, it's very easy
to prey
upon that person's weakness, to take advantage of him.
He
didn't choose to be an alcoholic, and he didn't have the strength or
self-honesty
to take the cure. He's just like a billion other alcoholics. If
they
could choose another way to be, they would.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 12:28:17 -0500
Reply-To:
"BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Tyson Ouellette
<Tyson_Ouellette@UMIT.MAINE.EDU>
Organization:
University of Maine
Subject: Re: Kerouac Gap Ad
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
8bit
BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU,.Internet
writes:
>> you mean the one with Edie in the
background? that's what i
>>
thought when i saw the ad too.
>Argh. I swear, I'm really sorry to keep bothering
people with this, but
>its
Joyce Johnson, not Edie Parker.
So the caption is wrong then? hmmm.. wonder if the folks who
compiled
it know that?
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 12:03:16 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: "Donald G. Jr. Lee"
<donlee@COMP.UARK.EDU>
Subject: Re: Atheism -- Agnostic
Comments:
To: Anne <gbarker@thegrid.net>
In-Reply-To: <34764033.BBD9A82F@thegrid.net>
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Yeah,
my own version of that has always been, "Sure, I believe in God--I
just
have no idea what that means."
These
days I lean toward my own understanding of Buddhism.
Don Lee
Fayetteville,
Ark.
The
Angel departs and where there was no fire no smoke, there is
really
a little too much gravity for your species optimum performance.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 12:06:58 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: "Donald G. Jr. Lee"
<donlee@COMP.UARK.EDU>
Subject: Re: opening chapter of duluoz
Comments:
To: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
In-Reply-To: <347706F7.472D@midusa.net>
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Well,
it's gotta be Marshall McLuhan, right?
But I don't know which book.
I'd
guess UNDERSTANDING MEDIA, his most famous--but there again, even
though
I've read it, I don't recognize which part J.K. might be thinking
of...hrmmma....
Don Lee
Fayetteville,
Ark.
The
Angel departs and where there was no fire no smoke, there is
really
a little too much gravity for your species optimum performance.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 10:50:49 -0800
Reply-To: Leon Tabory <letabor@cruzio.com>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Leon Tabory
<letabor@CRUZIO.COM>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
You
really believe that Jack here is a faithful reporter who chronicles
horrible
deeds by horrible people, and is not writing from his own
imagination?
leon
-----Original
Message-----
From:
You_Be Fine <AngelMindz@AOL.COM>
To:
BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Date:
Monday, November 24, 1997 9:36 AM
Subject:
Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
>In
a message dated 97-11-24 11:41:01 EST, DC wrote:
>
><< I agree with Patricia that
>
"Jack drowned his gift in alcholism and killed it." I don't feel
>
particularly angry about that but I do feel very sad about that. Even if
>
you believe alcoholism is a disease, it is a disease with a choice. It's
>
not like cancer. You can choose not to
drink. It brings us back to the
>
whole erroneous idea that the nature of the artist is to suffer and burn
>
out in self-destructiveness. What a
wonderful excuse that is to think
>
you are fated to be self-destructive.
The woman in Big Sur tries
>
continually to help Jack but he continues to choose the path he is on,
>
which is a slow suicide. >>
>
>Good,
bad or indifferent, jack always drank and jack always wrote. He
didn't
>"drown
his gift in alcoholism." All the while he was drinking, taking
speed,
>and
smoking dope, he was writing the beautiful words we all read today, but
>not
because of the drinking, as I said before; IN SPITE OF IT.
>
>If
you think alcoholism is any less fatal or imprisoning than cancer, I'd
say
>you
should do a little research on the subject. It's a complicated disease,
>and
from the outside, it looks like drinkers SHOULD be able to choose,
should
>be
able to stop. But if they could, they would. In the Big Book of
Alcoholics
>Anonymous,
1939, Bill W. (founder of AA) wrote:
>RARELY
HAVE WE SEEN A PERSON FAIL who hs thoroughly followed our path.
Those
>who
do not recover are people who cannot or will not completely give
>themselves
to this simple program, usually men and women who are
>constitutionally
incapable of being honest with themselves. There are such
>unfortunates.
They are not at fault; they seem to be born that way.
>
>He
goes on to say, "Remember that we deal with alcohol--cunning, baffling,
>powerful!
Without help it is too much for us." Alcoholics Anonymous, the
most
>recommended
group in the world for recovering from alcoholism, still has a
>less
than 10% success rate. That's not because it isn't a good program.
It's
>because
alcoholism is a disease that grabs one by the soul, mind and body,
>all
at once, and releasing its grip is, for most of us, impossible.
>
>As
for Billie, man, there is one sick puppy. That woman is despicable, and
>she's
not "helping" jack at all in Big Sur. She's only interested in what
she
>can
get from him. She's in love with Neal, and wants to use jack to get to
>Neal.
In jack's mind, he sees the conspiracy:
>CAN
IT BE it was all arranged by Dave Wain via Cody that I would meet
Billie
>and
be driven mad and now they've got me alone in the woods and they are
>going
to give me final poisons tonight that will utterly remove all my
>control
so that in the morning I'll have to go to a hospital forever and
>never
write another line?--Dave Wain is jealous because I wrote 10
>novels?--Billie
has been assigned by Cody to get me to marry her so he'll
get
>all
my money?
>
>Here's
jack with this beautiful blonde who wants to fuck all the time, but
>continually
lays trips on him about how she has nothing to live for and is
>going
to kill herself. Not only is she going to kill herself, but she's
going
>to
take her 4-year-old son, Elliot, out with her. And well she should,
since
>she's
messed him up beyond belief, encouraging the child to watch her and
her
>lovers
fucking and to ask questions about it, but then when he asks too
many
>questions,
she flips out, tells the kid she's going to beat him, beats him,
>and
then tells him it's his fault she's beating him and because she feels
so
>bad
about beating him, she has to kill herself. This, to a four-year-old. I
>say,
no fucking wonder jack flipped out with Billie.
