tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32593869915089350932024-03-15T21:11:38.854-04:00THE DAILY BEATRick Dale's blog, the most Kerouac-obsessed on the planet!Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.comBlogger2230125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-77851626805433421662024-03-12T11:19:00.002-04:002024-03-12T11:19:35.679-04:00Happy heavenly birthday to writer and Kerouac BFF, John Clellon Holmes<p> <span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEht6fcwmWrg-0RJTTz7w26l5SQMAFQip_cl4F-waRt11cYF18wlgh4jKSopAKpaQUOE_-YvEQzhFWibWWXj0P6_FBOTbI-TDE8FtJN8pZoK88YaB2teR8Pu_q3GnMHqFnec8yG3G-9wdnTQ/s1600/ScreenHunter+1049.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="491" data-original-width="294" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEht6fcwmWrg-0RJTTz7w26l5SQMAFQip_cl4F-waRt11cYF18wlgh4jKSopAKpaQUOE_-YvEQzhFWibWWXj0P6_FBOTbI-TDE8FtJN8pZoK88YaB2teR8Pu_q3GnMHqFnec8yG3G-9wdnTQ/s320/ScreenHunter+1049.png" width="191" /></a></p><br />Writer John Clellon Holmes, one of Jack Kerouac's closest friends, was born on this date -- March 12 -- in 1926. He appeared in a number of Kerouac's works: as Ian MacArthur in <i>On The Road</i>; Mac Jones and Balliol MacJones in <i>The Subterraneans</i>; Wilson and John Watson in <i>Visions of Cody</i>; James Watson in <i>Book of Dreams</i>; Clellon Holmes in <i>Maggie Cassidy</i>; and, Eugene Pasternak in <i>Doctor Sax</i>.<br /><br />For an in-depth look at Holmes and his relationship with Kerouac, get yourself a copy of Ann and Samuel Charters' <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Brother-Souls-Clellon-Holmes-Kerouac-Generation/dp/1604735791/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=brother+souls&qid=1584021817&sr=8-1" style="font-style: italic;">Brother Souls: John Clellon Holmes, Jack Kerouac, and the Beat Generation</a> (note the proper use of the Oxford comma in that title -- thank you, Ann and Samuel). I read this book on the basis of a glowing recommendation from my great friend, Richard Marsh, whose judgment on books I trust very much. It's now one of my favorite Kerouacian biographies, right up there with Gerald Nicosia's <i>Memory Babe: A Critical Biography of Jack Kerouac</i>.<br /><br />I realize today is also Jack's birthday, but we will take that up in a separate post.<br /><br />Happy heavenly birthday, Mr. Holmes.<div><br /></div><div><br /><br /></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-18282974361224471962024-03-12T11:15:00.001-04:002024-03-12T11:15:44.289-04:00Happy 102nd Birthday to our hero, Jack Kerouac<p> </p><p><br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnnthHD4yKPOqd7nd61Xn1Pxh2JEYaOcw9OwvhdVbvvr-0lTzj0NeYOKhReVYZWWDBcuwd3oJ7ZfYywUOQC7z-9SkXJjRTKw9GnoYMkUyLWLjV-kiKS_gdf1ylAUfXpPcT1i7SdDyAGGXM/s425/ScreenHunter+1267.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="425" data-original-width="250" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnnthHD4yKPOqd7nd61Xn1Pxh2JEYaOcw9OwvhdVbvvr-0lTzj0NeYOKhReVYZWWDBcuwd3oJ7ZfYywUOQC7z-9SkXJjRTKw9GnoYMkUyLWLjV-kiKS_gdf1ylAUfXpPcT1i7SdDyAGGXM/s320/ScreenHunter+1267.png" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cat lover and birthday boy, Jack Kerouac</td></tr></tbody></table><p>Our literary hero, Jack Kerouac, would have turned 102 years old today. He was born March 12, 1922 in the family home at 9 Lupine Road, Lowell, Massachusetts.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhg2Z6t9bM-ZxqPHLqKpJZSzuyE_9HvrKewHXiVt0Z-IjUNRXUruviX1WHf7Im4gsuMzMNTvjHYlDml9Y3Gfg75lDLhz94yh2ViA64UDWdYXtAm5dNMJbfkPaY1FXcde5q3HJskfpzJ8npl/s228/ScreenHunter+1266.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="173" data-original-width="228" height="243" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhg2Z6t9bM-ZxqPHLqKpJZSzuyE_9HvrKewHXiVt0Z-IjUNRXUruviX1WHf7Im4gsuMzMNTvjHYlDml9Y3Gfg75lDLhz94yh2ViA64UDWdYXtAm5dNMJbfkPaY1FXcde5q3HJskfpzJ8npl/w320-h243/ScreenHunter+1266.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jack Kerouac's birthplace: 9 Lupine Road in Lowell, MA<br />(c) 2011 Rick Dale</td></tr></tbody></table><br />Given that this blog is singularly Kerouac-focused, it's difficult to say much about Jack that we haven't said over the past 16 years of this blog's existence. Let's therefore let Jack speak for himself about the day he was born:<p></p><p></p><div><blockquote>March 12, 1922, at five o'clock in the afternoon, in Lowell, Mass. was the day of the first thaw. I was born on the second floor of a wooden house on Lupine Road, which to this day sits on top of a hill overlooking Lakeview Avenue and the broad Merrimack River. From this house my mother, God bless her dear heart, lay listening to the distant roar of the Pawtucket Falls a mile away; she has told me all this. Besides of which it was a strange afternoon, red as fire; "noisy with a lyrical thaw," as I said in my fictions of the past, and that is to say the snow was melting so fast you could hear it in a million small streams under the vast snowy banksides crumbling just a little in their middles from the weight of the moisture. Pines dripped like the seasonal maple, made gum and gummy firsmells in the air. Great shoulders of snow dropped precipitous from their bleak wood. These descriptions are necessary at this point, for the following reason. (December 28, 1950 letter to Neal Cassady, <i>Jack Kerouac: Selected Letters 1940-1956</i>, 1995, Penguin Books, pp. 248-249)</blockquote></div><div><br /></div><div>Jack goes on about his birth -- I encourage you to look up this letter and read it in its entirety.</div><div><br /></div><div>Happy 102nd birthday in heaven, Jack. </div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-91768065523294958132024-03-08T11:25:00.003-05:002024-03-08T11:25:46.735-05:00Belatedly remembering poet Philip Lamantia<p> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy4nw3FJ2QwiNw13PhAlekeLwDgmrVlI3DHLx23bDDOo78negewqFXcoDBuj-LJFOQeG_pUSq8iERuxzhX-le5gPAoGIiVfttth8RSTjprRvdC4sx9qp7FY0hzS3hlA588wsdRyoEfOsVP/s1600/ScreenHunter+1048.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="446" data-original-width="304" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy4nw3FJ2QwiNw13PhAlekeLwDgmrVlI3DHLx23bDDOo78negewqFXcoDBuj-LJFOQeG_pUSq8iERuxzhX-le5gPAoGIiVfttth8RSTjprRvdC4sx9qp7FY0hzS3hlA588wsdRyoEfOsVP/s320/ScreenHunter+1048.png" width="218" /></a></p><br />We spaced out yesterday and neglected to point out that poet Philip Lamantia died on that date -- March 7 -- in 2005. He appeared in two of Jack Kerouac's works: as Francis DaPavia in <i>The Dharma Bums</i> and as David D'Angeli in <i>Desolation Angels. </i>Lamantia read at the famous event at the Six Gallery in 1955 that many point to as kicking off the San Francisco poetry renaissance. (He didn't read his own work, but rather that of his dead friend, John Hoffman.)<div><br /></div><div>In a May 10, 1952 letter to Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac described visiting Lamantia:</div><div></div><blockquote><div>In Frisco, the last week, I visited Lamantia with Neal, he is living in the former stone small castle overlooking Berkeley Calif. he was reading "The Book of the Dead," was reclined in a sumptuous couch with furnishings and turned us on, three friends from Calif. U. dropped in, a psychology major who is apparently his Burroughs, a tall handsome owner of the house (who is somewhat the Jack K.) lounging on floor and sleeping eventually [. . . .] and a young eager intelligent kid who was like you; this was his circle, and of course he was being Lucien, they talked about psychology in terms of "I saw that damned black background to the pink again in yesterday's peotl," "Oh well (Burroughs), it won't hurt you for awhile" (both snickering). [. . . .] Lamantia showed me his poems about the Indian tribes on the San Luis Potosi plateau, I forget tribe name, they deal with his visions on Peotl and they, the lines are,</div><div><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> <span> </span><span> </span> </span>arranged</div><div><span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> <span> </span><span> </span></span>like</div><div><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> <span> </span><span> </span> </span>this, for effect, but more</div><div>complicated. (<i>Jack Kerouac Selected Letters 1940-1956</i>, 1995, Penguin Books, p. 349)</div></blockquote><div></div><div><br />We celebrated Lamantia's birthday on October 23, 2021 <b><i><u><a href="https://thedailybeatblog.blogspot.com/2021/10/happy-heavenly-birthday-to-poet-philip.html" target="_blank">HERE</a></u></i></b>; there's a link there to some of his poetry. Reading some of it would be a Beat thing to do.<br /><br />RIP, Mr. Lamantia.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-335184764961899662024-03-04T11:13:00.000-05:002024-03-04T11:13:37.239-05:00Remembering William Carlos Williams<p><span> </span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrRto3keLPUikYmkqygRowAh-ZYrzt2HJlM_FJWibG5dtjsoME8iHpgs2nsjDByQAXkYatNqePALhmRe1lJNFi4u1670ciwjXjVEiduxbEfWXAAYrDB1Sl3_MfF_bsL54bFbJKOTbWWM8r/s1600/ScreenHunter+1046.