Howl by Allen Ginsberg
"Howl" is a seminal poem by Allen Ginsberg, recognized as one of the defining works of the Beat Generation and American literature. The poem is divided into three sections, each addressing the struggles of marginalized individuals who resist the societal norms of 1950s America. In the first part, Ginsberg mourns the "best minds" of his generation, depicting their suffering and madness as a response to the rigid expectations of social, religious, and sexual conformity. The second section introduces Moloch, a symbol of the destructive forces of capitalism and the military-industrial complex, illustrating how these systems impact individual lives. The third section takes the form of a call-and-response directed at Carl Solomon, a fellow psychiatric patient, representing a broader countercultural rebellion against societal constraints. Ginsberg's candid exploration of gay and bisexual identities within the poem challenges prevailing stereotypes and celebrates sexual expression as integral to human experience. The explicit content of "Howl" led to a notable obscenity trial, ultimately resulting in a landmark ruling that underscored the importance of freedom of expression. Overall, "Howl" serves as a powerful critique of societal norms and an affirmation of diverse identities, making it a pivotal work in the exploration of individual freedom and artistic expression.
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Subject Terms
Howl by Allen Ginsberg
First published: 1956, in Howl and Other Poems
The Work
The protagonists of Howl, Allen Ginsberg’s best-known book, are marginalized because of their rejection of, or failure to measure up to, the social, religious, and sexual values of American capitalism. The poem “Howl,” central to the book, is divided into three sections. Part 1 eulogizes “the best minds of my generation,” whose individual battles with social, religious, and sexual uniformity leave them “destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked.” Ginsberg said that his use of the long line in Howl, inspired by Walt Whitman, is an attempt to “free speech for emotional expression.” The poem is structured to give voice to those otherwise silenced by the dominant culture, to produce from their silence a “cry that shivers the cities down to the last radio.”
Part 2 focuses on Moloch, the god for whom parents burned their children in sacrifice. Moloch symbolizes the physical and psychological effects of American capitalism. From America’s “mind” of “pure machinery” emerges Moloch’s military-industrial complex, whose bomb threatens to destroy the world.
Part 3 is structured as a call-and-response litany, specifically directed to Carl Solomon, whom Ginsberg met in 1949 when both were committed to the Columbia Presbyterian Psychiatric Institute. Solomon, to whom the poem is dedicated, represents the postwar counterculture, all of those whose “madness basically is rebellion against Moloch.” The addendum to the poem, “Footnote to Howl,” celebrates the holy cleansing that follows the apocalyptic confrontation dramatized in the poem.
Ginsberg termed crucial those elements of the poem that specifically describe the gay and bisexual practices of his protagonists as “saintly” and “ecstatic.” Drawing from Ginsberg’s experiences as a gay man in the sexually conformist 1940’s and 1950’s, the poem affirms gay eroticism as a natural form of sexual expression, replacing, as he said, “vulgar stereotype with a statement of act.” The sexual explicitness of the poem prompted the San Francisco police to seize Howl and to charge Ginsberg’s publisher, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, with obscenity. The judge in the case found the book to be “not obscene” because of its “redeeming social importance.” The Howl case remains a landmark victory for freedom of expression in the twentieth century.
Bibliography
Ginsberg, Allen. Howl: Original Draft Facsimile, Transcript & Variant Version, Fully Annotated by Author, with Contemporaneous Correspondence, Account of First Public Reading, Legal Skirmishes, Precursor Texts & Bibliography. Edited by Barry Miles. New York: Harper & Row, 1986. An impressive study of the annotations, allusions, inspirations, revisions, and original typescripts of the poem. The book also presents contemporaneous correspondence from a range of poets and critics who were involved with the poem.
Hyde, Lewis, ed. On the Poetry of Allen Ginsberg. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1984. An excellent collection of essays, reviews, and biographical materials. Gregory Stephenson’s explication of “Howl” is especially comprehensive and helpful. The discussion of “Howl” in the 1950’s and James Breslin’s essay on the poem’s genesis provide interesting information on the circumstances leading up to the original publication.
Merrill, Thomas F. Allen Ginsberg. Boston: Twayne, 1969. Provides a good overview of the publication history, structure, and theme of “Howl.” Also includes a useful chronology.
Miles, Barry. Ginsberg: A Biography. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1989.
Ostriker, Alicia. “Blake, Ginsberg, Madness, and the Prophet as Shaman.” In William Blake and the Moderns, edited by Robert J. Bertholf and Annette S. Levitt. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1982. Explains how Ginsberg’s reading of Blake inspired a series of religious visions that led him to believe that the poet is a prophet of madness who must “illuminate mankind.”
Portuges, Paul. The Visionary Poetics of Allen Ginsberg. Santa Barbara, Calif.: Ross-Erickson, 1978. Portuges writes about Ginsberg’s quest for a transcendent, mystical vision. He describes the poet’s fascination with the poetry of William Blake and his interest in jazz, drugs, mantras, and Tibetan Buddhism.
Raskin, Jonah. American Scream: Allen Ginsberg’s “Howl” and the Making of the Beat Generation. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004. An intensive scholarly study of the historical and cultural context of the poem and its author.
Schumacher, Michael. Dharma Lion: A Critical Biography of Allen Ginsberg. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1992.
Shinder, Jason. The Poem that Changed America: “Howl ” Fifty Years Later. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006. Twenty-six essays produced by noted authors recounting personal reactions to Ginsberg’s poem and the way it impacted society.