Beginning With Allen Ginsberg

1977

1.  

I began writing poetry before I heard of Allen Ginsberg but Ginsberg is the first poet whose work influenced me as a poet. He was an important influence for me as he was for many other young poets. 

2.  

Beginning with Allen Ginsberg's poems. Beginning with "Howl", "Kaddish", "Siesta in Xbalba", "Who Be Kind To", and others.

3.

Beginning with a statement by Ginsberg that I read in a newspaper in November 1967 that expressed what I wanted to do in my writing; Ginsberg's advice was to "Scribble down your nakedness. Be prepared to stand naked because most often it is this nakedness of the soul that the reader finds most interesting." Ginsberg's advice is to write the poems of your soul, to do this be fearless, be visionary.

4.

We forget that Ginsberg is both a poet of social change and a confessional poet. He is a poet who teaches through his writing and he is a poet who always entertains. He is one of the important poets of the second half of the Twentieth Century. People listened to what he said because he was a poet; how many poets can this be said about today?  Go back and read his Playboy interview.

5.

Allen Ginsberg was influenced by Walt Whitman and by William Blake; I don't know if Ginsberg is an influence on younger poets today, but he was from the 1950s to the 1990s. Ginsberg's lineage as a poet is Whitman and Blake. I learned from Ginsberg that poets have a lineage, it is made up of the poets who influence us as poets, our poet ancestors.

6.

The poets you begin with are not necessarily the same poets you end with, but who you begin with is still important at the end. For this reason Allen Ginsberg will always be a part of my journey as a poet, he will always be important to me. The important poets speak to our soul even when it is many years since we first read them.

7.

I think of Ginsberg as a poet of my youth, but he is not someone whose work interests me much now. Another writer of my youth is Jack Kerouac and I remember talking about Kerouac with bpNichol in the late 1970s; bp felt that Kerouac was a novelist of his youth but no longer of great interest to him. Ginsberg is a poet of my youth, not of my adulthood, but his influence has lasted a lifetime.

8.

One of the amazing things about Ginsberg's body of work is how extensive it is. His Collected Poems 1947-1997 (2003) is over a thousand pages long. Ginsberg's Deliberate Prose: Selected Essays 1952-1995 (2001) is a compilation of his essays, public addresses, and personal reflections on various subjects. I find everything that Ginsberg writes is interesting because it is Ginsberg who is writing it. His Indian Journals (1974), that I read when it was published, is also essential reading for fans of Ginsberg's writing.

9.

I met Ginsberg at a reception after his 1969 Montreal reading at Sir George Williams University. He was surrounded by his followers. There was nothing shy about Ginsberg.

10.

Ginsberg was the first important poet many of us read and came into contact with on our journey as poets; he introduced us to new ideas, new and exciting writers, and the example of a life committed to poetry. Ginsberg wrote, "widen the area of consciousness" which I always took as "be a conscious person" and not about using psychedelic drugs which was his intention; either way it remains that the message is only by being conscious can we fulfill our destiny as human beings.  

                                                            Stephen Morrissey

                                                            22 August 2018