>
>Near
the end, when Billie digs an Elliot-sized grave, that little
wigged-out
>child
is hysterical, screaming, "grabs the shovel and refuses [to] go near
>the
hole," Billie plays a sadistic game with Elliot and jack, and when jack
>confronts
her about it: "With the same quiet steady smile Billie says, 'Oh
>you're
so fucking neurotic!'"
>
>This
woman is more insane than jack, more neurotic and twisted. As I was
>reading
Big Sur this time, I was wondering what ever happened to her son,
>who'd
be 40 or 41 today. He was one of the several children jack mentions
in
>Big
Sur, including Michael McClure's "pretty little angel daughter...
coming
>in
to hand me an extremely tiny flower," and the 8, 9 and 10 year old girls
>the
pedophile Perry Yturbide says have "the most beautiful cans in town,"
to
>which
jack thinks, "I realize he's dangerously insane," as he kidnaps the
>10-year-old
and takes her off to molest her. But Billie, when jack tells
her
>this,
only says, "That's the way he is, be sure to dig him"--
>
>No,
that whole scene contributed to his crack-up at Big Sur, not just his
own
>alcoholism
(which lowered his defenses) but the users and misfits and
ghouls
>that
somehow attached themselves to jack, comprising that Beatnik scene.
>
>Read
the book and maybe you'll see. No one can save anyone from anything,
and
>no
one can ruin anyone's life. But when someone is sick, as jack was then,
>entering
the last stages of alcoholism with weeks-long binges, it's very
easy
>to
prey upon that person's weakness, to take advantage of him.
>
>He
didn't choose to be an alcoholic, and he didn't have the strength or
>self-honesty
to take the cure. He's just like a billion other alcoholics.
If
>they
could choose another way to be, they would.
>.-
>
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 14:03:34 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: You_Be Fine
<AngelMindz@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
Comments:
To: letabor@cruzio.com
In a
message dated 97-11-24 13:58:57 EST, leon asked:
<<
You really believe that Jack here is a
faithful reporter who chronicles
horrible deeds by horrible people, and is not
writing from his own
imagination?
leon
>>
If
you're saying this is a fictionalized account, that would be the first
time I
ever heard anyone say that.
Is that
what you think?
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 13:37:42 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Jym Mooney <jymmoon@EXECPC.COM>
Subject: Re: Good Blonde
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
Timothy
Gallaher wrote:
> As
I recall cityCityCITY is in Good Blonde.
This was first publshed in
The
>
Moderns (as was New York Scenes--an excerpt from Visions of Cody--is this
> in
Good Blonde?), edited by Leroi Jones.
He wrote an introductory essay
to
>
the stories, you could look there. But
you will need a university
library
> to
find it I'll bet.
"city
CityCITY" is not in "Good Blonde." Is "New York Scenes" the piece
that
appears in "GB" as "Manhattan Sketches"?
Jym
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 13:52:42 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Jym Mooney <jymmoon@EXECPC.COM>
Subject: Re: Atheism -- Agnostic
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
My
personal favorite summing up of a life philosophy that I can accept is
from
His Holiness the Pope of Straight Poop, Frank Zappa:
Do what
you wanna
Do what
you will
Just
don't mess up
Your
neighbor's thrill
And
when you pay the bill
Kindly
leave a little tip
To help
the next poor sucker
On his
one-way trip
"The Meek Shall Inherit
Nothing" (from "You Are What You Is")
Just my
own two existential cents,
Jym
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 12:13:37 -0800
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: tristan saldana
<hbeng175@EMAIL.CSUN.EDU>
Subject: Herbert Huncke
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
I am
going to the libary today. I will find
Hebert Huncke's story. He
wrote
about himself. Kerouac says that he's one of the finest story
tellers
there ever was. Kerouac also says that
Huncke was starved for
sex and
companionship.
Is
Hebert Huncke still alive?
Tristan
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 12:28:36 -0800
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: "Timothy K. Gallaher"
<gallaher@HSC.USC.EDU>
Subject: Re: Good Blonde
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
At
01:37 PM 11/24/97 -0600, you wrote:
>Timothy
Gallaher wrote:
>
>>
As I recall cityCityCITY is in Good Blonde.
This was first publshed in
>The
>>
Moderns (as was New York Scenes--an excerpt from Visions of Cody--is this
>>
in Good Blonde?), edited by Leroi Jones.
He wrote an introductory essay
>to
>>
the stories, you could look there. But
you will need a university
>library
>>
to find it I'll bet.
>
>"city
CityCITY" is not in "Good Blonde." Is "New York Scenes" the piece
>that
appears in "GB" as "Manhattan Sketches"?
>
>Jym
>
>
Yes,
Manhattan Sketches is what I erroneously called New York Scenes (I
didn't
remember the name) but cityCityCITY is in Good Blonde I am fairly sure.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 12:08:01 -0800
Reply-To: Leon Tabory <letabor@cruzio.com>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Leon Tabory <letabor@CRUZIO.COM>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
-----Original
Message-----
From:
You_Be Fine <AngelMindz@AOL.COM>
To:
BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Date:
Monday, November 24, 1997 11:03 AM
Subject:
Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
>In
a message dated 97-11-24 13:58:57 EST, leon asked:
>
><<
>
You really believe that Jack here is a faithful reporter who chronicles
>
horrible deeds by horrible people, and is not writing from his own
>
imagination?
>
>
leon
>
> >>
>If
you're saying this is a fictionalized account, that would be the first
>time
I ever heard anyone say that.
>
>Is
that what you think?
>.-
I don't
expect to learn the full truth of what went down there. Others may
know, I
do not know. I have seen people doing crazy and acting it out on
their
children, that is not impossible to have happened.
I have
never myself witnessed chidren of that age observing adults sexual
performance,
but I do know it is a fact of ordinary life in many poor
communities
where children share the living space, sometimes even bed, with
their
parents.
