MPR’s Nancy Fushan interviews famed Beat poet Allen Ginsberg. They discuss the changes in attitude of beat poetry and his work.

"The role of the poet and all that is to keep changing himself."

Transcript:

(00:00:00) Allen Ginsberg a man who changed the face of American poetry in the 1950s and 60s a keystone figure in the Beat Generation of writers who Incorporated political issues and the counterculture lifestyle directly into their art there were times when it Ginsberg reading would end in the arrest of the poet on obscenity charges. There were the marches to ban the bomb first and then to stop the Vietnam War now 53 the poet who became a model for a generation of denim jeans and flannel shirt. It's appears at the lectern in tie and jacket. The once angry pitch has evolved into a quieter more reflective tone a change in Allen Ginsberg perhaps but then again from his point of view Americans may have just come around to what he and the Beats were advocating all along.
(00:00:46) I think it's a recognition of the there is a basic intuitive recognition of the genuine contributions of people like Kerouac and Burrows to American culture in terms of frankness the straightforward just like that straightforward frankness that Revealing the private World which was not like the official World advertised. In this between the cigarette ads and they lured her ads Cara wax and Susie azzam for American American land and four characters and people was more like the old American tradition of what women and Burrows as a Yankee shrewdness was a lot more sharp than the somewhat hypocritical shrewdness of Harry Truman. So Burrows have been more Frank in public than the president's and Cara is being more emotionally healthy. And the president's or the politicians or the media
(00:01:40) Ginsburg does acknowledge a change within himself a mellowing which he credits largely to the ever increasing involvement with Zen meditation over the past 15 years Ginsberg says the Awakening of his inner Consciousness has deeply affected his poetry
(00:01:55) you finally realize that one main reason for writing is to communicate and to release your own secrets. So that others so that you demystify yourselves a lot of people understand. You and you become completely transparent so they don't have to be paranoid about you. They're afraid of you because they understand you and then through understanding you if you're able to tip your med and show your secrets then maybe they understand themselves a little bit and I or under the understand that there is not so scary to have secrets in his not so scary to tip them it about their own Secrets, but there's nothing to be afraid of is that perhaps the underlying reason why
(00:02:32) Allen Ginsberg is being accepted more these days than in the
(00:02:36) past. No, probably not. I don't think so. I can't find good words to better work good words to formulate it now. To make it sound natural. So people simply understand you on the communication basis probably in probably I was too impatient before when I was
(00:02:53) younger. The breaking point of that impatience came in 1968 prompted by a particularly bitter argument with his father over his anti-war sentiments
(00:03:02) after we argued a lot and one day I heard him talking about it to a friend of his but he didn't know that I was talking wasn't he I was you know in another room and I heard him. My uncle's house and he was taking my position about the Vietnam War and saying was a bad war and I suddenly realized that the arguments I was having with my father had nothing to do with the war. It had to do with me and his ego or something or my ego or mean dominating him or him defending himself against the aggression of his son. So I realized if I wanted him really to do something about the war. I would have to give him more space be a lot more gentle explain things from the very bottom use the right tone of voice not be mad. Add because actually I was just angry at my own inability to
(00:03:44) communicate to him. That's not to say his current work pulls punches the poems about nuclear power and nuclear warfare still have an edge and for Ginsburg the 1980s are more exciting than the decades passed.
(00:03:56) I'm more interested in what I see around me and it seems clear to me what's going on what is going on? Confusion good deal of confusion. I think today when one were babbling into this machinery. Yesterday the United States broke off relations with Iran United States will throw a fit like I did with my father and you know, they got mad at the Iranians and they refuse to have a real relationship anymore. They may believe they want to make believe the Iranians aren't there. So, it seems like a battle of egos accept. Our ego is armed with giant atomic bombs. And there you go is armed with a lot of oil. Maybe they'll spray us with oil spray them with radiation and everybody will be happy with the result role of the poet in all of that. to keep changing they're all about and all those to keep changing himself
(00:04:48) poet Allen Ginsberg. This is Nancy Fusion.