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="154" data-original-width="148" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrRto3keLPUikYmkqygRowAh-ZYrzt2HJlM_FJWibG5dtjsoME8iHpgs2nsjDByQAXkYatNqePALhmRe1lJNFi4u1670ciwjXjVEiduxbEfWXAAYrDB1Sl3_MfF_bsL54bFbJKOTbWWM8r/s320/ScreenHunter+1046.png" width="307" /></a></p><p><br />Poet <a href="https://friendsofkerouac.com/person/william-carlos-williams/" target="_blank">William Carlos Williams</a> died on this date -- March 4 -- in 1963. Williams was Doctor Musial in Jack Kerouac's <i>The Dharma Bums. </i>We wrote about Williams on his birthday in 2021, so you can click <b><i><u><a href="https://thedailybeatblog.blogspot.com/2021/09/happy-birthday-to-william-carlos.html" target="_blank">HERE</a></u></i></b> for some details on this influential person in the Kerouac world, including his advice to Jack and Allen Ginsberg et al. along with one of his poems.</p><div>In a September 11, 1955 letter to editor Malcolm Cowley, Jack explains his developing writing style and describes it as:</div><div><blockquote>RHYTHMIC--It's prose answering the requirements mentioned by W. C. Williams, for natural-speech rhythms and words-- (<i>Jack Kerouac Selected Letters 1940-1956</i>, 1995, Penguin Books, p. 515)</blockquote>Rest In Poetry, Dr. Williams.</div><div><br /></div><p> </p>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-60263804639093790332024-03-04T09:35:00.000-05:002024-03-04T09:35:21.932-05:00Belatedly remembering Sebastian Sampas<p> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5bM0TiGiEHK3G_51X5kBijrYDwhP-N3hKxsdYUUUIO7DScUccAb1UBuNOMdKgs5vk-RpPVd95-X_rnrkqwYNiXRSYuvURvqMnn3TPgFDZ8tkwoorQksOcP1efqEVHamXewx_EZjvAn1km/s1600/ScreenHunter+882.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="194" data-original-width="161" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5bM0TiGiEHK3G_51X5kBijrYDwhP-N3hKxsdYUUUIO7DScUccAb1UBuNOMdKgs5vk-RpPVd95-X_rnrkqwYNiXRSYuvURvqMnn3TPgFDZ8tkwoorQksOcP1efqEVHamXewx_EZjvAn1km/s320/ScreenHunter+882.jpg" width="265" /></a></p><br />We missed posting that on March 2 -- in 1944 -- Sebastian "Sammy" Sampas died at age 21. Sampas was one of Jack Kerouac's closest and dearest friends, and it would be hard to overstate the significant influence one had on the other (especially in ways literary and intellectual). Jack's third wife, Stella, was Sebastian's sister. Sampas appeared in the following Kerouac works (Source: <a href="http://www.beatbookcovers.com/kercomp/">Character Key to Kerouac's Duluoz Legend</a>):<br /><br /><u>Kerouac Work</u> <u>Character Name</u><br /><br /><i>Doctor Sax</i> Sebastian<br /><i>Visions of Cody </i> Sebastian<br /><i>Book of Dreams </i> Silvanus Santos<br /><i>Vanity of Duluoz</i> Sabbas (Sabby) Savakis<br /><i>Visions of Gerard </i> Savas Savakis<br /><i>Atop an Underwood</i> Sam<br /><i>The Town and the City</i> Alexander Panos<br /><i>The Haunted Life and Other Writings</i> Garabed Tourian<br /><br />There are some wonderful letters back and forth between Sebastian and Jack in <i>Jack Kerouac: Selected Letters 1940-1956</i> (1995, Penguin). In a November 1942 letter Jack calls Sampas his "mad poet brother (p. 31).<div><br /></div><div>Here is how a letter from March 1943 starts (p. 43):<br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">Sebastian!<br />You magnificent bastard! I was just thinking about you, and all of a sudden, I feel<br />very Sebastianish,<br />very Bohemian!<br />very Baroque!<br />very GAY! (TURN!)<br />I was thinking, in a flash of glory, about all the things we've done!!!--and all the others we're going to do!<br />AFTER THE WAR, WE MUST GO TO FRANCE AND SEE THAT THE REVOLUTION GOES WELL! AND GERMANY TOO! AND ITALY TOO! AND RUSSIA!<br />For 1. Vodka<br /> 2. Love<br /> 3. Glory. </blockquote><div>Alas, there was no "after the war" for Sampas -- he was killed by wounds received in the Battle of Anzio during WWII while serving as an army medic. His death from battle wounds is especially poignant today as the Russian military has invaded Ukraine and war deaths are mounting.</div><div><br /></div><div>It would take an entire book to describe adequately the deep and loving friendship Sampas and Kerouac shared, so I won't attempt it here. Suffice to say that you can get a good sense of it from Kerouac biographies, letters between the two, and, of course, Jack's own words about Sampas in the above listed works.<br /><br />RIP, Mr. Sampas. </div></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-83604399352444654982024-03-04T09:32:00.001-05:002024-03-04T09:32:24.966-05:00Happy belated heavenly birthday to Lucien Carr<p> </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTPi8i2dXzB4A6M8qtr-xGx6vhJWRz4dvjjsmFOK4eh4iDgnNM_jX30kJDFLm2HdkNdQ23uWzRtOTdA-6s8nfOEXqixL8auJOkCFTk2pP7eh7qzhPbd0Ze-OBOumrUCK14iAnSNNPWiq6K/s1600/ScreenHunter+1044.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="422" data-original-width="619" height="272" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTPi8i2dXzB4A6M8qtr-xGx6vhJWRz4dvjjsmFOK4eh4iDgnNM_jX30kJDFLm2HdkNdQ23uWzRtOTdA-6s8nfOEXqixL8auJOkCFTk2pP7eh7qzhPbd0Ze-OBOumrUCK14iAnSNNPWiq6K/s400/ScreenHunter+1044.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption">(L-R) William S. Burroughs, Lucien Carr, and Allen Ginsberg<br />(for more photos see <a href="https://allenginsberg.org/2021/03/m-m-1/">https://allenginsberg.org/2021/03/m-m-1/</a>)</td></tr></tbody></table><br />Proto-Beat Lucien Carr was born on March 1 in 1925. We got distracted and missed posting about it on that date. Carr appeared in a number of Jack Kerouac's works: as Damion in <i>On The Road</i>; Sam Vedder in <i>The Subterraneans</i> and <i>Book of Dreams</i> (expanded edition); Julien in <i>Big Sur</i>; Julien Love in <i>Book of Dreams</i>, <i>Desolation Angels</i>, and <i>Visions of Cody</i>; Claude De Maubris in <i>Vanity of Duluoz</i>; Claude in <i>Orpheus Emerged</i>; Kenneth Wood in <i>The Town and the City</i>; Kenneth in <i>The Haunted Life and Other Writings</i>; and, Phillip Tourian in <i>And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks</i>.<br /><br />We remembered Carr previously (click <b><i><u><a href="https://thedailybeatblog.blogspot.com/2022/01/remembering-lucien-carr-original-beat.html">HERE</a></u></i></b>), so we won't repeat biographical details except to say that Carr was an influential member of the early Beat Generation whose name is too often omitted when speaking of same (see Catherine De Leon's eye-opening article about Carr <a href="https://pleasekillme.com/lucien-carr/?fbclid=IwAR2r1nK3e5td2oBG4ELpgXKh_EnmCc7C7y8Bsxl7fJQtm-py5ZBqt5Y049c" target="_blank"><b><i>HERE</i></b></a>). Carr has a rather extensive entry on Wikipedia in case you want to read more about him. Wikipedia gets a bad rap all the time, but I often find it to be a useful tool in getting the sense of a person, concept, or event. <div><br /></div><div>Here is an excerpt from a February 24, 1956 letter from Jack Kerouac to Lucien Carr:</div><blockquote>Are you reading your Diamond Sutra daily like a good boy?--I got it divided into days--that is the best thing you'll ever read, it is the only thing ever written that has any value. The Bible is for shits. The Diamond Sutra is for ding-dong Buddha gongs. The words and the paper of this letter are emptiness, the words and the paper of this letter aint [sic]different from emptiness, neither is emptiness different from the words and the paper of this letter, indeed, emptiness is the words & the paper of this letter. (<i>Jack Kerouac Selected Letters 1940-1956</i>, 1995, Penguin Books, p. 564)</blockquote><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvHXWRDIrMGmCAFbRERuBm51Ywi6u1I4JAzmROnQTU-iAN868F3pwYAjTKOvmdK86bI8PcjQ9LzDREZQE_kvw_tW34MNgu7Tjb0geen6os0NvWIkuaxgDHxqNmqate9f5tGPOkmznPWIf7/s364/ScreenHunter+1262.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="357" data-original-width="364" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvHXWRDIrMGmCAFbRERuBm51Ywi6u1I4JAzmROnQTU-iAN868F3pwYAjTKOvmdK86bI8PcjQ9LzDREZQE_kvw_tW34MNgu7Tjb0geen6os0NvWIkuaxgDHxqNmqate9f5tGPOkmznPWIf7/s320/ScreenHunter+1262.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My copy of <i>A Buddhist Bible</i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>I've been in a Buddhist frame of mind of late, and that passage rang out to me. If you're a Kerouac fan, you <b>must </b>have a copy of this book. It is the one of the only books he had to read during his time on Desolation Peak (we posted about this <b><i><u><a href="https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/3259386991508935093/7067774957267945340" target="_blank">HERE</a></u></i></b>). The Diamond Sutra starts on page 87 of my edition above. Happy reading . . .</p><div>. . . and Happy Belated Heavenly Birthday, Mr. Carr.<br /><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-33563386147631397802024-02-29T14:05:00.001-05:002024-02-29T14:05:13.158-05:00RIP comedian Richard Lewis, who had a Kerouac connection<blockquote><blockquote><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivjonJLfAJ3h0Gx3eFVlxKbSG400Wr5KES5YNRqJ4YDPDDdUSPwrPHclEBSMByHiO4jn6UYIswElswJrxWcA4n7kzbOp_w8KhWj36WN3-b-CxQ5CY5DlftJZW0lg5XqRBHsW_Zip4AeDurESHHnYDi_j3zhgE5ZE5Zzb29QvqcR5cVCQJkLF9m_K0XKwjA/s545/ScreenHunter%201597.