I do
know there was experimentaion going on in Big Sur a few years later in
the
sixties. I remeber in particular one couple who moved from the North
Beach
to Big Sur. The man was a former teacher who ran the Cellar where his
wife
was a waitress. This was in the end of the fifties. He was no wild
maniac,
but a very conscientious nice guy, although by 1965 he did succumb
to
heroin. Before that he was telling me how he thought their kids blossomed
under
the freedom and honest exposure to natural phenomena as they occured.
I was
of course very interested and for a couple of years followed his
stories
about how wonderfully the kids were developing, including their
reactions
to what they were observing. To repeat, I have no personal first
hand
knowledge about children observing adult sexual activity, although when
we lived
in the Flower Farm community, my daughter had her own bed in our
one
room. She was three years old, but I can tell you that she is a
wonderful
person with no apparent ill effects. I
am prepared to believe
that it
may not necessarily be as much of a horror movie to them as is
suggested
in the post. I can expect a helplessly hysterical out of control
mother
to act out crazily with her child. It happens tragically a lot more
than is
publicly acknowledged.
What I
do believe is that Jack was victimized by the horrors that populated
his own
imagination, to a much larger extent than he was victimized by the
people
and events surrounding him there. At least some of the things he
wrote
existed only in his paranoid visions. At the very least not everything
that he
wrote down actually happened that way. At the very least.
leon
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 13:35:49 -0700
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: "Alcock, Denis"
<alcockd@BESTWESTERN.COM>
Subject: Re: Herbert Huncke
Huncke
died about a few years ago. There is an
excellent documentary
called
'Huncke and Me', which is a candid interview with Huncke shortly
before
his death.
Denis
Alcock
>
----------
>
From: tristan
saldana[SMTP:hbeng175@EMAIL.CSUN.EDU]
>
Reply To: BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List
>
Sent: Monday, November 24, 1997
1:13 PM
>
To: BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
>
Subject: Herbert Huncke
>
> I
am going to the libary today. I will
find Hebert Huncke's story.
> He
>
wrote about himself. Kerouac says that he's one of the finest story
>
tellers there ever was. Kerouac also
says that Huncke was starved for
>
sex and companionship.
>
> Is
Hebert Huncke still alive?
>
>
Tristan
>
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 14:54:48 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: jo grant <jgrant@BOOKZEN.COM>
Subject: Re: Herbert Huncke
In-Reply-To: <Pine.HPP.3.91.971124120646.8908A-100000@csun1.csun.edu>
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>I
am going to the libary today. I will
find Hebert Huncke's story. He
>wrote
about himself. Kerouac says that he's one of the finest story
>tellers
there ever was. Kerouac also says that
Huncke was starved for
>sex
and companionship.
>
>Is
Hebert Huncke still alive?
>
>Tristan
Hunke
is dead. See:
http://www.bookzen.com/books/068815266X_b.html
for
details on The Herbert Hunke Reader, Ben Schafer, Editor.
In the
near future Ben will be discussing The Herbert Hunke Reader on radio
statin
WORT-FM, Madison, WI. There will be others who knew HH joining in
the
conversation. Hope to get it transcribed so it can be posted to the
Beat List.
j grant
Small Press Publishers and
Authors
Display Books Free At
BookZen
592,901
Visitors 07-01-96 to 11-01-97
http://www.bookzen.com
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 13:46:10 -0700
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: "Derek A. Beaulieu"
<dabeauli@FREENET.CALGARY.AB.CA>
Organization:
Calgary Free-Net
Subject: Re: Herbert Huncke
In-Reply-To:
<Pine.HPP.3.91.971124120646.8908A-100000@csun1.csun.edu>
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
tristan
as far
as i know huncke died in 1996 ( i could be wrong abt the date,
but he
is quite dead) i suggest that you pick up a copy of _the herbert
Huncke
reader_ which is quite excellent, containing unpublished work and
excerpts
from all his other books, its available from Waterrow books
(www.waterrowbooks.com)
but -
yep definately read this book
yrs
derek
On Mon,
24 Nov 1997, tristan saldana wrote:
> I
am going to the libary today. I will
find Hebert Huncke's story. He
>
wrote about himself. Kerouac says that he's one of the finest story
>
tellers there ever was. Kerouac also
says that Huncke was starved for
>
sex and companionship.
>
> Is
Hebert Huncke still alive?
>
>
Tristan
>
****************************
Derek
beaulieu
House
Press (limited ed. chapbooks, prints, etc)
#5-933
3rd ave nw
calgary,
alberta, canada, t2n0j7
"remove
literary, grammatical & syntactical inhibition"
-Jack
Kerouac
*****************
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 15:08:30 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: "Donald G. Jr. Lee" <donlee@COMP.UARK.EDU>
Subject: Re: Good Blonde
Comments:
To: Jym Mooney <jymmoon@EXECPC.COM>
In-Reply-To:
<199711241953.NAA02242@core0.mx.execpc.com>
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
citycitycity
IS in "Good Blonde"--I'm looking at it right now...
Don
The
Angel departs and where there was no fire no smoke, there is
really
a little too much gravity for your species optimum performance.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 16:47:23 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Alex Howard <kh14586@ACS.APPSTATE.EDU>
Subject: Re: Herbert Huncke
In-Reply-To:
<E1D34B8573D0D0119F350000F863286544B5C1@phxopsexc00.bestwestern.com>
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
>
Huncke died about a few years ago.
There is an excellent documentary
>
called 'Huncke and Me', which is a candid interview with Huncke shortly
>
before his death.
Huh? Haven't heard about this one. Any more info on it or any of you
captialistic
literary peddlers can tell me a little about this?
