The Literature Book

264

HE WAS BEAT—

THE ROOT THE SOUL

OF BEATIFIC

ON THE ROAD (1957), JACK KEROUAC

spontaneous form of existence in

their quest to find true meaning in

life. Some of them became known

as “beats”: a collective of poets and

writers who sought kicks, spiritual

refuge, and excess in alcohol, drugs,

and sex; they also delighted in jazz.

I

n the postwar United States,

a generation of middle-class

youth became increasingly

reluctant to follow the societal

pathways of their parents based

on materialistic goals. Instead,

they adopted a meandering,

IN CONTEXT

FOCUS

The beat generation

BEFORE

1926 Ernest Hemingway’s

The Sun Also Rises depicts

modern Americans traveling

through Europe on a quasi-

spiritual journey.

1952 John Clellon Holmes’s

novel Go includes the first use

of the term “beat” to define the

people of the beat movement.

1953 Lawrence Ferlinghetti

opens City Lights Bookshop

in San Francisco; it becomes

a haunt for the beat writers.

1956 Allen Ginsberg’s first

collection of poetry Howl and

Other Poems is published,

launching him as the leading

beat poet.

AFTER

1959 William S. Burroughs’

Naked Lunch uses a radically

disjointed, nonlinear style

extending the narrative form

of the beat generation.

An idealistic youth culture turns away from

mainstream American society in the 1940s.

Jack Kerouac, Neal Cassady, and others take to the

roads of North America seeking the meaning of life.

The beat generation record their thoughts and

adventures in “spontaneous prose.”

“Beat” writing forges a path into mainstream literature

in both poetry and prose.

The birth of beat

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