This ruling allowed for the publication of HOWL and exonerated the poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti, who faced jail time and a fine 50 years ago for publishing ‘HOWL.’ - Īllen Ginsberg was born June 3, 1926, the son of Naomi Ginsberg, Russian emigre, and Louis Ginsberg, lyric poet and schoolteacher, in Paterson, New Jersey. New York Timesįifty years ago, on October 3, Judge Clayton Horn ruled that Allen Ginsberg’s great epic Beat-era poem HOWL was not obscene but instead, a work of literary and social merit. Ginsberg reigned as the raucous poet of American hippiedom and as a literary pioneer whose freewheeling masterwork Howl prevailed against government censorship in a landmark obscenity trial 50 years ago. William Carlos WilliamsĪt the height of his bardic powers, Allen Ginsberg could terrify the authorities with the mere utterance of the syllable om as he led street throngs of citizens protesting the Vietnam War. It is the poet, Allen Ginsberg, who has gone, in his own body, through the horrifying experiences described from life in these pages.
Howl was Allen’s metamorphosis from quiet, brilliant, burning bohemian scholar trapped by his flames and repressions to epic vocal bard. Howl & Other Poems is the single most influential poetic work of the post-World War II era, with over 1,000,000 copies now in print. customs and the San Francisco police, it was the subject of a long court trail at which a series of poets and professors persuaded the court that the book was not obscene. Allen Ginsberg’s Howl and Other Poems was originally published by City Lights Books in the Fall of 1956.
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