------------------
Alex
Howard (704)264-8259 Appalachian State
University
kh14586@am.appstate.edu P.O. Box 12149
http://www1.appstate.edu/~kh14586 Boone, NC 28608
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 14:12:50 -0800
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: tristan saldana <hbeng175@EMAIL.CSUN.EDU>
Subject: Re: Herbert Huncke
In-Reply-To:
<Pine.A32.3.93.971124134358.63502A-100000@srv1.freenet.calgary.ab.ca>
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Thanks
very much for the info. I am very sad
to hear that Huncke's gone.
He and
Corso are my favorites.
Tristan
On Mon,
24 Nov 1997, Derek A. Beaulieu wrote:
>
tristan
> as
far as i know huncke died in 1996 ( i could be wrong abt the date,
>
but he is quite dead) i suggest that you pick up a copy of _the herbert
>
Huncke reader_ which is quite excellent, containing unpublished work and
>
excerpts from all his other books, its available from Waterrow books
>
(www.waterrowbooks.com)
>
but - yep definately read this book
>
yrs
>
derek
> On
Mon, 24 Nov 1997, tristan saldana wrote:
>
> I am going to the libary today. I
will find Hebert Huncke's story. He
>
> wrote about himself. Kerouac says that he's one of the finest story
>
> tellers there ever was. Kerouac
also says that Huncke was starved for
>
> sex and companionship.
>
>
>
> Is Hebert Huncke still alive?
>
>
>
> Tristan
>
>
>
>
****************************
>
Derek beaulieu
>
House Press (limited ed. chapbooks, prints, etc)
>
#5-933 3rd ave nw
>
calgary, alberta, canada, t2n0j7
>
"remove literary, grammatical & syntactical inhibition"
> -Jack
Kerouac
>
*****************
>
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 16:49:09 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Jeff Taylor
<taylorjb@CTRVAX.VANDERBILT.EDU>
Subject: Re: Good Blonde
In-Reply-To:
<199711241953.NAA02242@core0.mx.execpc.com>
MIME-version:
1.0
Content-type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Mon,
24 Nov 1997, Jym Mooney wrote:
>
Timothy Gallaher wrote:
>
> As I recall cityCityCITY is in Good Blonde. This was first publshed in
>
>
"city CityCITY" is not in "Good Blonde."
There
are apparently 2 different editions of _Good Blonde & Others_ out
there.
The copy I have says on the copyright page "Revised and enlarged
edition,
1994" and on the back cover, "'cityCityCITY', Jack's science
fiction
vision of the future, has been added to this revised edition."
*******
Jeff
Taylor
taylorjb@ctrvax.vanderbilt.edu
*******
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 16:53:06 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Michael Skau
<mskau@CWIS.UNOMAHA.EDU>
Subject: Re: re beat fad spiritual atheism
Comments:
To: Sara Straw <saras@sisna.com>
In-Reply-To: <34771F89.58FB@sisna.com>
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Sat,
22 Nov 1997, Sara Straw wrote:
>
> As Abbie Hoffman pointed out, all isms are wasms.
>
> Cordially,
>
> Mike Skau
>
> I
give up, what does THAT mean?
> It
sounds real cute, but doesn't compute.
> s
>
Abbie
explained that isms (capitalism, communism, socialism--Judaism,
Catholicism,
Buddhism, etc.)--that is, all artificial organizations and
groups
with set beliefs, principles, etc.--belong to the past (wasms). He
felt
that we had to leave all that behind because it infringed on the
importance
of individual rights (see _The Best of Abbie Hoffman_, pp.
376-77,
where he spells it _wasisms_; when I heard him speak at Naropa
Institute
years ago, he pronounced it _wasms_).
Hope
this helps.
Cordially,
Mike
Skau
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 17:54:24 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: You_Be Fine
<AngelMindz@AOL.COM>
Subject: Fwd: big surLiSizeD without LSD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=unknown-8bit
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
quoted-printable
---------------------
Forwarded
message:
Subj: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
Date: 97-11-24 17:54:57 EST
From: AngelMindz
To: letabor@cruzio.com
In a
message dated 97-11-24 15:37:55 EST, you write:
<< I can expect a helplessly hysterical out of control mother to act ou=
t
crazily
with her child. It happens tragically a lot more than is publicly
acknowledged.>>
I don't
want to get off on a tangent about sexual abuse of children, beca=
use
that's
a very complicated subject that deserves its own thread on another
list.
But somehow your comment reminded me of this anecdote about Dorothy
Parker
(who, by the way, wrote a scathing review of The Subterraneans whe=
n it
came
out!) and a mother who seemed quite in control and not the least
hysterical:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------=
-----
---=20
Lilly
(from Peter Fiebleman=92s biography of Lillian Hellman)
The story Lillian had asked me (P. F.) to
tell that day was short. I=
t
happened
one evening in Los Angeles when I walked over to have a drink wi=
th
Dorothy
(Parker). A friend of Dorothy=92s, a well-known actress living in=
the
neighborhood,
had just come to visit with her little boy, who was six.
The actress kept her son in a vise-like
grip on her lap and played w=
ith
him
while she talked. She could not let the child alone; her hands wander=
ed
over
his mouth and face and chest and crotch and legs and feet and toes a=
nd
then
started all over again, while the child squirmed and wriggled to get=
off
her
lap. At last he slipped out of his mother=92s grip, jumped to the flo=
or and
ran
into the next room to be alone and play.
"I KNOW I=92m prejudiced, " the
actress said, smiling, "after all, h=
e=92s
only
six=85but he is a beautiful little boy, isn=92t he?"
"Yes, he is," Dorothy said.
"Strange=85he never married."
-------------------------------------------------------------------------=
-----
------------
<<
What I do believe is that Jack was victimized by the horrors that
populated
his own imagination, to a much larger extent
than he was victimized by t=
he
people and events surrounding him there. At
least some of the things he
wrote existed only in his paranoid visions.