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="406" data-original-width="545" height="238" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivjonJLfAJ3h0Gx3eFVlxKbSG400Wr5KES5YNRqJ4YDPDDdUSPwrPHclEBSMByHiO4jn6UYIswElswJrxWcA4n7kzbOp_w8KhWj36WN3-b-CxQ5CY5DlftJZW0lg5XqRBHsW_Zip4AeDurESHHnYDi_j3zhgE5ZE5Zzb29QvqcR5cVCQJkLF9m_K0XKwjA/s320/ScreenHunter%201597.png" width="320" /></a></div><br />Comedian Richard Lewis has died. Perhaps you weren't aware of his Jack Kerouac connection, so below is a post I pulled from the Jack Kerouac page (<a href="https://www.facebook.com/KerouacEstate">https://www.facebook.com/KerouacEstate</a>) on Facebook. I can relate to Richard because of his first name and that he had Parkinson's Disease. And he was an original, which I appreciate.<br /><br /><blockquote>The world has lost one of the most inspiring and influential comedians of our time Richard Lewis. We were truly blessed when Richard befriended us and collaborated with us on one of our most acclaimed projects, of which he gave us a truly captivating reading of Jack’s “America’s New Trinity of Love.” This was for the Kerouac-kicks joy darkness album we produced for Rykodisc. After that experience, Richard tapped the album's producer, Jim Sampas, for his album “Live From Hell” which included an interview with Richard by Bill Zehme, recorded in Boston. Richard was not only a joy to work with, he was so caring of others, always wanting to make sure everyone was ok. And not just on the surface of caring, but deep down and honestly, though not without his humor. We send our heartfelt condolences to his family and friends.</blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote><blockquote><blockquote>Here is that reading of Jack Kerouac’s “America’s New Trinity of Love.” <a href="https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DbC5YD_Qh2oU%26fbclid%3DIwAR1dKQLep_VRknk5koDjx9rHpeSiV1jJ8VmaOBh8Ml6bSU6uy0uBQrPHpiE&h=AT1VEHzAcYlPakfyHi7m5_MbWtZGFqSfiIKNKaRAAqlVZLKG_8Uhhldp5HCws3JuNbcxM-a--abKBJG2zrcEDWB11PbyF_c0sWFAuvnDjGlkpdWQAWQXomVu96k5VG02UW9ubXC_X2aaZOpBSQ&__tn__=-UK-R&c[0]=AT1d52kODNwl6ZaGKWwbDhp8RkWpIsh-q5dDP5BXaAR7fLYd974-KiU6vBE14XP7QCujMO_SyktevCEuuUrXm1OzBhVf5n5Df1n6e63Ipq6Ac8ZlgwiBPQYLL4mmkFlExHzRr5VcXpFj9qzEk0wF-PwTzBe77NOL7kQNP0wOtPcm3es-3FJhVuZQpEvwXSs2AYzTFxK1RGex">www.youtube.com/watch?v=bC5YD_Qh2oU</a></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><p><br /></p><p> </p><a href="https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DbC5YD_Qh2oU%26fbclid%3DIwAR1dKQLep_VRknk5koDjx9rHpeSiV1jJ8VmaOBh8Ml6bSU6uy0uBQrPHpiE&h=AT1VEHzAcYlPakfyHi7m5_MbWtZGFqSfiIKNKaRAAqlVZLKG_8Uhhldp5HCws3JuNbcxM-a--abKBJG2zrcEDWB11PbyF_c0sWFAuvnDjGlkpdWQAWQXomVu96k5VG02UW9ubXC_X2aaZOpBSQ&__tn__=-UK-R&c[0]=AT1d52kODNwl6ZaGKWwbDhp8RkWpIsh-q5dDP5BXaAR7fLYd974-KiU6vBE14XP7QCujMO_SyktevCEuuUrXm1OzBhVf5n5Df1n6e63Ipq6Ac8ZlgwiBPQYLL4mmkFlExHzRr5VcXpFj9qzEk0wF-PwTzBe77NOL7kQNP0wOtPcm3es-3FJhVuZQpEvwXSs2AYzTFxK1RGex"></a>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-60856580228992412152024-02-27T11:16:00.000-05:002024-02-27T11:16:04.650-05:00Remembering Beat poet Elise Cowen<p> <span> </span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuMcabH-YBRY7n3p0M9iLtQfQyIiCu6bDlA1g9MTUNJZdVQ8-c0G72YrVdcw-r8U0TJrV85S-bn46H1hGf_UKlPr04-VoIuHfiIeMd94fXySIJktSXeWRz5uq6ROy80fQckwCmCiKLPJK5/s1600/ScreenHunter+1042.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="301" data-original-width="303" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuMcabH-YBRY7n3p0M9iLtQfQyIiCu6bDlA1g9MTUNJZdVQ8-c0G72YrVdcw-r8U0TJrV85S-bn46H1hGf_UKlPr04-VoIuHfiIeMd94fXySIJktSXeWRz5uq6ROy80fQckwCmCiKLPJK5/s1600/ScreenHunter+1042.png" /></a></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><br />Beat poet <a href="https://friendsofkerouac.com/person/elise-cowen/" target="_blank">Elise Cowen</a> died on this date -- February 27 -- in 1962. She appeared as Barbara Lipp in Jack Kerouac's <i>Desolation Angels</i> and was a close companion to Allen Ginsberg (indeed, it is reported that they were lovers for a brief time). The bulk of her work, tragically, was destroyed after her death by suicide, but some of it survives, including the two poems <a href="https://www.writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/88v/cowen.html">here</a> (after the bio -- which starts with an enlightening quote from Gregory Corso about the lack of women representation in the Beat movement).<div><br /></div><div>Here's an excerpt from Kerouac's <i><a href="https://terebess.hu/zen/mesterek/angels.pdf" target="_blank">Desolation Angels</a></i>: <br /><blockquote>We stayed together for an awful long time, too, <i>years</i>—Julien called her [Alyce] Ecstasy Pie—Her best friend, the dark haired Barbara Lipp, happened by circumstance to be in love with Irwin Garden— Irwin had steered me to a haven. In this haven I slept with her for lovemaking purposes but after we were done I’d go to the outer bedroom, where I kept the winter window constantly open and the radiator shut off, and slept there in my sleepingbag. Eventually that way I finally got rid of that tubercular Mexican cough—I’m not so dumb (as Ma always said). (1995, Riverhead Books, pp. 329-330</blockquote>Click <a href="https://electricliterature.com/beat-poet-elise-cowens-time-traveling-love-letters-to-emily-dickinson/">here</a> to read an interesting article about Cowen and her connection to poetry giant Emily Dickinson (to whom poem #2 above refers).<br /><br />RIP, Ms. Cowen.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-46908374173745656872024-02-26T11:24:00.001-05:002024-02-26T11:24:29.614-05:00Remembering Carl Solomon<p> <span> </span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixtL_V8MO9PwcdzQi2ym2CB5oJqBg5w08yY0n727fghvECPFRMZTsSGP0Ho3cq2dza1RFBDfpXkPH7m8ZlYlN8my-O_ZOGb1YBA0zi2sNY524oQ7DoKNVcrA2FbZ3cL3BIAs-jGpcEa3gF/s1600/ScreenHunter+1041.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="331" data-original-width="284" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixtL_V8MO9PwcdzQi2ym2CB5oJqBg5w08yY0n727fghvECPFRMZTsSGP0Ho3cq2dza1RFBDfpXkPH7m8ZlYlN8my-O_ZOGb1YBA0zi2sNY524oQ7DoKNVcrA2FbZ3cL3BIAs-jGpcEa3gF/s320/ScreenHunter+1041.png" width="274" /></a></p><br />Carl Solomon died on this date -- February 26 -- in 1993. He appeared in two of Jack Kerouac's works: as Carl Rappaport in <i>Visions of Cody </i>and as Carl Solobone in <i>Book of Sketches</i>.<br /><br />Allen Ginsberg met Solomon in a psychiatric hospital and subsequently dedicated his famous poem, "Howl," to Solomon. Solomon worked as an editor for Ace Books, owned by his uncle A. A. Wyn. There are several published letters from Jack Kerouac to Solomon discussing Ace possibly publishing <i>On The Road</i>. The latter never happened, but Ace did publish William S. Burroughs' <i>Junkie</i>; Solomon wrote the Publisher's Note in one version and the Introduction in another. Here's an excerpt from an April 7, 1952 letter from Kerouac to Solomon:<div><blockquote>But here's my main idea in this note (and apart from fact that I feel you're okay and wish you'd like me more), I have an idea we could publish ON THE ROAD regular hardcover <i>and</i> papercover, extracting 160-page stretch for 25c edition (the sexy narrative stretch, I'll designate it when I mail in full manuscript some time soon). (<i>Jack Kerouac Selected Letters 1940-1956</i>, 1995, Penguin Books, p. 342.</blockquote>Click <a href="https://www.beatdom.com/carl-solomon-on-not-publishing-jack-kerouac/">here</a> to read a 1973 interview with Solomon by John Tytell titled, "Carl Solomon On Not Publishing Jack Kerouac." Oops.<br /><br />RIP, Mr. Solomon.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /><div><br /></div><div><br /></div></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-68997724720709740322024-02-22T11:12:00.000-05:002024-02-22T11:12:11.362-05:00Remembering Lawrence Ferlinghetti<p> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibDIx6rq4BiDJUHNHsnRJTxJVuLTym9ZdCy-_5sR3IKBZPABHdu-hHuJGcaTWuhuyrh2Fr2ZKIfYFBE_oH4pXYwb3sHJBCuDEuSiPAgziM3CU0PnhIDwOI-tUlOdOjN06WD9cCKpPcvzQt/s632/ScreenHunter+1255.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="381" data-original-width="632" height="241" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibDIx6rq4BiDJUHNHsnRJTxJVuLTym9ZdCy-_5sR3IKBZPABHdu-hHuJGcaTWuhuyrh2Fr2ZKIfYFBE_oH4pXYwb3sHJBCuDEuSiPAgziM3CU0PnhIDwOI-tUlOdOjN06WD9cCKpPcvzQt/w400-h241/ScreenHunter+1255.png" width="400" /></a></p><div><br /></div><div>Poet and book publisher Lawrence Ferlinghetti died on today's date -- February 22 -- in 2021 at the age of 101 at his Bay Area home. We had wished him a happy 101st on March 24, 2020 (click <b><i><u><a href="https://thedailybeatblog.blogspot.com/2020/03/happy-101st-birthday-to-lawrence.html" target="_blank">HERE</a></u></i></b>). Ferlinghetti appeared as Lorenzo Monsanto in Jack Kerouac's <i>Big Sur</i>, the devastatingly honest account of Jack's mental health decline at the hands of alcohol and his futile effort to forestall the same at Ferlinghetti's Big Sur cabin near the Bixby Canyon Bridge.