The landmark original publication of Allen Ginsberg's HOWL & Other Poems! HOWL & Other Poems
the prophetic book that launched the Beat Generation was published by Lawrence Ferlinghetti at
City Lights Books in 1956. Considered the single most influential work of post-WWII United
States poetry the City Lights edition of HOWL has remained in print for more than 60 years
with well over 1 000 000 copies in print. A strident critique of middle-class complacency
consumerism and capitalist militarism HOWL also celebrates the pleasures and freedoms of the
physical world including a tribute to homosexual love. In addition to Howl poems in the book
include: A Supermarket in California Sunflower Sutra America In the Baggage Room at
Greyhound Transcription of Organ Music and Wild Orphan among others. A History of HOWL: City
Lights founder Lawrence Ferlinghetti first heard Allen Ginsberg read Howl at the Six Gallery
event in San Francisco 1955 which featured writers Philip Lamantia Gary Snyder Philip
Whalen and Michael McClure introduced by poet Kenneth Rexroth. Jack Kerouac was present but
did not read encouraging and cheering the other poets on. Ferlinghetti was so impressed by
Ginsberg's performance he immediately telegrammed him referencing Ralph Waldo Emerson's
response to Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass I greet you at the beginning of a great career.
When do I get the manuscript? When the first edition of HOWL arrived from its British printers
it was seized almost immediately by U.S. Customs and shortly thereafter the San Francisco
police arrested its publisher and editor Lawrence Ferlinghetti together with the City Lights
Bookstore manager Shigeyoshi Murao. The two were charged with disseminating obscene literature
and the case was sent to trial. Ferlinghetti partnered with the ACLU to launch a defense of
HOWL and a parade of distinguished literary and academic witnesses appeared in court to
persuade the judge of its merits. In the end famously conservative Judge Clayton Horn ruled
that the poem was not obscene but rather as he stated emphatically HOWL was a work of
redeeming social significance. The landmark decision signaled a sea change in American culture
and the City Lights edition of HOWL became a vital cornerstone in the ongoing struggle for free
expression and representation. It continues to attract generation after generation of readers.
It is the poet Allen Ginsberg who has gone in his own body through the horrifying
experiences described from life in these pages.-William Carlos Williams Ginsberg is both tragic
and dynamic a lyrical genius . . . probably the single greatest influence on American poetical
voice since Whitman.-Bob Dylan Not only did he give us love and poetry he reminded us of our
civic duty to use our voice.-Patti Smith Howl was Allen's metamorphosis from quiet brilliant
burning bohemian scholar trapped by his flames and repressions to epic vocal bard.-Michael
McClure