At the very least not everyt=
hing
that he wrote down actually happened that
way. At the very least.>>
Regarding
this theory, I really don't see the value in it at all. It feel=
s
like,
for some reason, you're splitting hairs. What are we supposed to
believe
and not believe in Big Sur, or On The Road, or any of jack's book=
s?=20
I don't
see jack walking around possessed by paranoid delusions on a dail=
y
basis.
He was familiar with visions; he had them all his life. His writin=
g
style
in Big Sur is not over the top. He does write like a reporter,
faithfully
accounting the facts of his life during a short period of time.
The way
he describes certain acts, as well as his tacit or active
participation
in those acts, is fair and straightforward.
Big Sur
reads like life, and I have no reason to question any parts of it=
, or
to seek
redemption for the characters who, through stupidity, ignorance, =
or
emotional
illness, were a part of his descent into madness.
Too bad
Lew Welch isn't on the list to tell us what he saw there.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 18:15:36 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Nancy B Brodsky
<nbb203@IS8.NYU.EDU>
Subject: Re: Good Blonde
In-Reply-To: <199711241953.NAA02242@core0.mx.execpc.com>
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Actually,
cityCityCITY is in my copy of Good Blonde...
On Mon,
24 Nov 1997, Jym Mooney wrote:
>
Timothy Gallaher wrote:
>
>
> As I recall cityCityCITY is in Good Blonde. This was first publshed in
>
The
>
> Moderns (as was New York Scenes--an excerpt from Visions of Cody--is this
>
> in Good Blonde?), edited by Leroi Jones.
He wrote an introductory essay
> to
>
> the stories, you could look there.
But you will need a university
>
library
>
> to find it I'll bet.
>
>
"city CityCITY" is not in "Good Blonde." Is "New York Scenes" the piece
>
that appears in "GB" as "Manhattan Sketches"?
>
>
Jym
>
The
Absence of Sound, Clear and Pure, The Silence Now Heard In Heaven For
Sure-JK
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 17:12:37 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without anger
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
You_Be
Fine wrote:
>
> In
a message dated 97-11-24 00:08:13 EST, you write:
>
>
<<
> on the other hand, also important not to
pedestalize self-destruction
> for it's own sake. in the event that one feels JK may have been
> ultimately connected with mysteries better
met post-mortem, it hardly
> means this is the proper path for most of
us. >>
>
>
Yeah, the artist/poet myth that allows for unchecked drinking and
>
self-destructive behaviour is romantic and bogus and SICK. The
>
self-destruction that jack suffered was NOT deliberate, nor was it connected
> to
his gift... his "angel mind," if you will (hee hee hee)... He was an
>
artist IN SPITE of it, not BECAUSE of it. He was an alcoholic, an angel, a
>
vessel, a drunk.
i think
the evidence on what you're suggesting here -- especially given
the
capitalization -- is far from settled yet.
I'm currently reading a
wonderful
study titled Touched with Fire: Manic Depressive Illness and
the
Artistic Temperament. What I've gleaned
so far is that quite a lot
of
study is currently moving concerning the connections of chemistry and
creativity
-- and whether the correlation is one of "because" or "in
spite
of". And it seems to me that
though the author may be leaning
towards
an in spite of notion (with the qualifier that medical treatment
of the
illness occurs), it seems to me so far that the evidence is far
from
showing that point. The depth of
experience chronicled by Jack is
connected
to his gift as a writer for certain.
Not just anyone can
chronicle
such experiences. But the experiencing
of these things in the
first
place involves a different than average connection with the world
and
perceptions.
The
myth you suggest as SICK is i would agree SICK when it is the basis
for
people trying to imitate self-destructions in hope of gaining the
writing
gift. But perhaps it is also SICK to
believe that all social
and
scientific knowledge of these notions was determined pre-1940. Both
myths
have force in society and neither one alone is the answer. In the
book
you refer to in another post, it suggests the wording that more
will be
revealed. In the case of connections
between brain chemistry
and
creativity and the nature of these correlations it seems this is
definitely
the case -- the jury is certainly out.
david
rhaesa
TIAA
P&D Disabled
Salina,
Kansas
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 17:17:07 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Michael Skau
<mskau@CWIS.UNOMAHA.EDU>
Subject: Re: Kerouac Gap Ad
Comments:
To: Tyson Ouellette <Tyson_Ouellette@UMIT.MAINE.EDU>
In-Reply-To: <msg1274808.thr-3c78858a.55d4a82@umit.maine.edu>
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Sun,
23 Nov 1997, Tyson Ouellette wrote:
>
>Why am I prolonging this?
>
>I believe the original photo can be found in the booklet that comes
>
>with the
>
>audio set, "The Jack Kerouac Collection"
>
>I'm almost positive that this is the one edited for the Khakis ad.
>
> you mean the one with Edie in the
background? that's what i
>
thought when i saw the ad too.
>
If you
look at the photos carefully, you'll see that Jack's got his chin
lifted
more in one of them than in the other. In addition, that is not
Edie in
the background, despite what the text says for the photo in _The
Jack
Kerouac Collection_ booklet (p. 20): it's Joyce Johnson, and the same
photo
was used on the cover of her _Minor Characters_ and for the poster
for the
_Kerouac_ film. Perhaps this explains why the women could be
airbrushed
from the photos; apparently they are so interchangeable that
their
identities are not important (said with tongue in cheek).
Mike
Skau
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 15:21:20 -0800
Reply-To: Leon Tabory <letabor@cruzio.com>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Leon Tabory
<letabor@CRUZIO.COM>
Subject: Re: Fwd: big surLiSizeD without LSD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
8bit
You are
suggesting that you have no reason to doubt Jack's ability to see
things
as they were at the time:
<<SNIP>>
>His
writing
>style
in Big Sur is not over the top. He does write like a reporter,
>faithfully
accounting the facts of his life during a short period of time.
>The
way he describes certain acts, as well as his tacit or active
>participation
in those acts, is fair and straightforward.
Does
this excerpt fit your faith in Jack's ability to see things as they
were at
the time? Is this what you bellieve was Jack's state of mind always
"on
a daily basis" when he wrote other things?