</div><div><br /></div><div>I've never see Ferlinghetti in person, although I've been to his bookstore, City Lights, in San Francisco. You can read about his life in this <i>L.A. Times</i> obit (click <b><i><u><a href="https://www.latimes.com/obituaries/story/2021-02-23/lawrence-ferlinghetti-city-lights-dead" target="_blank">HERE</a></u></i></b>).</div><div><br /></div><div>It would do him a great honor if you read some of his <a href="https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/lawrence-ferlinghetti" target="_blank">poetry</a> today, or something he published at great personal and professional risk, like Allen Ginsberg's "<a href="https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/49303/howl" target="_blank">Howl</a>."</div><div><br /></div><div>RIP, Mr. Ferlinghetti.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-18169279035239437882024-02-20T11:43:00.000-05:002024-02-20T11:43:25.428-05:00Remembering Kerouac friend, artist Robert LaVigne<p> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3hS00dyJY_Jsy9pTZV7G7GSdH2zNiv7rACUSPosjtzd0b-uY-h_Tc2DtGw0xWw_wEFkLeui3T3ZoznzaAWzUkzQieBVEtM34ut8whVXXnzbShZbIFG9YW70s7nZalrYmqaxkOj9zCaYL6/s1600/ScreenHunter+1034.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="508" data-original-width="387" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3hS00dyJY_Jsy9pTZV7G7GSdH2zNiv7rACUSPosjtzd0b-uY-h_Tc2DtGw0xWw_wEFkLeui3T3ZoznzaAWzUkzQieBVEtM34ut8whVXXnzbShZbIFG9YW70s7nZalrYmqaxkOj9zCaYL6/s320/ScreenHunter+1034.png" width="243" /></a></p><br />On this date -- February 20 -- in 2014, artist and Kerouac friend Robert LaVigne died. LaVigne (I've seen it with the V capitalized and not capitalized) was Guy Levesque in Jack Kerouac's <i>Desolation Angels</i>. That is it according to the <a href="http://www.beatbookcovers.com/kercomp/">Character Key to Kerouac's Duluoz Legend</a>, yet Allen Ginsberg himself identifies LaVigne as Robert Browning in <i>Big Sur</i> (see Ginsberg link below). The Duluoz Key says Browning was William Morris. I asked Key curator Dave Moore about this discrepancy.<br /><br />Dave Moore sent me the below scan from one of Kerouac's notebooks (titled "Duluoz Legend Personae Names"), where we can see in Jack's own handwriting that Robert Browning in <i>Big Sur</i> was William Morris, a painter friend of Philip Whalen. And so, we will defer to Jack and assume that Alan was wrong.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTcjXbSZaG8q-4Dn862-GWwgTOS9pYKtH9uGbxcx_WhYNKOCI9H5Eb4bi0NQQyyz6cfGfa1cVG6-wedfnnR1S4KXoq2woiP37PzXigSeZf3hiqbD_4OZsQjxEbDRuwAR_OCGzLzqGEfF1m/s1600/ScreenHunter+1036.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="510" data-original-width="351" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTcjXbSZaG8q-4Dn862-GWwgTOS9pYKtH9uGbxcx_WhYNKOCI9H5Eb4bi0NQQyyz6cfGfa1cVG6-wedfnnR1S4KXoq2woiP37PzXigSeZf3hiqbD_4OZsQjxEbDRuwAR_OCGzLzqGEfF1m/s320/ScreenHunter+1036.png" width="220" /></a></div><br /><br />In a 1955 letter to Allen Ginsberg, Kerouac refers to Lavigne as a "canuck painter." There are no letters to or from LaVigne included in either of Ann Charters' compilations. Ginsberg referred to LaVigne as a "<a href="https://www.nga.gov/collection/art-object-page.160728.html" target="_blank">Painter friend of Poets</a>." Natalie Jackson, who we remembered <a href="https://thedailybeatblog.blogspot.com/2023/11/remembering-natalie-jackson.html" target="_blank">here</a>, was a model of LaVigne's. A well-known story about LaVigne is that it was his portrait of Peter Orlovsky -- his model and lover -- that caused Allen Ginsberg to request an introduction to Orlovsky, beginning a life-long relationship between the two.<br /><br />LaVigne has papers archived at Columbia University. See <a href="http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/archival/collections/ldpd_4079553/" target="_blank">https://researchworks.oclc.org/archivegrid/collection/data/606938645</a> (this resource includes a concise biographical sketch).<br /><br />LaVigne's drawing of Jack adorns the cover of one version of <i>The Scripture of the Golden Eternity</i> (see below).<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgV41ScNLxAaK0iEUooSNPh9m5Dut4omEykBJyU3oquNFiQmMjh9kXvo2zTUMZ3OSP6X6jgLyUtZ7FTIjMhnjnR6daopuAZ7sSj4wtm9wQOimrOAbAV30UePQ45LjS8s_3A42MmYno65pki/s1600/ScreenHunter+1035.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="278" data-original-width="207" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgV41ScNLxAaK0iEUooSNPh9m5Dut4omEykBJyU3oquNFiQmMjh9kXvo2zTUMZ3OSP6X6jgLyUtZ7FTIjMhnjnR6daopuAZ7sSj4wtm9wQOimrOAbAV30UePQ45LjS8s_3A42MmYno65pki/s320/ScreenHunter+1035.png" width="238" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">RIP, Mr. LaVigne.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div><br /></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-17373702173524809392024-02-17T00:05:00.001-05:002024-02-17T00:05:10.723-05:00Happy Belated Birthday in Heaven to Jan Kerouac<p> </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibNTL4K273pa4EaOoRDSqc8aMn_Bu3udabbkSWUlspdMMCFtGaE897KyJ7ktnElpUDMlc50UVDsQNhpUNrxN0_QYFledzLOGQTqr0jua0pYik_wXKuJHGVZzZZmGgaI8Toc7GLSDicXPYW/s574/ScreenHunter+1252.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="334" data-original-width="574" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibNTL4K273pa4EaOoRDSqc8aMn_Bu3udabbkSWUlspdMMCFtGaE897KyJ7ktnElpUDMlc50UVDsQNhpUNrxN0_QYFledzLOGQTqr0jua0pYik_wXKuJHGVZzZZmGgaI8Toc7GLSDicXPYW/s320/ScreenHunter+1252.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jan Kerouac</td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><br />Had Jack Kerouac's daughter, Jan, not died at a young age, she would have turned 70 yesterday. Unlike the rest of his family and many of his friends, she never appeared in any of Kerouac's books. Her mother was Joan Haverty, Jack's second wife.<br /><br />An accomplished author in her own right, Jan published <i>Baby Driver</i> and <i>Trainsong</i> during her lifetime and left behind the as-yet-unpublished novel, <i>Parrot Fever </i>(an extract of the latter in chapbook format is available from Gerry Nicosia -- gnicosia@earthlink.net).<br /><br />Jan is worth getting to know through her novels, but you can also read about her in Nicosia's <i>Jan Kerouac: A Life in Memory</i>, available <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Jan-Kerouac-Memory-Gerald-Nicosia-ebook/dp/B07XQMQ93M#ace-8881249860">here</a> or direct from the author (see above e-mail address).<br /><br />I didn't start out to write a commercial here, so I'll finish with some of Jan's own words to inspire you to read some of her writing. This is about one of the two times in total she ever saw her father in person (and they talked on the phone once).<br /><br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">Jack's reaction to me was shrugs and uncertain smiles. He said "Hi" but didn't make much of a fuss. When the doorway back-slapping and bantering was done with, he went back to rocking again, calling to his brethren across the room, "Hey, why doesn't somebody turn this thing down, I can't hear myself think!" This seemed odd, for he was closer to the TV than anyone else in the room. But someone did turn it down for him, and he continued to guzzle his giant baby bottle [a fifth of whiskey], rocking himself as if in a cradle. </blockquote><blockquote class="tr_bq">The relatives all left, and Jack nodded a casual so-long to them over his shoulder. I watched him curiously, once again with the feeling that I had to be careful of what I said, like I'd felt the first time I met him on Avenue B when I was nine. He was desperately trying to keep his shield in place, at a loss for what to say. (<i>Baby Driver</i>, 1981, St. Martin's Press, p. 184)</blockquote><br />You'll learn where this took place and what Jack was wearing when you read <i>Baby Driver</i>.<br /><br />I'll conclude by saying that Jan was surprisingly forgiving of her father, understanding that he "belonged to the world." <br /><br />Happy belated birthday in Heaven, Jan.<div><br /></div><div><br /><div><br /></div></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-5644613046011125222024-02-10T11:17:00.004-05:002024-02-10T11:17:34.616-05:00Remembering Mrs. Jack Kerouac<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrP7bs3RO6x_yMHX51Bc6dLJ6yMw_iVDSpmNiDOVNiIx_DQ7wpNTZPWb_wdCUvPYCtlNjBZbdsrC3QMgboItSoTjPbttahPtFW7ZDhznD_dIU1_GOi8yQvhe2GWTZfoGqfIshM7GghsTZz/s1600/ScreenHunter+1030.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="273" data-original-width="229" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrP7bs3RO6x_yMHX51Bc6dLJ6yMw_iVDSpmNiDOVNiIx_DQ7wpNTZPWb_wdCUvPYCtlNjBZbdsrC3QMgboItSoTjPbttahPtFW7ZDhznD_dIU1_GOi8yQvhe2GWTZfoGqfIshM7GghsTZz/s320/ScreenHunter+1030.png" width="268" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption">Jack Kerouac and Stella Sampas Kerouac</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div>Today -- February 10 -- we remember Stellas Sampas, who died on this date in 1990. Jack's third wife (married 11-18-66), she appeared in one Kerouac work, <i>Vanity of Duluoz</i>, as Stavroula Savakis. They knew each other from childhood and he wished her a Happy Valentine in a February 13, 1959 letter:</div><div></div><blockquote><div>Happy Valentine and good luck to all the family.