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BEATGEN_ANGRYMEN

                
                                     March 18, 2004 
                    
"The Beat Generation and 
the Angry Young Men" (1958)
ed. Gene Felman and Max Gartenberg 
                    
This book is an amazing document.    
I've got the 1959 Dell Paperback                              
edition: an old yellowing                  It has a yellowed     
paperback, shorter than the ones           dot matrix reciept    
we're used to now (6 3/8 inches, vs        slipped inside it         
the standard 7).  A cheap edition          from the ISU bookstore 
cranked out in the wake of the             dated Jan 21, 1983.   
phenomenal success of "On the Road"        I don't remember this 
(1957).                                    bookstore at all, 
                                           though I hung out at 
This is an anthology of essays,            Idaho State in        
poems and novel excerpts from              Pocatello on occasion.
all sorts of interesting                 
writers, but fundamentally it's                                  
a Beatnik Exploitation book.              
                           
Each chapter leads with a        
piece of introductary hype    
that are all truly great         
examples of their genre, even     
cheesier than Bruce Sterling's
introductions in the          
"Mirrorshades" anthology.     
                              
Try and imagine Rod Sterling doing this one:

  ... he gave it also its Creed -- DIG EVERYTHING -- 
  and its Trinity: Poet, Hoodlum and Junkie -- an  
  interlocked trio fused by a continuing dialogue. 
  Kerouac's characters are not impinged upon by the 
  society around them: they have fully succeeded in 
  making their own world, with places to go to, 
  things to do.  And when they're not on the move, 
  there's always the big kick: the jazz combo whose 
  beat is beyond mind or reason, the hell-bent party 
  that promises there'll be no end, or the stick of 
  tea that will bring one back to the lap of God. 
                                                  
                                                  
One interesting peculiarity is            
that it covers two different                                         
scenes/cultures, the "Beats"                   Though, what it              
and also the British "Angry                    suggest to me is           
Young Men", suggesting that                    that they couldn't          
there's some kind of                           find enough "beat"   
connection between the two.                    material to do a  
                                               book.             
                                                                        
                                                                   
  There's a blurb on the back 
  cover:  
                                        
     Defying society... convention... 
     the world -- the BEATNIKS and the            Note: Herb Caen 
     ANGRIES speak their minds.                   coined "Beatnik"       
                                                  in '58, here in 
  The "angries"?                                  '59 it's cover 
  Well, okay.                                     blurb material.
                                                                 
                    Some examples: 
                    Kingsly Amis,  
                    Colin Wilson,  
                    John Osborne...
                       

   "The Angry Young Men" is one of  
   those literary movements that no 
   one seems to think every really 
   existed... but maybe that's always 
   the case with these things.     
            
            Success for a movement can 
            be defined as that point when 
            everyone must deny that they 
            are members. 


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