Annotated Bibliography

Allen Ginsberg

Alanna Robertson 2nd period Mrs. Smith Rebel Poets Assignment

"Ginsberg (Irwin) Allen" Merriam Webster's Dictionary of American Writers. Springfield: Merriam Webster Inc., 2001. Print. Allen Ginsberg was born on June 3, 1926, in Newark, New Jersey. He was a poet and an activist, the leader of the Beat movement. He studied at Columbia University, where he met his fellow Beats. He was very much a controversial poet. His first poem was "Howl", and it caused a lot of controversy. Carlise, Chuck. American Literature. 1st edition, volume 2. NY, New York: Oxford University Press, 2004. pgs 110-114. Print. Allen was very provocative and profound. He even testified before Congress to legalize LSD. He was big into drugs. As a child, his mom has schizophrenia, so his childhood was different than many others. He went to Columbia at age 17, to study labour law. He got suspended from Columbia for a year after he had done some graffiti. He found the love of his life, Neal Cassidy, there, whom he lived with, in California years before Cassidy would die in Mexico, in 1968. He was arrested in 1949 for stolen property. He met Peter Orlevsky in San Francisco, who became his lover and life partner. His mom died in 1956, and his dad in 1976. John Lennon loved the Beats and Allen so much, he changed his band name to "Beatles" instead of "Beetles". "Allen Ginsberg" Authors and Artists for Young Adults. Vol 33. Gale, 2000. Gale Biography in Context. Web. 4 Feb 2011. Allen represented a poetic voice of an entire generation. He was the first prominent member of the Beat movement. Allen didn't conform to the accepted standards of poetry during those times. It shocked critics countless times. People tended to think his poems were unrefined and amateur. He was influenced by Edgar Allen Poe's work.

"Allen Ginsberg." St James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture. Ed. Sara Pendergast and Tom Pendergast. Detroit: St James Press. 2000. Gale Biography in Context. Web. 8 Feb 2011. Allen Ginsberg was a poet in the generation that was shaped by the Holocaust's aftermath. He used a popular form or artistic defiance, and was frequently called the "prophet of the 1960's". He really accepted eastern philosophers and African American culture and religion. He was deported from Cuba, Soviet Union, and Poland because he spoke out against communism and the persecution of homosexuals. "Allen Ginsberg". Concise Dictionary of American Literature Biography. Vol. 5. Detroit: Gale Research, 1987. Gale Biography in Context. Web. 8 Feb 2011. Allen has a certain philosophy: that the world is handiwork of Gods, and that only humans are responsible for all the tragedies and the bad. For the first few years, he could not get any publication and support. He went all around the world. He did many fun things, such as perform with Bob Dylan. He had the image of being freed from all inhibitions. Feeney, Mark. "A Beat Family Album: Poet Allen Ginsberg's Photographs Reveal An American Counterculture at Work and Play". Smithsonian. June 2010: 10+. Gale Biography in Context. Web. 8 Feb 2011. It was found that Allen was indeed a photographer, too. In the 1940s, he started taking pictures and would get them developed in drugstores. But in 1963, he accidently left his camera in India. He started photography again in the 1980s. Later, he wrote "Beat Memories: The Photographs of Allen Ginsberg", which was on display in the National Gallery of Art, from June 2010 to September 2010.