<<SNIP>>
>CAN
IT BE it was all arranged by Dave Wain via Cody that I would meet
Billie
>and
be driven mad and now they've got me alone in the woods and they are
>going
to give me final poisons tonight that will utterly remove all my
>control
so that in the morning I'll have to go to a hospital forever and
>never
write another line?--Dave Wain is jealous because I wrote 10
>novels?--Billie
has been assigned by Cody to get me to marry her so he'll
get
>all
my money?
leon
-----Original
Message-----
From:
You_Be Fine <AngelMindz@AOL.COM>
To:
BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Date:
Monday, November 24, 1997 3:02 PM
Subject:
Fwd: big surLiSizeD without LSD
---------------------
Forwarded
message:
Subj: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
Date: 97-11-24 17:54:57 EST
From: AngelMindz
To: letabor@cruzio.com
In a
message dated 97-11-24 15:37:55 EST, you write:
<< I can expect a helplessly hysterical out of control mother to act out
crazily
with her child. It happens tragically a lot more than is publicly
acknowledged.>>
I don't
want to get off on a tangent about sexual abuse of children, because
that's
a very complicated subject that deserves its own thread on another
list.
But somehow your comment reminded me of this anecdote about Dorothy
Parker
(who, by the way, wrote a scathing review of The Subterraneans when
it
came
out!) and a mother who seemed quite in control and not the least
hysterical:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
--
---
Lilly
(from Peter Fieblemans biography of Lillian Hellman)
The story Lillian had asked me (P. F.) to
tell that day was short. It
happened
one evening in Los Angeles when I walked over to have a drink with
Dorothy
(Parker). A friend of Dorothys, a well-known actress living in the
neighborhood,
had just come to visit with her little boy, who was six.
The actress kept her son in a vise-like
grip on her lap and played with
him
while she talked. She could not let the child alone; her hands wandered
over
his mouth and face and chest and crotch and legs and feet and toes and
then
started all over again, while the child squirmed and wriggled to get
off
her
lap. At last he slipped out of his mothers grip, jumped to the floor
and
ran
into the next room to be alone and play.
"I KNOW Im prejudiced, " the
actress said, smiling, "after all, hes
only
sixbut he is a beautiful little boy, isnt he?"
"Yes, he is," Dorothy said.
"Strangehe never married."
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
--
------------
<<
What I do believe is that Jack was victimized by the horrors that
populated
his own
imagination, to a much larger extent than he was victimized by the
people
and events surrounding him there. At least some of the things he
wrote
existed only in his paranoid visions. At the very least not everything
that he
wrote down actually happened that way. At the very least.>>
Regarding
this theory, I really don't see the value in it at all. It feels
like,
for some reason, you're splitting hairs. What are we supposed to
believe
and not believe in Big Sur, or On The Road, or any of jack's books?
I don't
see jack walking around possessed by paranoid delusions on a daily
basis.
He was familiar with visions; he had them all his life. His writing
style
in Big Sur is not over the top. He does write like a reporter,
faithfully
accounting the facts of his life during a short period of time.
The way
he describes certain acts, as well as his tacit or active
participation
in those acts, is fair and straightforward.
Big Sur
reads like life, and I have no reason to question any parts of it,
or
to seek
redemption for the characters who, through stupidity, ignorance, or
emotional
illness, were a part of his descent into madness.
Too bad
Lew Welch isn't on the list to tell us what he saw there.
.-
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 18:20:48 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Tyson Ouellette <Tyson_Ouellette@UMIT.MAINE.EDU>
Organization:
University of Maine
Subject: Re: re beat fad spiritual atheism
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
8bit
>Abbie
explained that isms (capitalism, communism, socialism--Judaism,
>Catholicism,
Buddhism, etc.)--that is, all artificial organizations and
>groups
with set beliefs, principles, etc.--belong to the past (wasms).
also, the very fact that ism institutions
establish rigid "party
platforms"
forces them to become outdated from the moment they're
formed,
because they are resistant to change, also, my own slant here,
something
conceived in an instant in time to become an ism is dated to
that
time, and is outdated thereafter because of change. one of the
reasons
that the many major religions that remain alive today are doing
so is
because they've become flexible enough to adapt to change a morph
as
necessary.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 18:53:06 EST
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Bill Gargan
<WXGBC@CUNYVM.BITNET>
Subject: Re: Good Blonde
In-Reply-To: Message of Mon, 24 Nov 1997 16:49:09 -0600
from
<taylorjb@CTRVAX.VANDERBILT.EDU>
On Mon,
24 Nov 1997 16:49:09 -0600 Jeff Taylor said:
>On
Mon, 24 Nov 1997, Jym Mooney wrote:
>
>>
Timothy Gallaher wrote:
>>
> As I recall cityCityCITY is in Good Blonde. This was first publshed in
>>
>>
"city CityCITY" is not in "Good Blonde."
>
>There
are apparently 2 different editions of _Good Blonde & Others_ out
>there.
The copy I have says on the copyright page "Revised and enlarged
>edition,
1994" and on the back cover, "'cityCityCITY', Jack's science
>fiction
vision of the future, has been added to this revised edition."
>
>*******
>Jeff
Taylor
>taylorjb@ctrvax.vanderbilt.edu
>*******
Thanks for noting this interesting
bibliographical development. Wonder how
it
came about?
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 18:00:27 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: RACE --- <race@MIDUSA.NET>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
Leon
Tabory wrote:
>
>
>In a message dated 97-11-24 13:58:57 EST, leon asked:
>
>
>
><<
>
> You really believe that Jack here is a faithful reporter who chronicles
>
> horrible deeds by horrible people, and is not writing from his own
>
> imagination?
>
>
>
> leon
>
>
>
> >>
>
>If you're saying this is a fictionalized account, that would be the first
>
>time I ever heard anyone say that.