</div><div>I hope you understand why I dont [sic] write, or visit. My mother is moving back to a small house in Florida now, with me, because it is too expensive in New York. I dont have as much money as people think. I didnt[sic] even sell On the Road to the movies yet but the movies are coming out soon with big pictures using the same theme. So I lost out and wont be rich at all. It's a shame but it always works that way. I dont [sic] need much money for myself, in any case. The awful abuse that I have been getting from critics resulted in the complete neglect of Dharma Bums. For some reason my name has become associated with bearded beatniks with whom I never had anything to do at all. I'm angry now, for sure, I'm going to Paris this spring and forget it all, and write something beautiful about Paris. When I'm an old man I'll at least have my jug of wine and a loaf of bread too. (<i>Jack Kerouac Selected Letters 1957-1968</i>, Ann Charters (ed.), Penguin Books, 1999, p. 210)</div></blockquote><div><br />Stella inherited Jack's estate when Jack's mom, Gabrielle, died in 1973, triggering the well-known Kerouac estate controversy over the forged will (so said a judge) and endless vitriole on-line about the whole matter. The Sampas family controls the estate to this day. For an insider's look at estate details, grab a copy of <i>Kerouac: The Last Quarter Century</i> by Gerald Nicosia (reviewed <a href="https://thedailybeatblog.blogspot.com/2019/05/review-of-kerouac-last-quarter-century.html">here</a>).<br /><br />Stella was the sister of Jack's closest childhood friend, Sebastian Sampas. Most would agree that theirs was mainly a marriage of convenience (she looked after Jack's invalid mother). Nevertheless, she played a major role in the Kerouac saga.</div><div><br /></div><div>I'm waiting for someone to write her biography. Any takers?<br /><br />RIP, Mrs. Kerouac.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><p> </p>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-73877921590546011062024-02-08T14:51:00.000-05:002024-02-08T14:51:20.738-05:00Happy heavenly birthday to Neal Cassady<p> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCZEOqe3Re4KBOPdSHf2SSriT87GEtllAzwO6fwzvbKyj4X4FlS1ZCVoNtt6tAEDrtRqJZa6fE5ToYw4E8SrVyimbvRdgpRf6kUBy34PYGTj7diifmFvfP4xRZFTQ1fxAsWuTg4R_rMMBl/s1600/ScreenHunter+1022.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="187" data-original-width="168" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCZEOqe3Re4KBOPdSHf2SSriT87GEtllAzwO6fwzvbKyj4X4FlS1ZCVoNtt6tAEDrtRqJZa6fE5ToYw4E8SrVyimbvRdgpRf6kUBy34PYGTj7diifmFvfP4xRZFTQ1fxAsWuTg4R_rMMBl/s320/ScreenHunter+1022.png" width="287" /></a></p><br />On this date -- February 8 -- Neal Cassady was born (in 1926). Cassady served as a significant muse for Jack Kerouac and appeared as Dean Moriarty in <i>On The Road*; </i>Cody Pomeray in <i>Visions of Cody</i>, <i>Book of Dreams</i>, <i>Big Sur</i>, <i>Desolation Angels</i>, and <i>Book of Sketches</i>; Leroy in <i>The Subterraneans</i>; and Neal Cassady in <i>Lonesome Traveler</i>, <i>Desolation Angels</i>, and <i>Satori in Paris</i>.<br /><br />So much has already been said about Cassady that is strains my brain to think of anything original to say. Thus, we'll let Kerouac's description of Dean's parking attendant prowess from <i>On The Road</i> suffice:<br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">The most fantastic parking-lot attendant in the world, he can back a car forty miles an hour into a tight squeeze and stop at the wall, jump out, race among fenders, leap into another car, circle it fifty miles an hour in a narrow space, back swiftly into tight spot, <i>hump</i>, snap the car with the emergency so that you see it bounce as he flies out; then clear to the ticket shack, sprinting like a track star, hand a ticket, leap into a newly arrived car before the owner's half out, leap literally under him as he steps out, start the car with the door flapping, and roar off to the next available spot, arc, pop in, brake, out, run; working like that without pause eight hours a night, evening rush hours and after-theater rush hours, in greasy wino pants with a frayed fur-lined jacket and beat shoes that flap. (Penguin Books, 1976, p. 9)</blockquote><br />To the ever-kinetic Neal Cassady -- Happy Birthday in Beat heaven.<br /><br /><br />P.S. Happy Birthday, also, to my friend Keith Fisher, who turned me on to Kerouac in the first place and served as my Dean Moriarty on quite a number of adventures in life.<br /><br /><br />*According to the Find feature on my electronic version of <i>On The Road</i>, "Dean" appears 825 times.<div><br /></div><div><br /><div><br /></div></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-87331125591552146812024-02-05T11:50:00.000-05:002024-02-05T11:50:20.092-05:00Happy Heavenly Birthday to William S. Burroughs<p> <span> </span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgscCMAYs0CNN9NtsCN3D8nZZqDh4XFclCy1B_3vlJabAfZns8a58UhlFxflkgDDOqeJNN7hCjrvm7XmsUL-NEUHefDXIik_u97Q7PwLscWah3dz11B116s68_quIiYznEAoHc3aoYJBPqn/s1600/ScreenHunter+1029.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="165" data-original-width="214" height="246" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgscCMAYs0CNN9NtsCN3D8nZZqDh4XFclCy1B_3vlJabAfZns8a58UhlFxflkgDDOqeJNN7hCjrvm7XmsUL-NEUHefDXIik_u97Q7PwLscWah3dz11B116s68_quIiYznEAoHc3aoYJBPqn/s320/ScreenHunter+1029.png" width="320" /></a></p><br />Core Beat Generation member, writer, and cultural icon <a href="https://friendsofkerouac.com/person/william-s-burroughs/" target="_blank">William S. Burroughs</a> was born this date -- February 5 -- in 1914. He appeared in several of Jack Kerouac's works: as Old Bull Lee in <i>On The Road</i>; Frank Carmody in <i>The Subterraneans</i>; Bull Hubbard in <i>Book of Dreams</i>, <i>Desolation Angels</i>, <i>Doctor Sax</i>, and <i>Visions of Cody</i>; Bull in <i>Tristessa</i>; Bill/William Seward Burroughs in <i>Lonesome Traveler</i>; Wilson Holmes Hubbard in <i>Vanity of Duluoz</i>; Bill Dennison in <i>The Haunted Life and Other Writings</i>; and, Will Dennison in <i>The Town and the City</i> and <i>And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks</i>.<div><br /></div><div>Here is some of what Kerouac said about Burroughs in <i>On The Road</i>:</div><div><blockquote>It would take all night to tell about Old Bull Lee; let's just say now, he was a teacher, and it may be said that he had every right to teach because he spent all his time learning; and the things he learned were what he considered to be and called "the facts of life," which he learned not only out of necessity but because he wanted to. He dragged his long, thin body around the entire United States and most of Europe and North Africa in his time, only to see what was going on; he married a White Russian countess in Yugoslavia to get her away from the Nazis in the thirties; there are pictures of him with the international cocaine set of the thirties--gangs with wild hair, leaning on one another; there are other pictures of him in a Panama hat, surveying the streets of Algiers; he never saw the White Russian countess again. He was an exterminator in Chicago, a bartender in New York, a summons-server in Newark. In Paris he sat at cafe tables, watching the sullen French faces go by. In Athens he looked up from his ouzo at what he called the ugliest people in the world. In Istanbul he threaded his way through crowds of opium addicts and rug-sellers, looking for the facts. In English hotels he read Spengler and the Marquis de Sade. In Chicago he planned to hold up a Turkish bath, hesitated just for two minutes too long for a drink, and wound up with two dollars and had to make a run for it. He did all these things merely for the experience. Now the final study was the drug habit. He was now in New Orleans, slipping along the streets with shady characters and haunting connection bars. (Penguin Books, 1976, pp. 143-144)</blockquote><br />Regular readers of <i>The Daily Beat</i> need no biographical details on Burroughs, and others can simply Google his name to reveal a trove of information on this seminal Beat Generation figure, author of classics such as <i>Naked Lunch</i> and <i>Junky</i>.<br /><br />Happy Birthday in Heaven or wherever you are, Mr. Burroughs.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-29776309319643603262024-02-04T08:05:00.001-05:002024-02-04T08:05:52.105-05:00A 7-for-1 significant date in Kerouac history<p> </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizMea4ocHnpKBZcHmZ29u_6By0NGh_FUezphThpspbi4i7YPyUtr2c1oG777CwBQPRyMCvthlQIT1T7SEoqB3EzVt8vgEVdYns6qddZkVoa-t_SRo9dTjafSVfu2H6x4jCI0zcFfYA_zOv/s1600/ScreenHunter+1028.