The Beats: A Literary History Extends Beat Era Into an Ambiguous Present

Critical studies about the Beats "have reached critical mass," writes Regina Weinrich at the Brooklyn Rail. "Happily, Steven Belletto's overview, The Beats: A Literary History, has much to offer." The new book, published by Cambridge University Press in August, "makes a good case for why Beat writing remains relevant, vital. Yet, while becoming a rogue’s gallery to illuminate 'Beat,' The Beats begs the question: OMG, who isn’t Beat?" Further in:

…The assumption here is that everyone wanted to be beat. In actual fact, Kerouac and Burroughs were ambivalent, thinking the label diminished their careers.

And so did Joyce Johnson. While setting her up, citing an early dumb critique that she never calls attention to the beat milieu even as she describes it, Belletto shifts focus to her art. His analysis of Joyce Johnson’s 1962 novel, Come and Join the Dance, in tandem with her 1983 memoir Minor Characters regards her writerly strategies, as he did for the men: what are the challenges of representation, of making art of one’s own life and experience.

As the list of women artists grows, Belletto defends his choices, asking the reader to view the book as part of “a matrix of avant-garde writing in the ’60s,” not necessarily limited to the Beats. He goes beyond discussing the work of Bonnie Bremser, Diane DiPrima, Joyce Johnson, Hettie Jones, Elise Cowan and the most recent it-poet, Ruth Weiss, with a few new additions: Barbara Moraff, Carolyn Bergé, Kay Johnson, for various reasons. Was sleeping with say Kerouac Beat by association? Are they women writers? Beat writers? Artists at all? Original voices? Belletto makes compelling cases for each one, and maybe the point is, you be the judge.

Belletto extends the Beat period way beyond its artistic origins, beyond his designated Beatnik period, politics, Vietnam, Bob Dylan, into an ambiguous present where they still enjoy cult status vs. the many undergraduates who have never even heard of them.…

Read more about The Beats: A Literary History at the Rail.