>
>
>
>Is that what you think?
>
>.-
> I
don't expect to learn the full truth of what went down there. Others may
>
know, I do not know. I have seen people doing crazy and acting it out on
>
their children, that is not impossible to have happened.
<snip>
>
What I do believe is that Jack was victimized by the horrors that populated
>
his own imagination, to a much larger extent than he was victimized by the
>
people and events surrounding him there. At least some of the things he
>
wrote existed only in his paranoid visions. At the very least not everything
>
that he wrote down actually happened that way. At the very least.
>
>
leon
At very
least for sure. I imagine that even if
we were people involved
we
could not know to what extent our actions contributed to paranoid
visions
and to what extent these perceptions would have happened
regardless
of what actions we took.
Also at
the very least it is important to recall the words attributed to
WSB on
other posts in other threads of it being important to keep in
mind
that Jack was "an author".
While the stories he tells are
sometimes
autobiographical and sometimes historical, they are nearly
always
considered to be "fiction."
And
even if they weren't, and despite Jack's famous memory, the
perceptions
one has of events during a crack-up (based on my own
experiences
and others i've known) are certainly only one point of view
of the
events that transpired. It is difficult
to expect anything akin
to
objectivity ever concerning such matters.
None of
this is to detract from the wonders of Jack's artistic
contributions. It is merely a limit on how we understand
and interpret
them. His contributions at describing vividly the
wonders and horrors
that
life can present are a wonderful gift to all of us -- and hopefully
to
readers for decades and even centuries to come.
and the
writing on this thread has definitely hooked me on Big Sur being
a book
i ought to read and will certainly obtain in Denver. I leave
tomorrow.
hope
y'all keep the Beat-L hopping while i'm gone -- i'll read the
digests
when i return. perhaps i'll find a
denver story or two to tell
as
well.
david
rhaesa
salina,
Kansas
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 18:13:59 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Jym Mooney <jymmoon@EXECPC.COM>
Subject: Re: Herbert Huncke
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
You
just gotta love someone who titles his autobiography "Guilty Of
Everything"!
Jym
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 18:16:22 -0600
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Jym Mooney <jymmoon@EXECPC.COM>
Subject: Re: Good Blonde
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
Jeff
Taylor wrote:
>
There are apparently 2 different editions of _Good Blonde & Others_ out
>
there. The copy I have says on the copyright page "Revised and enlarged
>
edition, 1994" and on the back cover, "'cityCityCITY', Jack's science
>
fiction vision of the future, has been added to this revised edition."
Thanks,
Jeff, for clearing this up. I was
feeling very confused indeed.
Guess I
need to track down a copy of the revised edition now.
Jym
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 16:25:12 -0800
Reply-To: Leon Tabory <letabor@cruzio.com>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Leon Tabory <letabor@CRUZIO.COM>
Subject: Re: Fwd: big surLiSizeD without LSD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
-----Original
Message-----
From:
You_Be Fine <AngelMindz@AOL.COM>
To:
BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Date:
Monday, November 24, 1997 3:02 PM
Subject:
Fwd: big surLiSizeD without LSD
---------------------
Forwarded
message:
Subj: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
Date: 97-11-24 17:54:57 EST
From: AngelMindz
To: letabor@cruzio.com
In a
message dated 97-11-24 15:37:55 EST, you write:
----------------------------------------------
I said:
<<
What I do believe is that Jack was victimized by the horrors that
populated
his own
imagination, to a much larger extent than he was victimized by the
people
and events surrounding him there. At least some of the things he
wrote
existed only in his paranoid visions. At the very least not everything
that he
wrote down actually happened that way. At the very least.>>
You
say:
>Regarding
this theory, I really don't see the value in it at all. It feels
>like,
for some reason, you're splitting hairs. What are we supposed to
>believe
and not believe in Big Sur, or On The Road, or any of jack's books?
I say:
So far
I haven't advanced any theory. Merely looked at what Jack wrote down.
He
writes a story describing deranged behavior that was going on in the
cabin
in the woods. He also describes his paranoid fears that his mind
painted
for him.
I
called attention to it because you seemed to me to leap over the facts
with
YOUR theories that it was those others who drove Jack crazy at that
time.
If you see my questions as trivial, that is
your evaluation. But since you
mention
theorizing, it is true that in my mind as well as in yours there
appear
to be cetain explanations more plausible than others.
This IS
my theory of what happened at Big Sur:
Stretched
speed and booze too far holed up in the cabin in the woods.
The
more plausible explanation in my mind for Jack's paranoid breakdown in
that
visit in Big Sur was, and this is pure speculation, his mind driven
into
the paranoid shadows that a few days on speed and alcohol that are
easily
recognied by people who are familiar
with what typically can happen.
I have
seen quite a few people who after three days of overstimulating and
fatiguing
their minds with speed, get very very delusional and paranoid. It
may
well be that this was the time when Jack stretched too far his acustomed
runs on
speed to take it over the edge holed up in that cabin., anxious to
use all
these elements in a new work.
I would not call it a theory, but that is more consistent with what I know
about
Jack, the way he wrote, the way he used speed a lot for his writing.
Just
like on acid people had some lofty trips full of beauty and vision, and
a
bummer where from the shadows of their unsettled issues sprung out
monsters
that threatened to devour them. I just don't buy your perception
that
Jack was fair mindedly and in charge of his mental faculties driven to
madness
by these mentally ill others.
You
say:
>I
don't see jack walking around possessed by paranoid delusions on a daily
>basis.
He was familiar with visions; he had them all his life. His writing
>style
in Big Sur is not over the top. He does write like a reporter,
>faithfully
accounting the facts of his life during a short period of time.
>The
way he describes certain acts, as well as his tacit or active
>participation
in those acts, is fair and straightforward.>
>Big
Sur reads like life, and I have no reason to question any parts of it,
or
>to
seek redemption for the characters who, through stupidity, ignorance, or
>emotional
illness, were a part of his descent into madness.