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="287" data-original-width="398" height="287" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizMea4ocHnpKBZcHmZ29u_6By0NGh_FUezphThpspbi4i7YPyUtr2c1oG777CwBQPRyMCvthlQIT1T7SEoqB3EzVt8vgEVdYns6qddZkVoa-t_SRo9dTjafSVfu2H6x4jCI0zcFfYA_zOv/s400/ScreenHunter+1028.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption">L-to-R top row: Neal Cassady, Albert Saijo, Joan Vollmer Adams; L-to-R bottom row: Gabrielle Kerouac, Mary Frank, Allen Temko</td></tr></tbody></table> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7MrQPAkhNSj6NtVkZNtfPXQ8LeOXSc4De6H6Gi7aIGL3d1ADHfOvDoBCZoHCgG27GUQoKG-6tyOB7JugwVApDPZRje1f-wvJQzv3RS8iHsH5HqYCCwER-7Fs7O-F3kj-EkSujw-FtwiJxQTuyAvRMlTSJUOgkNt8EwSLr6veeZPyhc0z_keq3iI2_w9Xp/s253/ScreenHunter%201511.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="253" data-original-width="238" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7MrQPAkhNSj6NtVkZNtfPXQ8LeOXSc4De6H6Gi7aIGL3d1ADHfOvDoBCZoHCgG27GUQoKG-6tyOB7JugwVApDPZRje1f-wvJQzv3RS8iHsH5HqYCCwER-7Fs7O-F3kj-EkSujw-FtwiJxQTuyAvRMlTSJUOgkNt8EwSLr6veeZPyhc0z_keq3iI2_w9Xp/w188-h200/ScreenHunter%201511.png" width="188" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Louise Bogan</td></tr></tbody></table> <br />February 4 is a date on which no less than 7 people that Jack Kerouac immortalized in his works were born or died. I am not aware of another similarly synchronous and significant date (purposeful alliteration there).<br /><br />I won't rank these in any particular order of importance, and I'm not going into much detail about any of them for sake of time. When relevant, I included links to other posts I've written about the person or to biographical information of some sort.<br /><br />Today is the date in 1968 that Kerouac muse and friend <a href="https://friendsofkerouac.com/person/neal-cassady/" target="_blank">Neal Cassady</a> died. Kerouac immortalized Cassady in <i>On The Road</i> as the central character, Dean Moriarty, but also dedicated an entire book to the Holy Goof, <i>Visions of Cody</i>, in which he appeared as Cody Pomeray. Cassady also appeared as: Cody Pomeray in <i>Book of Dreams</i>, <i>Big Sur</i>, <i>Desolation Angels</i>, and <i>Book of Sketches</i>; Leroy in <i>The Subterraneans</i>; and Neal Cassady in <i>Lonesome Traveler</i>, <i>Desolation Angels</i>, and <i>Satori in Paris</i>.<br /><br />Kerouac friend and writer Albert <a href="https://thedailybeatblog.blogspot.com/2017/05/albert-saijos-backpacker-and-story.html">Saijo</a> was born this date in 1926. Albert appeared as George Baso in <i>Big Sur</i> and co-authored<i> Trip Trap: Haiku on the Road</i> with Kerouac and Lew Welch based on a road trip across America in Welch's jeep.<br /><br />Core early Beat Generation figure, <a href="https://friendsofkerouac.com/person/joan-vollmer/" target="_blank">Joan Vollmer Adams</a>, was born this date in 1923. She appeared as Jane Lee in <i>On The Road</i>; Jane in <i>The Subterraneans</i>; June Evans in <i>Book of Dreams</i>, <i>Desolation Angels</i>, and <i>Vanity of Duluoz</i>; June Hubbard in <i>Visions of Cody</i>; Joan in <i>The Haunted Life and Other Writings</i>; Mary Dennison in <i>The Town and the City</i>; and "my old lady" in <i>And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks</i>.<br /><br />Jack Kerouac's mother, <a href="https://thedailybeatblog.blogspot.com/2019/10/a-kerouac-two-fer-date.html">Gabrielle</a>, was born this date in 1895. She appeared as Angie in <i>Vanity of Duluoz</i> and <i>Desolation Angels</i>; Ma in <i>Book of Dreams</i>; Angy in <i>Maggie Cassidy</i>; Angy Duluoz in <i>Doctor Sax</i>; Ange Duluoz in <i>Visions of Gerard</i>; Marguerite Martin in <i>The Town and the City</i>; and, Sal's Aunt in <i>On The Road</i>.<br /><br />Visual artist and wife of photographer Robert Frank, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Frank" target="_blank">Mary</a>, was born this date in 1933. She appeared as Mary Frank in <i>Lonesome Traveler</i>. She is the only one of the six characters featured today who is still alive as of this posting (as far as I know), making her 91. Her picture above was grabbed from <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gR-qxHoL5Yk" target="_blank">this clip</a> of Kerouac et al. in NYC in 1959 (see her talking to Jack around the 2:10 mark).<br /><br />Architectural critic, writer, Pulitzer Prize winner, and Kerouac friend Allen <a href="https://thedailybeatblog.blogspot.com/2021/01/remembering-kerouac-friend-allantemko.html" target="_blank">Temko</a> was born this date in 1924. He appeared as: Roland Major in <i>On The Road</i>; Irving Minko in <i>Book of Dreams</i>; Irwin Minko in <i>Desolation Angels</i>; Allen Minko in <i>Visions of Cody</i>; and, Alan Minko in <i>Book of Dreams</i> (expanded edition).<div><br /></div><div>Livermore Falls, Maine native and U.S. Poet Laureate Louise Bogan died on this date in 1970. She shows up in two of Kerouac's works: as Leontine McGee in <i>The Dharma Bums</i> and as Bernice Whalen in <i>Desolation Angels</i>. Click <b><i><u><a href="https://thedailybeatblog.blogspot.com/2018/09/curation-141-from-my-kerouac-bookshelf.html" target="_blank">HERE</a></u></i></b> for a post wherein I curated her book of poetry, <i>The Blue Estuaries: Poems 1923-1968</i>.</div><div><br />RIP, Mr. Cassady and Ms. Bogan, and Happy Birthday to Mr. Saijo, Ms. Adams, Ms. Kerouac, Ms. Frank, and Mr. Temko.</div><div><br /><br /><div><br /></div></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-18563252425505025102024-02-02T09:41:00.002-05:002024-02-02T09:41:32.321-05:00Happy Heavenly Birthday to Ed White, Kerouac friend and influencer<p> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiADSgocwS0IkS2ns3pXCz3sfLAR1dd51fupYwOB0ZKlQHmNArM2bLo4kl9SMNGKSmQ3jktPTdm_FT8WGp98oe1rwSKae1idnvweb-ku-Pzjs2yWiN5jPOXOxR81ffvdEQpENAiQZudaiTv/s1600/ScreenHunter+1021.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="198" data-original-width="162" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiADSgocwS0IkS2ns3pXCz3sfLAR1dd51fupYwOB0ZKlQHmNArM2bLo4kl9SMNGKSmQ3jktPTdm_FT8WGp98oe1rwSKae1idnvweb-ku-Pzjs2yWiN5jPOXOxR81ffvdEQpENAiQZudaiTv/s320/ScreenHunter+1021.png" width="260" /></a></p><p><br />Ed White, close friend of Jack Kerouac, was born this date -- February 2 -- in 1925. He appeared in several Kerouac works: as Tim Gray in <i>On The Road</i>; Ed Gray in <i>Visions of Cody</i>; Guy Green in <i>Book of Dreams</i>; and, Al Green in <i>Book of Dreams </i>(expanded edition). Here's an excerpt about White (as Tim Gray) from <i>On The Road</i> (setting: Denver):</p><p><span id="docs-internal-guid-3719f2ec-7fff-dae3-b3fc-7b638cb2fa4d"></span></p><p></p><blockquote>The Rawlinses lived a few blocks away. This was a delightful family--a youngish mother, part owner of a decrepit, ghost-town hotel, with five sons and two daughters. The wild son was Ray Rawlins, Tim Gray's boyhood buddy. Ray came roaring in to get me and we took to each other right away. We went off and drank in the Colfax bars. One of Ray's sisters was a beautiful blonde called Babe--a tennis-playing, surf-riding doll of the West. She was Tim Gray's girl. And Major, who was only passing through Denver and doing so in real style in the apartment, was going out with Tim Gray's sister Betty. I was the only guy without a girl. I asked everybody, "Where's Dean?" They made smiling negative answers. (Penguin Books, 1976, p. 41)</blockquote><p></p><p><br />Notably, White is credited with suggesting the practice of sketching with words to Kerouac, a practice Kerouac implemented in the notebooks he always carried with him. Kerouac defined it in a 1955 letter to Neal Cassady as "writing fast without thought of words" (<i>Jack Kerouac: Selected Letters 1940-1956</i>, Penguin Books, 1995, p. 473).</p><p>In a May 18, 1952 letter to Allen Ginsberg, Jack said:<br /></p><blockquote class="tr_bq">Sketching came to me in full force on October 25th, the day of the evening Dusty and I went to Poughkeepsie with Fitzgerald--so strongly it didn't matter about Carl's offer and I began sketching everything in sight, so that <i>On The Road</i> took its turn from conventional narrative survey of road trips etc. into a big multi-dimensional conscious and subconscious character invocation of Neal in his whirlwinds. Sketching (Ed White casually mentioned it in 124th Chinese restaurant near Columbia, "Why don't you just sketch in the streets like a painter but with words") which I did . . . . (Ibid, p. 356)</blockquote><p><br />To which I say, one never knows when a passing comment will have significant influence on another person. And on literary history....<br /><br />Happy Birthday in Heaven, Mr. White.</p><p><br /></p>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-20216338909125031362024-01-28T12:05:00.000-05:002024-01-28T12:05:13.335-05:00Remembering Lucien Carr, original Beat Generation member<p> </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiETtpW5N-pdjpLW4OgyDHDw4V73UGe3BaFTvkfw4syuXwicHirLnmWTPb-evkAwV-Ic_JoxFYV9VQI5Fs4TCyHprVHM4fMyKi7uRlpFh9NBE1zFPa0M8yTcAWpSNrhr5CdXAf8xMIFhyzW/s1600/ScreenHunter+1018.