Alleycats and Beatsters, a collection of essays by British writer Kenton Crowther, explores what it means to be Beat, the nature of hipness, and the poets, writers and hipsters who orbited the Beats, … [Read more...]
Beat Generation Authors, Poets & Artists
Here you'll find everything relating to the Beat Generation - biographies of the writers, poets, artists, and other players; interviews, book reviews, photo galleries, and more.
Empty Phantoms: Interviews and Encounters with Jack Kerouac is reissued
In 2005, Thunder's Mouth Press published my collection of interviews with Jack Kerouac. It was titled Empty Phantoms: Interviews and Encounters with Jack Kerouac. Not long afterwards, the famed … [Read more...]
Addendum to “Lost Letter Found”
Here is an addendum to a previous article written for Empty Mirror. Herewith I will describe the contents of the "lost" letter in both the U.K. and U.S. trade editions of The Sea is My Brother so that … [Read more...]
How Kerouac’s haiku changed my life
When I was twenty-two, I was lucky enough to be the only South African on an American college campus, studying creative writing and trying to figure out what to do with my life (along with every other … [Read more...]
A “lost” Jack Kerouac letter found . . . and “lost” again.
In the U.K. edition of Jack Kerouac's 1945 novel, The Sea Is My Brother (Penguin 2011), there is an addendum of material meant to represent Jack Kerouac's formative writing experience during the early … [Read more...]
4 terrific Gregory Corso videos
In honor of Gregory Corso's birthday (he was born March 26, 1930), we've collected some videos of him. Check 'em out. 1. & 2. Gregory Corso Walks and Talks in Roma, 1989 "Two weeks with Gregory … [Read more...]
In honor of Jack’s birthday: 4 Kerouac videos
In honor of Jack Kerouac's birthday (March 12), here are some videos to enjoy. 1. Kerouac & friends in New York "Silent footage of Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, Lucien Carr, and others in New … [Read more...]
Review – Anywhere Road: Retracing Jack Kerouac, by Joerg Haeske
"What's your road, man?—holyboy road, madman road, rainbow road, guppy road, any road. It's an anywhere road for anybody anyhow." - Jack Kerouac, On the Road For the last several years, on … [Read more...]
Review – Free Beer: Kicks and Truth with Jack Kerouac by Cliff Anderson
Free Beer: Kicks & Truth with Jack Kerouac, and other strong drinks is a collection of twelve stories by Cliff Anderson. Also included is Kerouac scholar Rod Anstee's 1990 interview with Anderson, … [Read more...]
Kerouac and An American Marriage
an excerpt from a work-in-progress) In January 1945, Jack Kerouac set out to write his Great American Novel. His newly-drafted notes embraced the activities of the last four years and scaffolded … [Read more...]
Are There Any Good Unpublished Kerouac Books Left?
With the glut of books that thankfully made our way in the past 20 years or so, we now have (probably) just as many posthumous titles as those Kerouac published in his lifetime. These have added … [Read more...]
Jack Kerouac – “Big Sur” Movie Trailer
The film, Big Sur, based upon Jack Kerouac's novel of the same name, released nationwide on November 1, 2013. Directed by Michael Polish, who also wrote the screenplay, it stars Jean-Marc Barr as … [Read more...]
Remembering Poet Kirby Doyle
Kirby Doyle & the Snows of Yesteryear by Michael McClure In 1958 Kirby Doyle's menage on Sacramento Street, in a basement apartment of the no-man's land between the wealthy on the Hill and the … [Read more...]
Earwitness Testimony: Sound and Sense, Word and Void in Jack Kerouac’s Old Angel Midnight
“the ineluctable modality of the audible” – James Joyce Ulysses So much of Jack Kerouac’s writing seems impelled by an impatience with all verbal restraints and by an urgent purpose that strains … [Read more...]
Who was Neal Cassady?
Neal Cassady: a brief biographical sketch Born on February 8, 1926, Neal Cassady grew up in Denver, Colorado. He was the son of a barber who moved the family from cheap hotel to cheap hotel. As a … [Read more...]
The Official Kerouac “On the Road” Movie Trailer is Here!
"On the Road," the movie based on Jack Kerouac's novel of the same name, will be released in the United States on December 21, 2012. Produced by Francis Ford Coppola's American Zoetrope, it's directed … [Read more...]
“The Old Maestro”: an interview with Kerouac friend Henri Cru by Dave Moore
Henri Cru was one of the friends that Jack Kerouac met at Horace Mann School, New York, in 1939. Their friendship sustained for many years, and Cru featured as a character in several of Kerouac's … [Read more...]
La Picaudiere — and Hundertwasser’s Honey
Asked in an interview what he would remember most about his life as an artist, Man Ray replied "the women." I was a bee whisperer, like Edmund Hillary who climbed Mount Everest and who was a beekeeper … [Read more...]
Kerouac — “My really best friend…” an interview with Seymour Wyse by Dave Moore
Seymour Michael Wyse was one of Jack Kerouac's closest friends. An Englishman, educated at Charterhouse School, Wyse met Kerouac when they both attended Horace Mann School, New York, in 1939. They … [Read more...]
The Language of Bebop: Syncopated Sounds and Rhythms in Allen Ginsberg’s ‘Howl’
America, mid-twentieth century. Wearied by civilization, excesses and ornamentation, complications and. All precursors to extinction: The drone of war, the machinery of death, the … [Read more...]