Too bad
Lew Welch isn't on the list to tell us what he saw there.
.
I agree
with you there.
leon
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 20:07:18 -0500
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Nancy B Brodsky
<nbb203@IS8.NYU.EDU>
Subject: Re: Good Blonde
In-Reply-To:
<BEAT-L%1997112418554094@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Mime-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
My copy
is from 1993 and it sounds exactly like the one described below...
On Mon,
24 Nov 1997, Bill Gargan wrote:
> On
Mon, 24 Nov 1997 16:49:09 -0600 Jeff Taylor said:
>
>On Mon, 24 Nov 1997, Jym Mooney wrote:
>
>
>
>> Timothy Gallaher wrote:
>
>> > As I recall cityCityCITY is in Good Blonde. This was first publshed in
>
>>
>
>> "city CityCITY" is not in "Good Blonde."
>
>
>
>There are apparently 2 different editions of _Good Blonde & Others_ out
>
>there. The copy I have says on the copyright page "Revised and
enlarged
>
>edition, 1994" and on the back cover, "'cityCityCITY', Jack's
science
>
>fiction vision of the future, has been added to this revised edition."
>
>
>
>*******
>
>Jeff Taylor
>
>taylorjb@ctrvax.vanderbilt.edu
>
>*******
>
> Thanks for noting this interesting
bibliographical development. Wonder how
it
> came about?
>
The
Absence of Sound, Clear and Pure, The Silence Now Heard In Heaven For
Sure-JK
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 20:21:21 EST
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Comments: Resent-From: Bill Gargan
<WXGBC@CUNYVM>
Comments: Originally-From: Emma Lee
<ELYBC@CUNYVM>
From: Bill Gargan
<WXGBC@CUNYVM.BITNET>
Subject: Re: (FWD) Comparative Religions
In-Reply-To: Your message of Mon, 24 Nov 97 10:16:59 EST
For
Rinaldo...an alternative text....Notice the interesting variations.
----------------------------Original
message----------------------------
This is
from my files, which has some duplicates, some new ones, and
even
some different ones. ENJOY!
--ely
=======================================================================
A
COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF WORLD RELIGIOUS PHILOSOPHIES
Taoism: Shit happens.
Confucianism: Confucius say, "Shit happens."
Buddhism: If shit happens, it really isn't shit.
Zen: What is the sound of shit happening?
Hinduism: This shit happened before.
Islam: If shit happens, it is the will of Allah.
Protestant: Let shit happen to someone else.
Catholic: If shit happens, you deserve it.
Judaism: Why does this shit always happen to us?
Jehovah's
Witness: Let us in and we'll tell you
why shit happens.
Hare
Krishna: Shit happens, shit happens,
shit happens, shit happens.
Pagan: Shit is part of the Goddess, too.
Scientology: This book gets rid of your shit.
Existentialism: Everything is shit, so let's be depressed.
Nihilism: Everything is shit, so let's blow it up.
Satanism: I made shit happen and I'm glad about it.
Solipcism: This shit happens to me alone, but I am the
cause of it.
Atheism: I don't believe this shit.
Agnosticism: What is this shit?
New
Age: For $300 I can help you achieve
Shit Happens Awareness.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 1997 09:50:35 -0800
Reply-To: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation List"
<BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sender: "BEAT-L: Beat Generation
List" <BEAT-L@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
From: Diane Carter
<dcarter@TOGETHER.NET>
Subject: Re: big surLiSizeD without LSD
MIME-Version:
1.0
Content-Type:
text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding:
7bit
>
You_Be Fine wrote:
>
No, that whole scene contributed to his crack-up at Big Sur, not just
>
his own
>
alcoholism (which lowered his defenses) but the users and misfits and
>
ghouls
>
that somehow attached themselves to jack, comprising that Beatnik
>
scene.
>
>
Read the book and maybe you'll see. No one can save anyone from
>
anything, and
> no
one can ruin anyone's life. But when someone is sick, as jack was
>
then,
>
entering the last stages of alcoholism with weeks-long binges, it's
>
very easy
> to
prey upon that person's weakness, to take advantage of him.
>
> He
didn't choose to be an alcoholic, and he didn't have the strength or
>
self-honesty to take the cure. He's just like a billion other
>
alcoholics. If
>
they could choose another way to be, they would.
I have
read Big Sur. Twice. But given your
interpretation, it does make
me
wonder if we're reading the same book.
I do believe that Jack's
writing
is true to what he saw happening in his own mind. The middle to
end of
the book is probably one of the best written records ever of
delirium
tremens. But with all your knowledge
about alcoholism you fail
to see
how someone writing in this state is suffering from acute delirium
and
paranoia. He writes (on page 191)
"...I feel a great ghastly hatred
of
myself and everything, the empty feeling far from being the usual
relief
is now as tho I've been robbed of my spinal power right down the
middle
on purpose by a great witching force--I feel evil forces gathering
down
all around me, from her, the kid, the very walls of the cabin, the
trees,
even the sudden thought of Dave Wain and Romana is evil..." Given
your
literal interpretation, then not only is Billie and the kid and Dave
and
Romana out to get him, but so are the trees and the walls of the
cabin. You have to see, as Leon accurately has been
pointed out as well,
that
anyone in this condition is not exactly in a sound state of mind.
My
assessment of Billie also is much more sympathetic than yours. I
think
(and this is only from what Jack wrote in Big Sur) that she truly
understood
him and wanted to pull him from the brink of self-destruction,
but
even she eventually realizes that he cannot accept her love because
he
cannot love himself. I also do not
agree with your assessment of
alcoholism,
"if they could choose to be another way they would," because
it
borders on fringe of saying "once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic,"
and on
an even greater scale, that people are powerless to change their
own
lives no matter what kind of emotional trauma they have experienced
or path
they are on. The choice to be otherwise
is always there.
DC