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="497" data-original-width="530" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiETtpW5N-pdjpLW4OgyDHDw4V73UGe3BaFTvkfw4syuXwicHirLnmWTPb-evkAwV-Ic_JoxFYV9VQI5Fs4TCyHprVHM4fMyKi7uRlpFh9NBE1zFPa0M8yTcAWpSNrhr5CdXAf8xMIFhyzW/s320/ScreenHunter+1018.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption">Jack Kerouac (L) and Lucien Carr at Columbia University</td></tr></tbody></table><br />Regular readers of <i>The Daily Beat</i> are familiar with Lucien Carr, one of the core members of the inner circle of the New York Beat Generation in the 40s. Carr died on this date -- January 28 -- in 2005 at the age of 79. He appeared in a number of Jack Kerouac's works: Damion in <i>On The Road</i>; Sam Vedder in <i>The Subterraneans</i> and <i>Book of Dreams</i> (expanded edition); Julien in <i>Big Sur</i>; Julien Love in <i>Book of Dreams</i>, <i>Desolation Angels</i>, and <i>Visions of Cody</i>; Claude De Maubris in <i>Vanity of Duluoz</i>; Claude in <i>Orpheus Emerged</i>; Kenneth Wood in <i>The Town and the City</i>; Kenneth in <i>The Haunted Life and Other Writings</i>; and, Phillip Tourian in <i>And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks</i>.<br /><br />Infamous for his role in the David Kammerer affair (whose murder by Carr led to Kerouac's first marriage when he promised to marry Edie Parker for bail money from her parents -- more on that <b><i><u><a href="https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2019/06/27/the-queer-crime-that-launched-the-beats/" target="_blank">HERE</a></u></i></b>), Carr really needs to be recognized for his role in the original Beat Generation circle; indeed, he has been described by Allen Ginsberg as the glue that held the group together. Carr was at the center of many formative intellectual and literary conversations held among the early Beats.<br /><br />Speaking of friendships, here's a picture from September 2015 of my great friend Richard Marsh and me recreating the Kerouac-Carr picture. Note who got to play each role.<br /><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKzp5E3LrnKCPvSX1UVGsn0WBmrUY2p9r2jrTdf9PNhV8XOrTd28ToQON7o1AaZGbgA8P9dVhUKK2fXW39TW7pYL7mRqobALHtOfAyZIUpDqlcsuoPsUOzo874o3zj7HNeO0Y-I-2ZWPCz/s1600/ScreenHunter+1019.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="360" data-original-width="361" height="318" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKzp5E3LrnKCPvSX1UVGsn0WBmrUY2p9r2jrTdf9PNhV8XOrTd28ToQON7o1AaZGbgA8P9dVhUKK2fXW39TW7pYL7mRqobALHtOfAyZIUpDqlcsuoPsUOzo874o3zj7HNeO0Y-I-2ZWPCz/s320/ScreenHunter+1019.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption">Richard Marsh (L) and Rick Dale at Columbia University</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br />Here's an excerpt about Carr as Damion from On <i>The Road</i>. I would point out that Kerouac calls him the hero of Kerouac's New York gang, just as Dean (Neal Cassady) was the hero of his Western gang. It's important that Kerouac equates Carr with Cassady, thus confirming Carr's significance to the Beat Generation.<div><br /></div><blockquote>The parties were enormous; there were at least a hundred people at a basement apartment in the West Nineties. People overflowed into the cellar compartments near the furnace. Something was going on in every corner, on every bed and couch-not an orgy but just a New Year's party with frantic screaming and wild radio music. There was even a Chinese girl. Dean ran like Groucho Marx from group to group, digging everybody. Periodically we rushed out to the car to pick up more people. Damion came. Damion is the hero of my New York gang, as Dean is the chief hero of the Western. They immediately took a dislike to each other. Damion's girl suddenly socked Damion on the jaw with a roundhouse right. He stood reeling. She carried him home. (Penguin Books, 1976, p. 126)</blockquote><p> </p>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-81679242001334057292024-01-25T07:55:00.000-05:002024-01-25T07:55:34.129-05:00Remembering Kerouac friend, Allan Temko<p> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYq044Y1dB8-VNwtBDs46GYqfnJDZGe8eUZUjem0lyQoxzv-jrLLCZ_WuIUBEwYemxWOCv3NRi3wN5eePJhGtIUJsCZYJFEk9E95tHt7PNqJOYdaSZ-G2sonjquuviy8jjM2j4DKPsJ0Sk/s441/ScreenHunter+1233.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="441" data-original-width="365" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYq044Y1dB8-VNwtBDs46GYqfnJDZGe8eUZUjem0lyQoxzv-jrLLCZ_WuIUBEwYemxWOCv3NRi3wN5eePJhGtIUJsCZYJFEk9E95tHt7PNqJOYdaSZ-G2sonjquuviy8jjM2j4DKPsJ0Sk/s320/ScreenHunter+1233.png" /></a></p><p></p>Today we remember architectural critic, writer, and Pulitzer Prize winner Allan Temko, who died on this date -- January 25 -- in 2006. Temko met Jack Kerouac when they were students at Columbia, and he appeared in a number of Kerouac's works as follows: Roland Major in <i>On The Road</i>; Irving Minko in <i>Book of Dreams</i>; Irwin Minko in <i>Desolation Angels</i>; Allen Minko in <i>Visions of Cody</i>; and, Alan Minko in <i>Book of Dreams</i> (expanded edition).<br /><br />When Kerouac (Sal Paradise) anticipates meeting up with Temko (Major) in Denver, he refers to him in <i>On The Road</i> as "my old college writing buddy" and ended up living with him in Tim Gray's folks' apartment there.<br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">We each had a bedroom, and there was a kitchenette with food in the icebox, and a huge living room where Major sat in his silk dressing gown composing his latest Hemingwayan short story--a choleric, red-faced, pudgy hater of everything, who could turn on the warmest and most charming smile in the world when real life confronted him sweetly in the night. (1976, Penguin Books, p. 40)</blockquote><br />Major (Temko) features prominently in the Denver story and then Kerouac runs into him again in San Francisco at Alfred's in North Beach where Major gets kicked out for rowdiness and the two go drinking at the Iron Pot.<div><br /></div><div>For those readers who enjoy making connections, Temko's one-time girlfriend was Jean White, who was Ed White's sister. She appeared as Betty Gray in <i>On The Road</i>. Ed was the person who originally suggested the idea of sketching in words to Kerouac.</div><div><br /></div><div>Temko won a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism in 1990. Click <u><i><b><a href="https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://www.google.com/&httpsredir=1&article=1373&context=nma" target="_blank">HERE</a></b></i></u> to read a transcript of him speaking in 1964 at a luncheon in New Mexico as part of a study he was conducting for UC Berkeley on the industrialized urban environment. Some Googling will find a number of articles he wrote.<br /><br />RIP, Mr. Temko.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-17388211381923833982024-01-23T13:50:00.002-05:002024-01-23T13:50:57.010-05:00Happy Heavenly Birthday to Kerouac friend Alan Ansen<p> </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRiFT-AvJluxfd3dgKO4OjRU-PaUDGkSbhHnzPGMcScxRvwjbM74ajfHB45qEHsqzkb0mvEPbvW2zMU4j1w8KR8okSnzhBfkqAEh1yG6F840Q_JeBfFQXCbwpAljr7nDvF23ly3S9PXXfL/s1600/ScreenHunter+1016.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="236" data-original-width="226" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRiFT-AvJluxfd3dgKO4OjRU-PaUDGkSbhHnzPGMcScxRvwjbM74ajfHB45qEHsqzkb0mvEPbvW2zMU4j1w8KR8okSnzhBfkqAEh1yG6F840Q_JeBfFQXCbwpAljr7nDvF23ly3S9PXXfL/s320/ScreenHunter+1016.png" width="305" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption">Alan Ansen in 1973</td></tr></tbody></table><br />We wrote a pretty lengthy piece remembering Jack Kerouac's friend, poet and playwright Alan Ansen, on November 12, 2021 -- click <b><i><a href="https://thedailybeatblog.blogspot.com/2021/11/remembering-alan-ansen-rollo-greb-in-on.html" target="_blank">HERE</a></i></b> -- and today we are celebrating his heavenly birthday (January 23, 1922).<br /><br />Born the same year as Jack Kerouac, Ansen met Kerouac through his association with W.H. Auden. Ansen appeared in several Kerouac works: as Rollo Greb in <i>On The Road</i>; Austin Bromberg in <i>The Subterraneans</i>; Irwin Swenson in <i>Book of Dreams</i> and <i>Visions of Cody</i>; Amadeus Baroque in <i>Doctor Sax</i>; and, Allen Ansen in <i>Book of Sketches.</i><div><i><br /></i></div><div>Jack frequently wrote to or about Ansen, who appears 11 times in the index of <i>Jack Kerouac Selected Letters 1957-1969</i> and 5 times in the index of the <i>1940-1956</i> collection.<br /><br />Happy Birthday in Heaven, Mr. Ansen. We aspire to having "IT," like you obviously did (see my November 12 post above).<i> Go go go . . . .</i><div><br /></div></div><div><br /></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-58265218561915406472024-01-21T13:14:00.000-05:002024-01-21T13:14:05.195-05:00Jack Kerouac speaks at the Brandeis University Club of New York in 1958<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjh6LGvlxYyvFAU6AMi42vXAKkMDAclieqBCL-gm-bMsrUF5fUBu8_O1bExICaDeH8vpwOeSQqGpZp1rbaAnkcNHFuwk9BFbnndkXjq2wTnI8GXzG801bsFMITHE-ipmN45hNH5d5JVkz4v4VbivgvvdtYimOC_A8cC1MGcnbBl9l9cytE7nxxxp3kMf_dS/s425/ScreenHunter%201575.