From 1948 to 1949 Ginsberg had a series of
mystical visions of the eighteenth-century Eng-
lish poet William Blake, one of his poetic influ-
ences. Ginsberg heard Blake’s voice speaking to
him. Barry Miles, inGinsberg: A Biography, cites
Ginsberg as saying, ‘‘The peculiar quality of the
voice was something unforgettable because it
was like God had a human voice, with all the
infinite tenderness and mortal gravity of a living
Creator speaking to his son.’’ These experiences
prompted Ginsberg to experiment with psycho-
active drugs.
In 1949 Ginsberg was arrested after some
acquaintances used his apartment to store goods
stolen in a robbery. Lionel Trilling and other staff
at Columbia University, together with Ginsberg’s
father, persuaded Ginsberg to commit himself
voluntarily to Columbia Presbyterian Psychiatric
Institute in New York as a way of avoiding prison.
Ginsberg agreed, convinced that he had become
insane like his mother. He remained there for eight
months while doctors attempted to make him
conform to their idea of normality. There he met
fellow patient Carl Solomon, who provided inspi-
ration for ‘‘Howl’’; Ginsberg dedicated the poem
to him.
Ginsberg did various jobs in New York City
until 1954, when he moved to San Francisco and
met Peter Orlovsky, who became his lover and
lifelong companion. San Francisco was the cen-
ter of the countercultural Beat movement, led by
such poets as Kenneth Rexroth and Lawrence
Ferlinghetti. On the advice of his therapist,
Ginsberg gave up his job as a market research
analyst to focus on writing poetry full time. He
first came to public notice in October 1955 at
what has come to be known as an iconic poetry
reading at the Six Gallery in San Francisco,
hosted by Kenneth Rexroth. Also reading their
work were the now-famous poets Philip Laman-
tia, Michael McClure, Gary Snyder, and Philip
Whalen. Ginsberg read ‘‘Howl,’’ which was pub-
lished the following year by Lawrence Ferling-
hetti, through his City Lights imprint, inHowl,
and Other Poems(1956).
In 1962 Ginsberg traveled to India, where
he was introduced to yoga and meditation. He
became convinced that these spiritual techniques
were superior to drugs in raising consciousness;
the trip marked the beginning of a lifetime’s study
of Eastern religions. Ginsberg was particularly
interested in mantras, mystical sounds used for
certain effects. He incorporated mantras into
some of his poems, and often began poetry read-
ings by chanting a mantra. In the early 1970s
Ginsberg took classes in Buddhist thought and
practice at the Naropa Institute in Colorado,
which was founded by the Venerable Cho ̈gyam
Trungpa Rinpoche, a Buddhist monk from
Tibet. In 1972 Ginsberg took vows formally
committing himself to Buddhism.
Throughout the 1960s and 1970s Ginsberg
became an iconic figure of political dissidence,
addressing in his poetry such themes as the
McCarthy red hunts and union struggles. He
became associated with the antiwar movement
that opposed American military involvement in
Vietnam and with the philosophy of peace and
love promoted by the hippie movement. He was
also active in antinuclear protest. Though Gins-
berg was a critic of capitalism, he did not con-
sider himself a Communist. He did, however,
speak of his admiration for certain Communist
and labor leaders in the United States, especially
those who were active during the McCarthy red
hunt years.
Ginsberg’s next important poem after ‘‘Howl’’
was ‘‘Kaddish’’ (published by City Lights Books in
1961 inKaddish, and Other Poems), an elegy to his
mother, who died in a mental hospital in 1956.
A Kaddish is a traditional Jewish prayer for the
dead. Ginsberg’s next major work wasThe Fall
of America: Poems of These States, 1965–1971
(1972), which takes the reader on a cross-country
journey, with stops in various places to comment
on the spiritual decline of the United States. The
collection won the National Book Award in 1974.
The poems collected inMind Breaths: Poems,
1972–1977(1977) reflect Ginsberg’s interest in med-
itation and spirituality. Ginsberg’s last poems,
including those written after he learned he had
liver cancer, appear inDeath and Fame: Poems,
1993–1997(1999).
In the spring of 1997, Ginsberg, who already
suffered from diabetes and hepatitis, was diag-
nosed with liver cancer. He continued to write
during his final illness, composing his last poem,
‘‘Things I’ll Not Do (Nostalgias),’’ on March 30.
He died of a heart attack brought on by compli-
cations of liver cancer on April 5, 1997, in New
York City.
Ginsberg has received many honors, includ-
ing a Guggenheim Fellowship (1965), a grant from
the National Endowment for the Arts (1966), a
National Institute of Arts and Letters Award
(1969), membership in the American InstituteHowl