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Reading "I Celebrate Myself" provides a skeleton key to Ginsberg's public obsessions, as well as his private life, as if there were whole new aspects to discover. What was there more to know about the poet whose lifelong ambitions were to find love and acceptance, as well as understanding, from his family, acquaintances, and even from total strangers?
Much, apparently. Not unlike that other obsessive diarist and collector, Andy Warhol, Ginsberg noted everything that happened and wrote it all down, from the William Blake-inspired epiphanies to the failed sexual encounters, and eventually hired assistants who had the task of sorting it all out.
It's a biography not for the squeamish or the faint-of-heart. "I Celebrate Myself" (Morgan's title, taken from Walt Whitman, is not without a little Ginsberg-style self-promotion) is a rollercoaster ride through much of the twentieth century, most of it in a society of underground circles and outside the pale of contemporary considerations.
It's a real surprise, however, to read of Ginsberg's early, earnest struggles to find a place in 1940s post-war America: the bright student (a genius!) involves himself in a round of well-intentioned jobs, enrollment at Columbia, letters of introduction to literary journals, trying to scale the walls of society in very acceptable ways. He entered Columbia, originally, in hopes of becoming a lawyer.
He tries drugs with a scientific experimenter's zeal, writes unsatisfactory poetry in pale imitation of his literary models, falls in and out of love trying to make up his mind who -- or what -- he really wants.
But poetry becomes the hinge that opens the door. When Ginsberg finally realizes what it is he needs to say, he finds a path of expression so direct it shocked his family, his friends, and an American public unprepared for him (and which still hasn't fully recovered from the shock, generally, fifty years later after the publication of "Howl"). Years of doubting his own abilities as a poet found Ginsberg was ready to scale the walls of social and literary convention with a force that surprised everyone.
This is a social biography, rather than an explanation of Ginsberg's work -- Morgan assumes, rightly, that the poems speak for themselves. Whatever the reader thinks of Ginsberg, the Beats and their work, this is essential reading.
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After reading "Dharma Lion" an also biobook about Allen Ginsberg which I loaned from a library,
I bought this incredible work
In my opinion everybody should read it, it gives a very importanted view of the American culture & history
and for my part Allen Ginsberg was and still is a very important milestone in human history
give this great man a statue
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Really good biography, hard to put down, would highly recommend. A couple of thoughts on finishing (first I would like to mention almost didn't get this book because of the Amazon description, it gave me an idea of a book of charts, it is not. The chapters are headed up by years - 1966, 1967 etc. and is a normal biography) is that condensing the book to a few chapters after 1970 would have avoided a lot of repetition. In his later years it's mostly about traveling and giving readings and Peter's crazy antics and boys. (After reading yet another lament by Allen about growing old by himself I couldn't help thinking a problem could be that he only seemed to be attracted to heterosexual male teenagers that inevitable left him for girlfriends.)
Two other biography's I recently finished was the very good Literary Outlaw about Burroughs the work of art Memory Babe about Kerouac, and while I am hooked on their books and think that they are our most important and influential post WW2 writers, they are still, even with fame, to borrow a title from Kerouac, the subterraneans. A fascinating cast of drug addicts, alcoholics, murderers (Carr and Burroughs), criminals, thieves, bisexuals, homosexuals, a few heterosexuals, and some truly, clinically insane people.
- also, Ginsberg would be pleased to know that there is something to shock nearly everyone in the book. I for one did not feel comfortable with the seduction by Ginsberg of hundreds? of boys while he was an unpaid teacher at the Narobi? institute. I guess because this was a tantric institution it was accepted since teacher/student flings seemed to be going on with not just Allen (in the book a scandal is reported when the then leader of the college was found to be having numerous affairs with students even though he knew he was HIV positive.) Also Allen's unwavering support of NAMBA, yuck
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There are now many biographies of Allen Ginsberg. Shumacher's Dharma Lion stands out as a particular favorite, and the book-length poem by Ed Sanders is not to be overlooked. Most take a bird's-eye view of this poet and his life. Because of his long personal relationship with Ginsberg as his archivist and bibliographer, Morgan stood closer to his subject, both personally and through his access to the prolific journals Ginsberg diligently kept from the age of eleven to the end of his life, than any previous biographer has, or any future biographer is likely to.
The result is a biography whose intimacy and authority are unparalleled. For or some at least, this will be a decidedly mixed blessing. Those with a strong aversion to sexual revelation and description will be distracted if not put off, for Ginsberg was possessed of a ruthless, at times self-defeating, candor in all matters sexual, as readers familiar with his poetry will know. But, as Morgan shows, he was equally candid in all other areas of his life and feeling.
He was also deeply flawed, persistently naive and hopeful about the numerous lifelong friends he made in his days at Columbia and shortly thereafter: Kerouac, a drunk Republican mama's-boy and anti-semite, whose friendship Ginsberg treasured and whose work he championed to long after Kerouac's death; Huncke, who mooched and stole from him repeatedly; Burroughs, who, for a time lusted after him, but at others was inaccessible and gratuitously mean to Ginsberg's life partner, Peter Orlovsky; Cassady, an insatiable womanizer and artful dodger, or worse; Corso, who embarrassed and abused him often; and Orlovsky himself, heterosexual, chronically unstable and addicted to alcohol and amphetamines, and not infrequently interpersonally and physically destructive. To all of these, and to scores if not hundreds of others, Ginsberg's loyalty, generosity, and his efforts to support them financially and promote their work and enhance their lives never wavered. In his close personal relationships, Ginsberg could be, and often was, a fool, but he was not a fair-weather friend. Among the flaws that Morgan addresses and clarifies was Ginsberg's peculiar and persistent blind spot for women, their strengths, virtues, and talents. Even those close to him, not rarely in love with him, could in important ways escape his notice.
In fairly documenting his flaws, however, Morgan's treatment does not throw Ginsberg's virtues into shadow. His intense interest in all things human, his passionate commitment to free speech and unfettered thought and social justice and, some will be surprised, his patriotism, all come through. But what comes through most powerfully is the loving pains he took to care for others, more often than not one-at-a-time. Undivided attention, a meal, a place to stay, the reading of a poet's work brought to him for comment, his personal responses to virtually all the letters sent to him, from friend and stranger alike; Ginsberg cared and gave.
Until the last very few years of his life, and despite the popularity of his books, readings, and recordings, Ginsberg was chronically close to poverty, on many occasions simply broke, and sometimes temporarily stranded. Even when his income was nominally adequate, he bought his clothing in second-hand stores, rescued his friends again and again and again, and made up the difference. As he supported his friends, sometimes over many years, he supported numerous younger poets and writers, as well as working tirelessly to benefit the many causes, programs, and institutions he cared about; he gave and gave and gave.
In the end, Morgan's biography, its chapters proceeding year by year, covers the life of a great poet who was not less a man of truly heroic love and candor, a flawed human being who can stand as a model and a beacon for that which is most tender and dear in each of us.
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Bill Morgan's new book about the poet Allen Ginsberg, "I Celebrate Myself", rates at the top of my favorites list. I was immediately captivated when I read in the Introduction about an incident where Ginsberg saw a poor woman who was about to be attacked by an angry dog.Ginsberg went to her and asked,"Would you like a fig newton?" From then on I couldn't stop reading.
The book is full of many interesting facts about Ginsberg's life and poetry.His writings represent the turbulence of the cultural revolution of the time and this book is a wonderful testament to this eccentric and unique writer's talent. I applaud and congratulate Bill Morgan for his superb book.
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