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="425" data-original-width="253" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjh6LGvlxYyvFAU6AMi42vXAKkMDAclieqBCL-gm-bMsrUF5fUBu8_O1bExICaDeH8vpwOeSQqGpZp1rbaAnkcNHFuwk9BFbnndkXjq2wTnI8GXzG801bsFMITHE-ipmN45hNH5d5JVkz4v4VbivgvvdtYimOC_A8cC1MGcnbBl9l9cytE7nxxxp3kMf_dS/s320/ScreenHunter%201575.png" width="190" /></a></div><p><br /></p>If you've never heard Jack Kerouac speak at the Brandeis University Club of New York in 1958, click <b><i><u><a href="https://www.wnyc.org/story/226476-beat-generation/?utm_source=sfmc&utm_medium=nypr-email&utm_campaign=Newsletter%20-%20Weekly%20Brief%20-%2020240120&utm_term=Listen%20here.%26nbsp%3B&utm_id=296487&sfmc_id=53402818&utm_content=2024120&nypr_member=Unknown&fbclid=IwAR3Xqb-D03vqSqBOcEbNdUzaoc0N775bc4ipEXSL2fTcjqZWcAtpDmbCTgw" target="_blank">HERE</a></u></i></b> to listen.<p></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-31153785377369759242024-01-21T12:57:00.002-05:002024-01-21T12:57:54.600-05:00Mill Valley Literature Review January 2024 Winter Special Edition<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3U2EQiy4a5pK-Ce01YwYmpa06sz2VpRMpm9gAtGSC9PVYQ9WUAvgMBu8tGXMKKv89TbcXju91-mBG55kiPo8He5q6N9_ebx9mXnNUcaK-z9qrrgiPEeCEof0nv4NxfuwhRxGeMwe3gNfCfA1LpakU8-NHaXQUrMJk6-5t3hbvkhejeN-eAib1ovDgXCxC/s327/ScreenHunter%201572.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="96" data-original-width="327" height="94" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3U2EQiy4a5pK-Ce01YwYmpa06sz2VpRMpm9gAtGSC9PVYQ9WUAvgMBu8tGXMKKv89TbcXju91-mBG55kiPo8He5q6N9_ebx9mXnNUcaK-z9qrrgiPEeCEof0nv4NxfuwhRxGeMwe3gNfCfA1LpakU8-NHaXQUrMJk6-5t3hbvkhejeN-eAib1ovDgXCxC/s320/ScreenHunter%201572.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Back in October 2020, I reviewed J. Macon King's rollicking novel, <i>Circus of the Sun</i> (click <a href="https://thedailybeatblog.blogspot.com/2020/10/book-review-circus-of-sun-by-jmacon-king.html" target="_blank"><b><i>HERE</i></b></a>). As mentioned in that review, the author is the publisher of the <i>Mill Valley Literary Review</i>, the new issue of which is available <b><i><u><a href="https://millvalleylit.com/" target="_blank">HERE</a></u></i></b>. </p><p>This issue features an anniversary celebration of "Beat at the Sweet" at Sweetwater Music Hall in Mill Valley, California, an event I attended and detailed in January of 2013 <b><i><u><a href="https://thedailybeatblog.blogspot.com/2013/01/san-francisco-kerouactivities-report.html" target="_blank">HERE</a></u></i></b>.</p><p>There's a lot to digest in the current issue of <i>Mill Valley Lit</i>, so check it out!</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-21666526800264799012024-01-18T11:57:00.000-05:002024-01-18T11:57:30.007-05:00Belatedly remembering Gregory Corso<p> </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-2po2JDA50BKV8i7EBuDlK03PCIIqqubFG9uizRqFeMVgJe42eTsHpRakITdZj0EvXNe95zRUa8pztoamCmZ4TC5z0ncUvgMKzgjwsCnCoBSuVyOV-xvzfo8SLJhgqeu3MfpSrl0k8_z6/s1600/ScreenHunter+1015.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="280" data-original-width="447" height="250" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-2po2JDA50BKV8i7EBuDlK03PCIIqqubFG9uizRqFeMVgJe42eTsHpRakITdZj0EvXNe95zRUa8pztoamCmZ4TC5z0ncUvgMKzgjwsCnCoBSuVyOV-xvzfo8SLJhgqeu3MfpSrl0k8_z6/s400/ScreenHunter+1015.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption">(L-R) Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, & Gregory Corso</td></tr></tbody></table><p><br />Streetwise Beat poet Gregory Corso died on yesterday's date -- January 17 -- in 2001 at the age of 70. It was a record-keeping error on my part,</p><p>An important inner circle Beat Generation figure (and youngest), Corso appeared in a number of Jack Kerouac's works: as Yuri Gligoric in <i>The Subterraneans</i>; Raphael Urso in <i>Book of Dreams</i> and <i>Desolation Angels</i> (also as Gregory in the latter); and, Manuel in <i>Beat Generation</i>.</p><p><br />Corso had a tough upbringing and experienced foster homes, orphanages, prison, and even time in Bellevue Hospital. You can read a bio and some of his poetry by clicking <b><i><u><a href="https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/gregory-corso" target="_blank">HERE</a></u></i></b>.</p><div>I never met Corso and only know him from reading about him. He strikes me as the kind of person who keeps you off balance and you never know when he is serious. The kind of person who enjoys fucking with your head. Admittedly, this is one of my least favorite personality types. Nevertheless, he was an accomplished poet and an integral member of the Beat Generation. And I may be wrong about him -- let me know if you have reason to think so.<br /><br />I glanced through my copies of Kerouac's selected letters and noticed that several times he wrote to Corso along with Allen Ginsberg and Peter Orlovsky, but there is one lengthy letter written to Corso alone when Jack was in Northport on October 13, 1956. An excerpt follows:<br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">I just read your latest letter to Allen about Zen-nutty and you're right, in fact I've not been able to "meditate" or make any buddhist scene now for a long time and have actually started writing catholic poems and sending them to Jubilee Magazine tho I'm aware that all the scenes are the same empty scene. Your criticism of buddhism in other words is fairly accurate but you mustnt let yourself be fooled every moment of your life into believing there's any special "reality" to either life or death, you say people die real deaths but in a few hundred years who's to remember or notice that it was real death? (<i>Jack Kerouac Selected Letters 1957-1969</i>, 1999, p. 178, Penguin Books)</blockquote>And <b><i><u><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1z1LkYLDCrg" target="_blank">HERE</a></u></i></b> is a clip of Corso discussing Kerouac.</div><div><br />RIP, Mr. Corso.<br /><br /></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-84249077313700978032024-01-16T10:31:00.003-05:002024-01-16T10:31:54.903-05:00Happy Heavenly Birthday to Kerouac friend, Alan Harrington<p> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvvuNT0U_zBfuv7dSyOZWIbTXPwU1eyt1vcU3qG2rFM3jMFm4edqjTLqHEeCxiJ9IPvymBQbYN84dl8UO8Wa3V6jMq6z_nxdIKEiSTfkV29p559B5G6m7x4G7OKgNCn1a8-GSU36obSR7d/s1600/ScreenHunter+1014.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="198" data-original-width="198" height="198" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvvuNT0U_zBfuv7dSyOZWIbTXPwU1eyt1vcU3qG2rFM3jMFm4edqjTLqHEeCxiJ9IPvymBQbYN84dl8UO8Wa3V6jMq6z_nxdIKEiSTfkV29p559B5G6m7x4G7OKgNCn1a8-GSU36obSR7d/w198-h198/ScreenHunter+1014.png" width="198" /></a></p>Today, January 16, is Alan Harrington's birthday (1919). He appeared in several Kerouac novels: as Hal Hingham in <i>On The Road</i>; Early Wallington in <i>Book of Dreams</i>; and, Worthington in <i>Book of Dreams</i> (expanded edition).<br /><br />Harrington introduced Jack Kerouac to John Clellon Holmes, no small matter given the deep friendship that ensued between them -- "brother souls" as my great friend Richard Marsh would point out.<br /><br />An interesting blog post with info about Harrington is available <u><i><b><a href="https://allaboutheaven.org/sources/harrington-alan/136" target="_blank">HERE</a></b></i></u>. I still haven't read any of his work, but it's on my (long) list of things to do.<br /><br />Happy Heavenly Birthday, Mr. Harrington.<div><br /></div><div><br /><br /></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3259386991508935093.post-9335347908655217292024-01-15T11:17:00.000-05:002024-01-15T11:17:03.973-05:00Happy Belated Heavenly Birthday to Beat Poet Lenore Kandel<p> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxSgAxVEdwGfjh9nUJSpda3DsAUSaK80sHOReZxbC8Jp4f85ChmQj_iwwwgGtwVK7MKcAvSWV5mRnxOqbH8hGyVxTgethGz3m7v8F_eTn5Yt9uYgYwJxf9b45iVlQ-2rfoK758msGf-XTz/s1600/ScreenHunter+1013.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="309" data-original-width="196" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxSgAxVEdwGfjh9nUJSpda3DsAUSaK80sHOReZxbC8Jp4f85ChmQj_iwwwgGtwVK7MKcAvSWV5mRnxOqbH8hGyVxTgethGz3m7v8F_eTn5Yt9uYgYwJxf9b45iVlQ-2rfoK758msGf-XTz/s320/ScreenHunter+1013.png" width="201" /></a></p><br />I got side-tracked yesterday, so today we wish Lenore Kandel a happy belated birthday in Beat poet heaven (January 14, 1932). She appeared in Jack Kerouac's <i>Big Sur</i> as Romana Swartz.<br /><br />Click <b><i><u><a href="http://michaeldennispoet.blogspot.com/2014/01/collected-poems-of-lenore-kandel-lenore.html" target="_blank">HERE</a></u></i></b> for Michael Dennis' poetry blog post about Lenore; it includes some of her poetry as well as analysis. Warning: It's not for the faint of sexual heart and it's most definitely Not Safe For Work (#NSFW).<br /><br />Happy Belated Heavenly Birthday, Ms. Kandel.<div><br /></div><div><br /></div>Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbookhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17721559977431022390noreply@blogger.com0